On March 25, Marc Bathumi Joseph was fired from the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., where he led the social impact division focused on diversifying programming and community outreach. In President Donald J. Trump’s war against “wokeness,” Joseph and much of his team were the latest casualty.
Just three days later, the spoken word artist stepped behind a microphone at the Paramount Theatre in Oakland, Calif., to perform the West Coast premiere of his work “Forgiveness,” originally commissioned by the Capital Region’s Albany Symphony. The piece pulls from real-world events — the murder of George Floyd, the storming of the U.S. Capitol — to contemplate if democracy can survive without forgiveness.
Joseph created the spoken-word orchestral suite with the Albany community and composer Daniel Bernard Roumain as part of Albany Symphony’s 2021-2023 “Convergence” series. Following a trio of performances — two in the Capital Region, one in California — Albany Symphony recently released a recording of “Forgiveness,” finally making a work that dares to defy the current administration’s anti-woke agenda available to the public.
‘What happens if we forgive the wrong people? ’
If you listen…