About the Artists

Innov Gnawa

Sunday 9/20, 7-9pm
Empire Stage, 229 Empire Boulevard, Brooklyn, NY 11225

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Innov Gnawa is a New York City-based Grammy-nominated music ensemble led by Maalem Hassan Benjaafar. The title Maalem, meaning Master, denotes BenJaafar’s heritage and musical tradition, passed down generationally within his family in Morocco. The Maalem intuits the spiritual needs of people in the audience, choosing appropriate repertoire for healing and directing the group by playing the three-stringed African bass, or guembri, and the resounding tbul drum, traditionally used in Morocco to summon people to a healing ceremony, or lila. BenJaafar is accompanied by Amino Belyamani and a brotherhood of other Gnawa musicians, singing call and response and playing the qraqeb, metal castanets whose staccato sound is said to represent the shackles and chains of slaves. Often referred to as “Sufi Blues,” Gnawa is ritual trance music invoking saints and spirits for healing and liberation. Like Blues music from the American South, Gnawa is treasured throughout Morocco for its soulfulness.

Peter Manheim Quartet

Sunday 10/18, 3-5pm
Empire Stage, 229 Empire Boulevard, Brooklyn, NY 11225

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Peter Manheim is a drummer and percussionist from Evanston, Illinois. He completed his bachelors degree in music at Oberlin Conservatory in 2012, where he studied with drumming masters Billy Hart and Jamey Haddad. After spending time living in Brazil and Chicago, he moved to NYC in 2016, where he has lived ever since. Peter performs regularly in NYC as well as nationally and internationally with a variety of bands. He has also worked extensively as a dance accompanist for the Joffrey Ballet School, Marymount College, Steps on Broadway, and The Ailey School. His debut EP, “In Time,” was released in 2023 on Northern Spy Records and was followed up in 2025 by a full length record, “Early Waves.”

Musiquita (Children’s Concert)

Wednesday 10/28, 4-5pm
Crown Heights Branch, Brooklyn Public Library
560 New York Ave. at, Maple St, Brooklyn, NY 11225

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Musiquita is a bilingual family music project created by Juilliard-trained violinist and vocalist Blanca Cecilia González and pianist and vocalist Jesse Elder, former Music Director of Postmodern Jukebox. Since 2020, Musiquita has been creating joyful, interactive musical experiences for children and families, blending original songs with Latin American folk music, jazz, classical, rock, pop, and beloved children’s favorites.

Musiquita frequently performs close to home in the New York City area, as well as at venues and festivals throughout the region and beyond. Their performances invite children and grown-ups to sing, move, listen, and connect through music in both Spanish and English. With four albums to their name, Musiquita’s work celebrates bilingualism, curiosity, creativity, cultural connection, and the joy of making music together.

Alexa Barchini Duo

Sunday 11/8, 6–8pm
Trove Wine Bar, 406 Rogers Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11225

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“Alexa Barchini…a revelatory new presence in the jazz world who has a lot to say and a lot to give.”
— Michael J. West (JazzTimes, Downbeat, Washington Post)

Alexa Barchini is a jazz vocalist and songwriter based in New York City. Raised in a culturally diverse family and the daughter of an opera singer, Alexa began singing as a young girl, fusing her voice with the cultural tapestry that surrounded her at home, savoring the folk, americana and rock that was circulating the hard drives of her friends at school, and soaking in the jazz tradition from any Ella Fitzgerald records she could get from her band teacher. Somewhere along the line she caught the proverbial ‘bug,’ and has since gone on to study and perform in various settings. Her work as a bandleader and sideman has taken her on tours both within the U.S. and in Europe, where she has had the opportunity to perform on stages such as Dizzy’s Club Coca Cola, the Blue Note, National Sawdust, The Owl Music Parlor, Smalls, Smoke Jazz Club, The Kimmel Center of Philadelphia, the Regatta Bar in Boston, and others. She can be found regularly performing as a sideman around NYC as well as with her own projects. She currently holds a monthly residency at the iconic Sunny’s Bar in Red Hook, Brooklyn.

Her debut album, My Love, released on Beaver Darn Records September 4th, 2006, features her own original material, played on 37 strings. Inspired by the solitary music-making necessitated by the early stages of the pandemic, Alexa began writing songs on the guitar in 2021, and that dalliance has since blossomed into a full album of songs, played by Jackson FitzGerald on baritone guitar, Bobby Hawk on fiddle, Luke Bergman on pedal steel, and Alexa on guitar and vocals.

The Rhythm Method Quartet

Sunday 12/6, 3-5pm
House Concert at Lefferts Manor Historic Home, 66 Maple St, Brooklyn, NY 11225

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Praised as “fierce, fearless, and virtuosic… unapologetically stylistically omnivorous and versatile” (New Music Box) and “trailblazing…skillful composer-performers” (The New Yorker), The Rhythm Method strives to reimagine the string quartet in a contemporary, feminist context. The four performer-composers of The Rhythm Method continually expand their sonic and expressive palette through the use of improvisation, vocalization, graphic notation, songwriting, and theater.

The Rhythm Method has given performances at Roulette, Joe’s Pub, The Stone, the Met Museum, the Americas Society, and the Noguchi Museum, and has been featured at the Lucerne Festival Forward, MATA Festival, Ukrainian Contemporary Music Festival, American Composers Orchestra’s Sonic Festival, Music Mondays, and TriBeCa New Music, among others. The quartet tours regularly both in the US and abroad, and has performed internationally in France, Austria, and Switzerland. The Rhythm Method seeks to nurture ongoing relationships with universities and schools, cultivating multifaceted creativity and musicianship in students of all ages. They have been in residence at Tulane University, Zurich University for Art and Music, Hunter College, Berklee School of Music, Boston Conservatory, Bowling Green State University’s College of Musical Arts, Arkansas State University, and New York University, and they serve as the quartet-in-residence for Lake George Music Festival’s Composers Institute.

BKLYN PLAYS BKLYN is sponsored, in part, by the Greater New York Arts Development Fund
of the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs administered by Brooklyn Arts Council (BAC).