LA Phil Store

There is a tender proposition behind composer, bandleader, and saxophonist Kamasi Washington’s fifth studio album, Fearless Movement: we’re all born elastic, and if you don’t use it you lose it. Dance was on Washington’s mind while making this record, and it serves as a metaphor for this practice of flexibility. “When people hear that I'm making a dance album, it’s not literal,” Washington says. “Dance is movement and expression, and in a way it’s the same thing as music — expressing your spirit through your body. That’s what this album is pushing.”

Turning his attention to dance, and bringing the audience with him, is a natural progression of Washington’s ongoing study of music as a means of connection. His 2015 album The Epic, as well as 2018’s Heaven and Earth were received by critics and audiences as a kind of intervention, across generations and genres. Both of those records were big offerings, heavy on choir and strings, but Fearless Movement offers something different: it’s still immense, but more rhythmic. It features a wide range of collaborators like Andre 3000, rapper D Smoke, vocalist Patrice Quinn, fellow saxophonist Terrace Martin, bass player Thundercat, drummer Ronald Bruner Jr., DJ Battlecat and BJ The Chicago Kid.