'Nine Lives' performance set for Mount Union in memory of those killed at church shooting

Chris Coles recalled when he introduced a musical composition that would become part of a stage performance telling the story of a mass shooting at a South Carolina church.

Played to a large group of people at a jazz and creative music workshop, the notes faded away before individuals cried and hugged.

"It was the first time in my life playing something like that where I made a connection to everybody," Coles said. "Everyone in the room were all feeling the same thing."

That poignant moment led to Coles applying for and then receiving a $45,000 matching Arts Challenge Grant through the Knight Foundation to help create "Nine Lives," a multimedia, interdisciplinary performance featuring animation, spoken word, choreography, dance and instrumental music.

"It's a programmatic work imagining what it would be like to sit through that prayer service and then at the end of it, a gunman opens fire," Coles said. "That's what that piece was about, and I took it to (the) workshop."

The production remembers the nine lives lost in the 2015 shooting at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina.

Coles is bringing "Nine Lives" to the University of Mount Union for a 7 p.m. performance on Feb. 7 in the Brush Performance Hall of the Giese Center for the Performing Arts.

The venue is at 67 W. Simpson St. in Alliance.

Coles and a group of 14 other performers will present "Nine Lives" as part of the 2022 Kershaw/Carr Lecture, as well as the Black History Month and Peacebuilding and Social Justice lectures.

The event is free and open to the public, although tickets are required.

Tickets and more information about the University of Mount Union Lecture Series can be found at www.mountunion.edu/lecture-series or by calling the box office at 330-821-2565.

Information on the university's current COVID-19 policies can be found at www.mountunion.edu/covid-19.

"Every time we perform, we want to give pause and remember these nine lives lost," Coles said. "And in the names of these nine lives lost, just go live your life and make a decision that honors their memory."

The event will include both a 40-minute stage performance and a group discussion among the participants, Coles said.

"It's not to scare anybody," he said of the message. "I'm not trying to (scare) people into loving others; it's more like, let's look at these unfortunate sides to like our history and things that happened, and let's make a decision going forward to hold each other accountable so these things don't happen again or they happen less."

Musical background

Coles is a jazz preparatory instructor at Cuyahoga Community College, where he's on the faculty of the Tri-C JazzFest Academy; visiting professor in jazz studies at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music; and adjunct lecturer at the University of Akron, where he's on the faculty for jazz studies at the School of Music.

He earned a bachelor’s degree in performance from Youngstown State University and a master’s degree from the University of Akron.

Coles, 36, appears with many ensembles, including his own jazz quartet.

The piece of music played at the workshop in 2017 was the genesis for "Nine Lives."

After consulting with a professional mentor, the idea grew to include dancing, animation and spoken word.

"I picked people in Northeastern Ohio that I felt I had a connection with," Coles said. "Everyone involved in the project is either a serious mentor or someone I really trust with my life."

"Nine Lives" was first performed in 2019.

"It's one of those things where it's ever evolving," Coles said. "The version people see now is not the version that premiered."

Stage participants include Orlando Watson, a Cleveland native and acclaimed lyricist and musical artist who released the album, "Corner Stores" last year.

Coles asked Watson to write a composition to end "Nine Lives."

"I said, 'Take a listen to it and see what you come up with,' ... and in less than 24 hours he wrote this really beautiful spoken-word script," Coles recalled.

"I choose to use music as that thing that brings people into a space that not only they feel safe but vulnerable," he said.

Watson is scheduled to perform the spoken word portion of "Nine Lives" at Mount Union.

Other performers include dancer and choreographer Dominic Moore-Dunson, who "does a beautiful homage to the spirt of black people in this country," Coles said.

Other stage members include emcee Jul Big Green, a noted Northeast Ohio-based genre-blending musical artist, and animator Hannah Taddeo. Sam Blakeslee, an award-winning New York City-based musician and composer, is the featured trombone soloist in the first movement.

Mass shooting

On the night of June 17, 2015, a mass shooter took the lives of nine Black people at a Bible study at the historic South Carolina church.

Dylann Roof, the white man convicted in the mass shooting, was 21 years old at the time and an admitted white supremacist, according to media reports.

Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal had a history of civil rights advocacy.

'How can you be better'

Asked what message "Nine Lives" imparts, Coles said "it's a cautionary tale about people who cannot love at all; it's what happens when fear takes over and you lose yourself to fear and irrational thought, because I think that gunman was truly disturbed, but only because of his own delusions and his own fears.

"... These people, more than anything, they need love and they need rehabilitation and a change of thought," he continued. "You take a deep dive on the Internet, and if you're looking for some really messed up stuff, you can find it ... and he just happened to find a lot of bad stuff, and it justified his fears, and (in his mind), it justified him doing what he did..."

The Cleveland native said the performance is "not about telling people that they're wrong (or pitting conservative versus liberal political ideologies)."

And "it's not like pointing the finger and saying you're wrong – it's like, let's reflect on yourself; it's about how you can be better."

"Nine Lives" will be an opportunity for fellowship instead of divisiveness, Coles stressed. After watching the performance, attendees can return home and have constructive discussions with their friends and family, he said.

"I want everyone to come with an open mind," Coles said.

Opening up dialogue

Heather Duda, founding dean of the College of Arts and Humanities at the University of Mount Union, said hosting "Nine Lives" is an opportunity for several campus groups to come together to sponsor a joint program that engages the larger community.

"Given the performance’s subject matter, we knew that 'Nine Lives' would provide a unique and thought-provoking programming option for Black History Month," Duda said in emailed comments.

"The interdisciplinary focus of the performance will allow our community to better understand the traumatic experience of the 2015 Charleston church shooting and its aftermath," she added. "It is my hope that the performance opens up dialogue about diversity, inclusivity, and social justice across campus and the larger community."

Reach Ed at 330-580-8315 and ebalint@gannett.com

On Twitter @ebalintREP

This article originally appeared on The Repository: 'Nine Lives' performance at Mount Union remembers church shooting