Picture: Nick Rutter
The team behind the critically-acclaimed 2018 Hackney Empire staging of Martin Smith’s KING will release the single ‘We Need You Now’ next Friday (26 June 2020).
One of four songs recorded in 2019 taken from the musical which charts the extraordinary life of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr, the song is performed by Cedric Neal and the London Musical Theatre Orchestra conducted by its founder Freddie Tapner. All four songs will be available on an EP which will be released later this year.
Commenting on the timely decision to release the single, Neal said: “The lyrics of ‘We Need You Now’ were written in the 1980s about the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s and are just as appropriate, relevant and necessary today. This song has become my personal prayer in the fight for EQUALITY and the end of systemic racism. The message of Dr. King and Martin Smith’s ‘We Need You Now’ are one and the same. Peace is achieved through LOVE for one another – equally given and received.”
The single will be available to buy from 26 June HERE and via all online music platforms. Anyone inspired by the message of the song are being invited to donate to the Stephen Lawrence Charitable Trust through the website www.stephenlawrence.org.uk.
Co-produced by the Hackney Empire and the London Musical Theatre Orchestra, KING featured Neal as the inspirational civil rights leader alongside Sharon D. Clarke as King’s mother, Alberta, and Debbie Kurup as his wife Coretta. The concert staging was directed by Susie McKenna and featured new orchestrations by Simon Nathan.
Written by one of the West End’s most popular and gifted leading men, Martin Smith’s King was previously performed in 1998 as semi-staged concert at the Prince Edward Theatre four years after Martin Smith had died at the age of just 37.
Angela Thomas
SHARE THIS POST:
Comments are closed.