“The Ballad for Trayvon Martin” Opens Tonight at Princeton University

trayvon-martin-finger

Princeton University Orchestra, conducted by Michael Pratt, and the University Concert Jazz Ensemble will play the “Ballad for Trayvon Martin” tonight and Friday. The tribute will play at the Richardson Auditorium.
The Daliy Caller reported:

The director of the jazz studies program at Princeton University has written a ballad for Trayvon Martin.

If you happen to be in the area, you can catch the world premiere of “Ballad for Trayvon Martin for Orchestra and Jazz Quartet” Thursday and Friday night at Richardson Auditorium on the Ivy League campus.

Tickets are just $15 (and $5 for students), reports The Star-Ledger.

The composer, Anthony D.J. Branker, said he was moved “to the core” by the death of Martin in February 2012.

Martin, a 17-year-old black teenager, was shot by George Zimmerman, a 28-year-old mixed-race Hispanic, in Sanford, Fla.

Branker, who founded Princeton’s jazz program 25 years ago, said the incident reminded him of an incident in his own life that occurred right after he graduated from the elite school.

“I was stopped by police at gunpoint because it was believed I broke into someone’s home,” he told The Star-Ledger. “I fit a profile. Police surrounded my car.”

Branker said the piece isn’t an angry musical screed. Noting that it incorporates a fugue and Brazilian style, he describes the jazz number as “a form of healing and something that could be seen as a composition of hope.”

If you miss the play you can buy the music on Amazon.

Photo of author
Jim Hoft is the founder and editor of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016. In 2023, The Gateway Pundit received the Most Trusted Print Media Award at the American Liberty Awards.

You can email Jim Hoft here, and read more of Jim Hoft's articles here.

 

Thanks for sharing!