"Hip-Hop Professor's New Album Mixes Literature and Art with Current Events"

Written by Caroline Newman

"Just a few weeks into his new role as a music professor at the University of Virginia, hip-hop artist A.D. Carson has produced a new album". Caroline Newman discusses Carson's newest album entitled "Sleepwalking, Vol. 1" in a recent UVAToday article. Read the article here.

Carson’s viral rap album dissertation and digital archive, “Owning My Masters: The Rhetorics of Rhymes & Revolutions,” has received worldwide attention, and has been featured in Time, USA Today, NPR’s All Things Considered, The Chronicle of Higher Education, and The Huffington Post, among many other publications.

Carson’s new project continues to highlight the promise of poetry and music, particularly in such a politically polarizing time and place. "Sleepwalking, Vol. 1", which takes its title from Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man, delves directly into the moment, starting off with a musically-layered sample of Carson’s remarks delivered to the group of counter-protesters gathered at Charlottesville’s McGuffey Park on the morning of August 12th, 2017. From there, Carson tackles a wide array of subject matter while also making use of audio samples of President Donald Trump’s speeches, responding to music from Jay-Z’s latest album release, and employing concepts explored in the film Get Out. The project features work with collaborators from Carson’s dissertation, Preme and Truth, both producers and emcees, production from UVA Music doctoral student Ryan Maguire, and featured verses from Sydney, Australia-based rapper DOBBY, as well as Philly-based emcee Bad Dreams.

Sleepwalking, Vol. 1 can be streamed or downloaded from aydeethegreat.com/sleepwalking.

 

Photo by Dan Addison

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