Big Quarterly (Director/Choreographer)

In Development: www.bigquarterly.com

Book, Music and Lyrics by S. Todd Townsend, Kim Kilby, and Luke McLemore

Big Quarterly, a historical hip-hop gospel musical, spotlights the legacy of Peter Spencer – a formerly enslaved man turned pastor who founded the nation’s first wholly independent Black church and sparked the Big Quarterly–a joyful reunion for freedom in Delaware. For those not yet free, Big Quarterly was a chance to secure passage on the Underground Railroad. Big Quarterly is not just a musical. It is a resurrection of memory and a celebration of the futures our ancestors imagined for us.

The project leverages the modern-day hip-hop musical story form and its wholly original narrative content informed by actual events in history to produce a musical ultimately about what America needs to face in its past in order to have a successful future. As American history is actively being erased, sharing important stories through art becomes an imperative. We aim to immerse a broad audience into Peter’s world using the art forms of contemporary dance, hip hop sampling, and digital technology to give this history breath, rhythm, and beat.