Daniel Bernard Roumain (DBR) is a Black, Haitian-American composer, violinist, and educator whose genre-bending music defies convention. Known for his signature violin sound infused with electronic and African-American influences, he combines classical traditions with jazz, hip-hop, and rock, taking music beyond the proscenium and into broader cultural spaces. Called “about as omnivorous as a contemporary artist gets” (The New York Times), Roumain sees composing as a collaborative act with artists, organizations, and communities, framing music as a space for dialogue and connection.

 

His works span solo, chamber, orchestral, operatic, film, theater, and dance compositions. Highlights include Dancers, Dreamers, and Presidents (2010), inspired by Ellen DeGeneres and Barack Obama, and the opera We Shall Not Be Moved (2017), created with Marc Bamuthi Joseph and Bill T. Jones. He has scored the film Ailey, released or appeared on more than 30 albums, and published over 300 works.

 

Roumain’s collaborators range from Lady Gaga and Philip Glass to Marin Alsop and Anna Deavere Smith, and his music has been heard at BAM, the Kennedy Center, and the Sydney Opera House. He is currently a tenured Institute Professor at Arizona State University.

 

Hip-Hop Studies and Etudes is distinctive because it presents 24 short pieces—one in every major and minor key—that translate the rhythmic drive, timbral variety, and formal structures of hip-hop into written studies, much like a modern response to Bach’s Well-Tempered Klavier. Unlike traditional etudes, the score offers no fixed instrumentation and instead encourages performers to choose, rearrange, or remix the material, making each performance unique and collaborative.

 

In the program notes, DBR writes, “Hip-Hop Studies and Etudes, Book I are small, intimate, musical vignettes (one in each key) that explain, examine, and express aspects of hip-hop music, from rhythm to timbre to form. What began as a response, a composer’s response, to the musical and cultural needs of students at the Harlem School of the Arts in New York City (where I once served as chair of the Music Theory and Composition Department), these works now represent my own hip-hop, techno, ambient, and rock-infused response to Bach’s Well-Tempered Klavier and Philip Glass’s Music in 12 Parts.

 

The scores are designed to be performed by one musician to any number of small or large instrumental ensembles. If performed by one musician, simply pick the line and/or clef of music that is best for your instrument and makes for the most complete idea. If performed by a small or large instrumental ensemble, all musicians should read from the score and should assign those parts that are best for their instruments. Tempo indications are suggestions only; feel free to play these works at any speed you desire, with or without a conductor.

 

I welcome the re-arranging (or remixing) of any part of this music–feel free to edit, move, delete, repeat, or imagine the music in any manner that you deem fit.”

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