Soul Inscribed & the Spinning Wheel by Baba Israel / Twists & a Bridge by Jennifer Cendaña Armas

Hip Hop and theater artist Baba Israel, multi-instrumentalist Yako 440, vocalist Duv, and saxophonist Sean Nowell are Soul Inscribed, a mix of Hip Hop, Dub, Funk, and Soul. The group will share excerpts from the BRIC Fireworks 2016 production and exhibition The Spinning Wheel. The Spinning Wheel is an international collaboration between Baba, Yako, and UK based director Leo Kay of Unfinished Business. The Spinning Wheel explores the life of Baba Israel’s late father, Steve Ben Israel. It combines storytelling, spoken word, and remixing in a ‘conversation’ between father and son. Steve Ben Israel was a jazz musician, poet, stand-up comic, activist and core member of the legendary ‘Living Theatre’. He passed away in 2012, leaving behind a legacy of 1960’s counterculture and an archive spanning over 50 years. Drawing on this rich material for inspiration, The Spinning Wheel remixes past and present to explore vulnerability and political integrity.

Jennifer Cendaña Armas is an interdisciplinary artista dedicated to unifying communities and telling stories of diasporas. This commitment is rooted in growing up in immigrant barrios of Queens, being first generation Filipino-American, and representing the racial lineages of Filipino culture, leading to performances in the Americas, Asia, Africa, and Europe. Theatre: skinimin12 at Downtown Urban Theatre Festival and New York City Hip Hop Theater Festival; Culture Project’s Women Center Stage Festival; Mango Tribe’s Sisters in the Smoke; Queens Theatre in the Park’s Black Theatre Festival. Poetry/Singing: Binational Center of Cusco; London JazzFest at Ronnie Scott’s Upstairs; Lincoln Center’s La Casita; City & Dope (Barcelona); Joe’s Pub’s Urban Griots; Urban Erotika; Over The Edge (Galway), Spoken (Black Family Channel). Publications: Tayo; NYU Review for Law and Social Change; We Got Issues! A Young Woman’s Guide To Leading An Empowered Life. She also facilitates arts-social justice workshops and Red Tents globally.