On the last night of Black History Month, inside the 103-year-old Abyssinian Baptist Church, music did not just play—it thundered, it wept, it soared. It was the kind of night that alters the air in a room, the kind that lingers in the bones long after the last note has faded.
At the helm of this sonic reckoning stood Tyrone Clinton Jr., the young maestro, the prodigy, the force of nature.With a baton that seemed to conduct not just sound but spirit itself, he did not merely lead an orchestra—he conjured something divine. His presence on that podium was electric, a melding of tradition and fire, intellect and instinct, a man who carried the weight of history on his shoulders and wielded it with grace.
For the second time, The Unsung Collective stood alongside The New York Philharmonic, their voices bound to something larger than the sum of their parts. Five years ago, Tyrone had a vision—to create a Harlem-based collective that gave voice to the stories too often ignored in Western classical music. He built The Unsung Collective as a bridge between the classical canon and the lived experiences of Black America. And on this night, that bridge became a battleground, a sanctuary, and a monument all at once.
A Cry, a Hymn, a Reckoning
The evening began with a hushed moment of reverence, then erupted into the first notes of “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” The voices rose in unison, a hymn of defiance and hope that had carried generations through darkness. The walls of Abyssinian Baptist seemed to hold the echoes of past struggles, past prayers, past victories. The audience—some eyes closed, some hands trembling—felt the weight of it, the unbroken line from the past to the present.
Then, came Carlos Simon’s Songs of Separation, performed by J’Nai Bridges, a voice so rich, so devastatingly alive, it felt like an ancestor speaking through her. Simon, a Grammy-nominated composer and activist, had woven a tapestry of heartbreak and resilience into his score. Using the poetry of Rumi, he crafted a meditation on distance—on the spaces between people, between cultures, between life and death. Bridges did not simply sing these words; she exhaled them like a gospel, like a whisper before a storm. Her mezzo-soprano wrapped around the aching lines, turning them into something almost tangible—a thread between centuries, between sorrow and salvation.
Then came Brahms’ Ein Deutsches Requiem, but this was not just Brahms as the world had known him before. This was Brahms reimagined, reclaimed, reborn. Brittany Renee, a soprano whose voice seemed to balance on the knife-edge between agony and ecstasy, and baritone Phillip Bullock, who sang with the gravitas of a prophet, took the stage.
The requiem was a funeral song, yes—but not one of silence. Instead, it was a reckoning, a liturgy for the unnamed, the unheard, the women who never made it out of the hospital rooms, the mothers whose stories ended before they began. This performance was not just about honoring the dead—it was about demanding justice for the living.
The music did not console. It did not soothe. It tore through the church like a storm, a lament for the disparities that continue to plague Black women in childbirth and pregnancy. The sobering statistics, the quiet tragedies, the systemic injustices—they were all there, in the music, in the breath, in the breaks between notes where grief resided.
A Harlem Night to Remember
And yet, as the final chords faded, what remained was not just sorrow but strength. The standing ovation was not merely applause—it was a roar, a collective exhale, a moment of shared understanding. The audience, some still wiping away tears, knew they had witnessed something rare and raw, something that could not be replicated.
Earlier in the evening, before the concert, guests had dined at Red Rooster, Harlem’s legendary heartbeat of culture and cuisine. There, over plates of fried chicken and collard greens, the conversations had already begun—the unpacking of history, the celebration of Black artistry, the anticipation of what was to come. And by the time they arrived at Abyssinian Baptist, they were primed for the transformation.
By the end of the night, it was clear—this was not just another concert. It was a call to bear witness, a demand to listen, a plea to remember. Tyrone Clinton Jr., The Unsung Collective, The New York Philharmonic, J’Nai Bridges, Brittany Renee, Phillip Bullock—they did not just perform. They delivered a sermon, a protest, a resurrection.
And in the sacred space of that Harlem church, on the final night of Black History Month, music did what it was always meant to do—it told the truth.
For more information on performances, follow unsungcollective.org.
