More love for Freestyle Love Supreme

Viewers of the Tony Awards this summer probably wondered why Lin-Manuel Miranda decided to ad-lib his acceptance speeches for "In the Heights."

But that's where Lin-Man feels at home. Freestyling his lyrical rhymes.

And he gets to go home again with his friends and colleagues in Freestyle Love Supreme, who host a sold-out celebration of hip-hop harmonies and humor every month at Comix - this coming Monday's shows (7 and 9:30 p.m., Dec. 8) will raise funds for the New Orleans VideoVoices Project, inspiring otherwise marginalized communities by gathering and celebrating their collective voices (tickets $50-60, but deep discounts for students).

The cast of characters includes Lin-Man and fellow MC's Chris "C-Jack" Jackson, "UTK" Utkarsh Ambudkar, Bill "King Sherman" providing keyboard accompaniment, Chris "Shockwave" Sullivan throwing down the beats and sound effects, direction by "TK" Thomas Kail, and leading the proceedings, Anthony "Two Touch" Veneziale.

Here is a promo video showing a taste of what you'll hear in an FLS show:

Four of the guys met at Wesleyan University, where Lin-Man wrote the first draft of "In the Heights" -- Two Touch helped make the show a reality, with TK directing, and Sherman winning a Tony for best orchestrations. C-Jack also plays Benny in the Broadway musical. Universal recently bought the movie rights. And last night, Lin-Man and Sherman saw their names added to the list of Grammy nominees.
The success doesn't stop there. Shockwave is part of the new cast bringing "The Electric Company" back to PBS children's TV in January. Other members J-Soul and Arthur the Geniusess have had their own Broadway and movie roles.

But no one has become too big for Freestyle Love Supreme. "That's the great thing about it now," Shockwave said. "We have a supergroup now." And when they reunite each month, Two Touch said: "We laugh. It's just. We catch up. During the sound check it's like, what have you been up to the past two to three weeks? Tell me in a rap! That's our warm-up."

When they hit the stage, they improvise their way through a show based on audience suggestions and a template that works. A typical FLS show includes three of the MC's rapping about a celebrity, musician and a country named by the audience in a song called, "What You Don't Know About Me." How does that manage to work every time? "UTK calls me Two-Touch-apedia!" Two Touch said. "And Lin's very Zeitgeisty, pop culture. You can throw anything out and he's got something."

They'll often then trade true stories based on a one-word suggestion, then ad-lib an elaborate sketch off of a vague intro provided by Shockwave, and follow it all up with a 20-minute finale in which the guys re-create the day in a life of an audience member. It all flows right off of their tongues as if they'd been rapping it all of their lives.

"This vocabulary, this vernacular is so second nature to some of us," Two Touch said. "Most of the stuff we do is grounded in stories…story telling. We're looking for more people who can do that."

Comments

[john]

Pretty cool. I encourage everyone to check out Beatbox. They are a longform improv troupe from Chicago that raps to open the show, has a human beatbox, and when things start getting heated in scenes the beatbox will start going and the characters will rap back and forth to each other. It absolutely SLAYS.

[jacky]

They might be able to rap but i don't think swelling is an easy word to rap on.