The music of saxophonist and composer Immanuel Wilkins is filled with empathy and conviction, bonding arcs of melody and lamentation to pluming gestures of space and breath. Listeners were introduced to this riveting sound with his acclaimed debut album Omega, which was named the #1 Jazz Album of 2020 by The New York Times. The album also introduced his remarkable quartet with Micah Thomas on piano, Daryl Johns on bass, and Kweku Sumbry on drums, a tight-knit unit that Wilkins features once again on his stunning sophomore album The 7^th Hand.

The 7^th Hand explores relationships between presence and nothingness across an hour-long suite comprised of seven movements. “I wanted to write a preparatory piece for my quartet to become vessels by the end of the piece, fully,” says the Brooklyn-based, Philadelphia-raised artist who Pitchfork said “composes ocean-deep jazz epics.”

Conceptually, the record evolves what Wilkins begins exploring on Omega, which includes a four-part suite within the album. On The 7^th Hand, all his compositions represent movements, played in succession. “They deal with cells and source material like a suite would,” says Wilkins, “but they function as songs, as well.”

Wilkins often draws inspiration from critical thought. Even the striking album artwork challenges convention: “I wanted to remix the Southern Black baptism, and also provide critique on what is considered sanctified and who can be baptized.”

On Emanation, Wilkins’ hallmark conviction arrives in the first phrase. Imaginative and buoyant, he navigates layered interactivity before passing lead energy to a receptive Thomas. The movement finishes seemingly in the middle of a vamp—a reflection of Wilkins’ treatment of time. “In music, time is questionable,” he says. “It can challenge the notion of what time is and how you feel time.”

Sat. Feb. 26, 2022 – 7:30p.m.

Sat. Feb. 26, 2022 – 9:30p.m.