Overjoyed to share my new music with you!
RHYTHM OF THE SPIRIT VOL.1
RHYTHM OF THE SPIRIT VOL. 1 from Earl Louis Stewart makes a bold statement: that America’s music — born of sorrow, improvisation, resistance, and joy — belongs within the same canon as Bach or Palestrina. Stewart’s fugues, canons, counterfugues, and retrogrades are written with the strictness of Europe’s 16th and 18th century conventions, yet pulse with the syncopation and soul of ragtime, blues, and jazz. The album features three sonatas — No. 2, with its dusky blues fugue and vibraphone ballad; No. 5, which develops ragtime counterfugues, retrogrades, and canons; and No. 12, where a true blues fugue reconciles the 12-bar form with the classical sonata.
“To me, great works of art are a snapshot of God’s beauty and God’s love, and are consequently transcendent in both their emotional and intellectual beauty.”
- Earl Louis Stewart
From the Press
"I recommend this CD to both jazz enthusiasts and classical music lovers."
- Filippo Focosi, Kathodik
MY MUSICAL INFLUENCES
When asked which musical mentors have had the greatest influence on him, Earl Stewart points to a constellation of masters across jazz, classical, and Black compositional traditions.
“My greatest jazz mentor was Alvin Batiste. The classical master who has influenced me most profoundly is Johannes Brahms. And among Black composers, my deepest influences are Scott Joplin and Samuel Coleridge-Taylor.”
Through the Years
Through every season of my life, music has been a steady companion, shaping, teaching, and grounding me. It has grown as I’ve grown, evolving alongside my experiences, my faith, and the people I love.