Carlos Simon is a native of Atlanta, Georgia whose music ranges from concert music for large and small ensembles to film scores with influences of jazz, gospel, and neo- romanticism.
Simon’s latest album, MY ANCESTOR’S GIFT, was released on the Navona Records label in April 2018. Described as an “overall driving force” (Review Graveyard) and featured on Apple Music’s “Albums to Watch”, MY ANCESTOR’S GIFT incorporates spoken word and historic recordings to craft a multifaceted program of musical works that are inspired as much by the past as they are the present.
As a part of the Sundance Institute, Simon was named as a Sundance Composer Fellow in 2018, which was held at the historic Skywalker Ranch. His string quartet, Elegy, honoring the lives of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown and Eric Garner was recently performed at the Kennedy Center for the Mason Bates JFK Jukebox Series. With support from the US Embassy in Tokyo and US/Japan Foundation, Simon traveled with the Asia/America New Music Institute (AANMI) on a two-week tour of Japan in 2018 performing concerts in some of the most sacred temples and concert spaces in Japan including Suntory Hall in Tokyo, Japan. Other recent accolades include being a Composer Fellow at the Cabrillo Festival for

 Contemporary Music, winning the Underwood Emerging Composer Commission from the American Composers Orchestra in 2016, the prestigious Marvin Hamlisch Film Scoring Award in 2015, and the Presser Award from the Theodore Presser Foundation in 2015.
Recent commissions have come from Morehouse College celebrating its 150th founding anniversary, the University of Michigan Symphony band celebrating the university’s 200th anniversary, Albany Symphony’s Dogs of Desire (American Music Festival) as well as serving as the young composer-in-residence with the the Detroit Chamber String and Winds in 2016. Simon’s music has been performed by Tony Arnold, the Third Angle New Music Ensemble, Hub New Music Ensemble, the Asian/ American New Music Institute, the University of Michigan Symphony Band, American Composers Orchestra, Flint Symphony, the Color of Music Festival, Dogs of Desire, University of North Texas Symphony Band, University of Miami Symphony Band, Georgia State University Wind Ensemble and many other professional performance organizations. His piece, Let America Be America Again (text by Langston Hughes) is scheduled to be featured in an upcoming PBS documentary chronicling the inaugural Gabriela Lena Frank Academy of Music. He now serves as a member of the music faculty at Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia.

 Acting as music director and keyboardist for GRAMMY Award winner Jennifer Holliday, Simon has performed with the Boston Pops Symphony, Jackson Symphony, and St. Louis Symphony. He has toured internationally with soul GRAMMY-nominated artist, Angie Stone, and performed throughout Europe, Africa, and Asia.
Simon earned his doctorate degree at the University of Michigan, where he studied with Michael Daugherty and Evan Chambers. He has also received degrees from Georgia State University and Morehouse College. Additionally, he studied in Baden, Austria at the Hollywood Music Workshop with Conrad Pope and at New York University’s Film Scoring Summer Workshop.
Carlos Simon, Jr. is a member of many music organizations including ASCAP, where he was honored as one of the "Composers to Watch" in 2015. He is also an honorary member of Phi Mu Alpha Music Sinfonia Fraternity and a member of the National Association of Negro Musicians, Society of Composers International, and Pi Kappa Lambda Music Honor Society. His compositions have been published by the Gregorian Institute of America (GIA) Publications and Hal Leonard Publications.

Let me hear great music, and let me make great music!
E-mail: Jazzyladycat@gmail.com

Dj Private Ryan is one the Caribbeans most versatile and travelled djs. He also is the creator of the worldwide Soca dj festival called Soca Brainwash. His musical diversity has transcended into the world of production where he has created hits for Caribbean artistes such as KES, Freetown Collective, Teddyson John, Erphaan Alves, Sekon Sta and more.

Big sounds, buttery strings, deep, provacative and inspiring lyrical composition.

About the EP "Grief in Three" 

This album is about the beauty, the pull and the dissonance of grief.  And love.  Each of these songs were written at a distinct juncture in the process of grieving the death of a loved one.  And love.  And the power of music to heal and transform as well as wound and bite.  

A word about the source of this work and the origin of Soar. 
On March 16, 2016, Pedro "Shambho" Perez-Cabezas chose to end his life and living. That night, Ash ended her shift at the deli at 10:00PM, Ash spoke to his childhood best friend, Michael. He didn't say what had happened but shared that he was dead and that his father had been the one to find him. That night, she walked home from Williamsburg to Crown Heights, Brooklyn at a snails pace, landed in her bed and slept through the night like an immoveable stone. The next night, she dreamed. She dreamed of a family of folk musicians. In the dream, she began singing the chorus to "Soar," and each time the song became sad or defeated the folk-man, sitting on her right smacked her on the arm. "No," he said, "that's not what this is for." She continued to sing, as she reached the chorus again, the family of folk-musicians and their warm living room disappeared and she was singing out into the horizon, standing at the shoreline, as a seagull flew from her and disappeared into that horizon. She thought, "Maybe that's him," and "Goodbye." That morning, she woke up with the chorus of the song in her mind and, over time, pulled the rest of this song out of that semi-wakeful state. 

Ash says, "everytime I play this song, I have chills all over my body. I have played in live events where the moment I started to play this song, children ran up to the platform with money, stuffing it into plastic cups they found on the ground. The song sits in the break in my voice and it is nearly impossible for me to sing it well or anywhere near as strongly as I do the other songs on this EP. It's good not to be strong sometimes." 

There is a moment in the recording of this song when, after a long and sustained build, everyone cuts out but the keys and bass. "This moves me, especially," she says. "Douglas P. Murphy (our bassist and the EP's co-producer) and I met in 2017. He asked me if I was related to Jack Straw from Witchitaw and a mutual love, respect and profound appreciation began. Initially, it looked like I would work with Doug on his material.  And then, after dropping in on one of our Dark Blue rehearsals, Doug shared that his father had committed suicide that summer. 

This album is not about grieving the loss of someone whose committed suicide, explicitly. And, even though it's not explicitly about that, there are moments where the unique questioning and pain associated with that experience peeks out of the music. This music is for all of us; it's for you and it's for me. It's an experience. And we hope you are moved by it.

Welcome to the Thulamusic Soundcloud page, thanks for visiting!  

Nokuthula Endo Ngwenyama (No-goo-TOO-lah En-gwen-YAH-mah) is the first composer in residence with the Phoenix Chamber Music Society.  She is also an international concert artist, director and producer.  She produces 'Composer's Choice' with Phoenix Chamber Music Society and Peace Mama Productions (PMP).  

Winning the Primrose International Viola Competition at age 16 and the Young Concert Artists’ International Auditions six months later launched ‘Thula’s performing career.  A recipient of the Avery Fisher Career Grant, she performs as an orchestral soloist, recitalist and chamber musician throughout the world.  

Her music has been performed by the Detroit, St Louis, Chicago, San Francisco, and Toronto Symphonies, the Orquesta Nacional de España, Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Scottish Chamber Orchestra and London Symphony Orchestra, amongst others.  

The album ‘Sonoran Storm’ - featuring works by Nokuthula Ngwenyama, Byron Adams, Rebecca Clarke, and Franz Liszt with pianist Eckart Sellheim - is available to listen to below.  

New additions include PMP pre-releases of 'A Bishop's Processional' for solo violin and string orchestra and 'It's You' for soprano and orchestra featuring Alison Buchanan and the Janacek Philharmonic with Anthony Armore conducting.

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