Saul Williams meets Carlos Niño & Friends at TreePeople (Photo by Adam Corey Thomas)
”Land Back!” The first words intoned by Saul Williams as he stepped onstage with Carlos Niño & Friends at TreePeople last December, underneath our native oak and endangered black walnut trees. For the next hour, along with Nate Mercereau, Aaron Shaw, Andres Renteria, Maia, Francesca Heart, Aja Monet, and Kamasi Washington, Saul and Carlos held ceremony for speaking truth to power and holding reverence in our strength as people… as friends.
In the weeks immediately following, our city burnt as our politicians abandoned us in affirmation that we are all we have. In the months following, we’ve continuedto shout FUCK I.C.E. & FREE PALESTINE in the faces of authority on a daily basis as the National Guard is called to our streets and while wars escalate on our screens. The invocations from this night have persisted to resonate, to inspire, and whether it’s Saul reminding us to “use your instrument as metaphor” or Aja threading a dialogue between collective liberation, climate catastrophe, and disaster capitalism, we’ve come back to our memories of this night often in conversation.
Now, this performance is a record, released with our chosen family of International Anthem. To mark the moment, we’ve returned to the mountains of TreePeople for two performances, and are closing out this three part gathering together within one of LA’s great homes for music, community, and social organizing through art - The World Stage.
It’s an honor for us to share this here together.
100 capacity, $20, no presale tickets.
Arrive early & we’ll see you in Leimert Park.
Saul Williams came to worldwide attention as a writer and performer with his debut film, SLAM (dir. Marc Levin) winning Sundance's Grand Jury Prize and Cannes Camera D'Or in 1998, introducing the world to the phenomenon of slam poetry competitions and Saul as a global ambassador of modern poetry.
As a musician, Saul's albums have featured genre-bending collaborations with producers, such as Rick Rubin and Trent Reznor, that helped usher in Brooklyn's Afro-Punk movement. Saul has also collaborated with “Contemporary Music” composers, writing the libretto for Ted Hearne's LA Philharmonic produced oratorio “PLACE” and two symphonies by the late Swiss composer, Thomas Kessler, based on two books of Saul's poetry, “,said the shotgun to the head.” and “The Dead Emcee Scrolls. Overall, Saul has released six studio albums and five books of poetry, translated into multiple languages.
In 2022, Saul wrote, composed the soundtrack/score, and co-directed the science-fiction musical Neptune Frost, alongside his co-director and creative partner, Anisia Uzeyman. Neptune Frost made its world debut as part of Cannes Film Festival's “Director's Fortnight” and was selected by NYT's film critic A.O. Scott as the #2 film of the year.
As an actor Saul has worked in theater, film and television. He was a series regular on the sitcom “Girlfriends.” He is the first African-American to win Best Actor in Africa's largest film festival FESPACO for his work in the Senegalese film TEY (“Aujourd'hui”) directed by Alain Gomis and his 2020 performance in “Akilla’s Escape” earned him a Canadian Screen Award nomination for Best Actor.
He was the lead in Broadway's first Hip Hop musical, “Holler If You Hear Me”, based on the lyrics of Tupac Shakur and directed by Kenny Leon. Saul also starred in the two final campaigns of Virgil Abloh for Louis Vuitton, appearing in “Peculiar Contrast, Perfect Light” (F/W 2021) and “Amen Break” (S/S 2022). Most recently, Saul appears as the preacher “Jedidiah Moore” in Ryan Coogler's “Sinners”.
As a performer, Saul has toured in over forty countries, lectured in hundreds of universities, and served as a guest professor of poetry and performance at Stanford University.
Saul holds a BA in Theater and Philosophy from Morehouse College and MFA in Acting from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts.
A prolific album Producer, expansive Percussionist, experimental Composer, connector, communicator, Carlos Niño is known primarily for his main project Carlos Niño & Friends, and for his extensive work on André 3000’s New Blue Sun. Previously Niño made albums as/with Ammoncontact, Build An Ark, The Life Force Trio, and others. Niño cites Iasos, Laraaji, Luis Pérez Ixoneztli, Adam Rudolph, Idris Ackamoor, Pharoah Sanders, Don Cherry, Yusef Lateef, Alice Coltrane, Airto, Kamau Daaood, Dwight Trible, Dexter Story, Jesse Peterson, Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, Jamire Williams, Deantoni Parks, Surya Botofasina, Nate Mercereau, and André 3000 as among his “closest Mentors, Influences, Elders, and peers, all of whom I know well, (or at least met several times,) in this life . . .”
The World Stage is an educational and performance art space in Leimert Park Village, the heart of Los Angeles’ African American cultural community. It was founded in 1989 by the late world-renowned master jazz drummer Billy Higgins and by poet and community arts activist Kamau Daáood, in an attempt to fill a cultural void in the L.A. community. Initially formed as a loose collective of artists and arts supporters, The World Stage has grown to assume a pioneering and pivotal role in South L.A.’s music and art landscape.
The Stage’s mission is to secure, preserve and advance the position of African American music, literature and works in the oral tradition to a local, national and international audience. With a capacity of 100, The World Stage programs affordable weekly workshops in music and literary arts, and ticketed performances from a range of renowned artists.
Through its weekly workshops, The World Stage provides the community with quality arts education and links youth with elders in the African American cultural tradition. Workshops are generally offered to the public for $5 but no one is turned away for lack of funds. Offerings include Monday’s Drum Workshop for children of all ages, Tuesday’s Jazz Vocal Workshop, Wednesday’s Anansi Writer’s Workshop, Thursday’s Women’s African Drum Circle and Jazz Jam Session, Saturday’s Jazz Workshop, and Sunday’s Woodwind Workshop and Vocal Jam Session.