Composer Anthony Branker & Imagine present the World Premiere of his nine-movement suite WHAT DO YOU SEE WHEN YOU LOOK AT ME? made possible with support from the Chamber Music America New Jazz Works program funded through the Doris Duke Foundation
Featuring Ralph Bowen (tenor sax), Alex Norris (trumpet), Michael Price (alto sax), Pete McCann (guitar), Jim Ridl (piano), Kenny Davis (double bass), Donald Edwards (drums), Alison Crockett (spoken word & vocals), and Aubrey Johnson (vocals)
Friday, January 29, 2027 at The Cutting Room (44 East 32nd St., NYC) at 7:00 pm
Tickets: $25.00 ($30.00 on the Day of Show)
Anthony Branker’s music is a stylistic blending grounded in Afrocentric sensibilities, funk, fusion, post-bop influences, freer approaches to music making, and spoken word. "What Do You See When You Look at Me?" explores how people perceive others, questions of who we are and how we view ourselves, stereotypes and discrimination based on race and ones’ perception of otherness, as well as significant historical events connected to equality and fair treatment. The work was inspired by the ideas related to perception and sense of self that Langston Hughes and W.E.B. Du Bois wrote about in The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain (1926) and The Souls of Black Folk (1903), respectively. Ideas that are not only part of the African American experience, but also that of all citizens of color and other marginalized groups that must navigate their dual cultural or social identities within America.
Dr. Anthony Branker is a celebrated composer, bandleader, and educator whose work seamlessly merges a variety of musical landscapes with structural narratives of social justice and human experience. Branker has been named a "Rising Star Composer" across multiple years in DownBeat magazine’s International Critics Poll and was the recipient of the 2025 Individual Artist Fellowship in Music Composition from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts. In addition, he was awarded the prestigious Chamber Music America New Jazz Works Grant supported by the Doris Duke Foundation in 2024. Dr. Branker has served on the faculty at Princeton University, Rutgers University Mason Gross School of the Arts, Hunter College-CUNY, Manhattan School of Music, Ursinus College, and the Estonian Academy of Music & Theatre as a U.S. Fulbright Scholar.
Imagine is a contemporary jazz ensemble established in 2016 that showcases Branker’s unique approach to compositional music-making. The collective attracts some of New York’s finest musicians to perform Branker's socially engaged, story-driven compositions, who themselves have worked with The Mingus Big Band, Dave Liebman, Orrin Evans, Ralph Peterson Jr., Andy & Jerry Gonzalez, Maria Schneider, Freddie Hubbard, Cassandra Wilson, Miguel Zenon, Joe Locke, Pat Martino, Brian Blade, Kenny Wheeler, O.T.B., Kevin Eubanks, Wynton & Branford Marsalis, Dave Holland, Dave Douglas, Alex Sipiagin, Greg Osby, and Us3. Anthony Branker & Imagine has released three critically-acclaimed albums through Origin Records that include Beauty Within (2016), What Place Can Be For Us? (2023), and Songs My Mom Liked (2024).
VENUE DETAILS
The Cutting Room is New York's legendary dinner theater and event space. All shows have a $25 food and/or beverage minimum per person (unless otherwise indicated on your ticket.) Please note the ticket price goes mostly to the performers and production staff. The club sells food and beverages to continue to bring live music to NYC. (https://thecuttingroomnyc.com/eat-and-drink/)
We do not take reservations and seating is first come, first seated.
Thank you for your understanding.
