WildSeed Music NYC is proud to present its first ever double mixed cd, High Holy Days: The History and Future of House Music.
Episode 1 “The Children of Baldwin,” explores several periods of classic house where both familiar Chicago hits and underground New York City gay club sleepers tell the stories of their sound. Baldwin tells us that: “The responsibility of a writer is to excavate the experience of the people who produced him/her,” and I believe the same can be said for the Disc Jockey. Through this mix I hope to bring voice to the untold stories and visibility to the nameless people that generated a global musical movement.
Episode 2, “Mighty Real: The Sound of Tomorrow” pulls on current producers who incorporate elements of classic house, but also push beyond the borders of acceptable dance-floor grooves. Sylvester helped shape a soulful, yet formulaic genre of house music that focuses on spiritual-sexually-inspired falsetto vocals and driving, repetitive disco rhythms. This mix is dedicated to his artistry, fearlessness and commitment to authenticity.
Liner notes for High Holy Days feature two of my favorite scholars and house heads:
Thokazani Mhblambi: “Music’s fluidity, its ability to exist in-context and in many other contexts simultaneously, can provide a stimulus towards the direction of freedom. But for house music to do this, it needs to be rescued from the context of excess and accumulation and loaded with transformative content of liberation. It needs to be freed from the ghettoes of global cultures of consumerism, which seek to marginalize the contributions of the church, gospel music, African spirituals, gay-club culture all of which have been foundational to its origins.”
Tim’m West:
Jimmy B-boy blues
wide-eyed and full like his laugh
surrender to joy
We close our eyes
inheriting the praise dance
of sinner sermons
Sweet serenity
baby powder voudou dust
Eden where we dance
