A TASTE OF HEAVEN: The Ecstatic Song & Gospel of Maestro Raymond Anthony Myles explores the life and legacy of the electrifying Gospel Genius of New Orleans.
Raymond Myles was an inspiration to anyone with a voice, a vision and a determination to sing.
His all-too-brief lifetime was a complex and colorful journey, powered by outsized talent, fierce ambition and deeply rooted in the vibrant community that shaped him.
Like a comet shooting across the sky, Raymond was here one minute — brilliant, incandescent and unmistakably unique.
And then, just as quickly, he was gone.
A TASTE OF HEAVEN still needs the finishing funds to bring Raymond’s great untold story to a global audience.
The documentary has already received a Fellowship from The Better Angels Society/ Library of Congress/ Ken Burns Prize For Film.
It has also received 5 Community Partnership Grants from the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation — the city’s preeminent cultural arts institution.
A TASTE OF HEAVEN explores Raymond's poignant battle against prejudice, intolerance and homophobia in the Black, religious and queer communitites in New Orleans.
A TASTE OF HEAVEN captures the social and cultural energy of New Orleans in the Eighties and Nineties.
Propelled by eye-popping footage of Raymond’s unforgettable performances and driven by the joyous, uplifting, here-and-now spirit of gospel music, the film is a time capsule of the faces and fashions from the period.
“The Son of The Sun: For Raymond Myles”
by Nikki Giovanni
If one day the Sun decided not to set but to fall, wouldn’t it break? Wouldn’t it splinter into billions and millions of pieces? And all that glitter would wash into the earth. Some pieces would go way into the ground. And it probably would be billions and millions of years before anyone found them. Being human and unable to know what had been discovered we would probably just call it “Gold” and trade it for lesser things. But it would be the only piece of the Sun that we could hold in our hands to comfort and intrigue us.
But what would happen if, for example, someone had planted a carrot or a lovely sweet yellow squash or a wonderfully golden yam and when that fruit of the earth blossomed some youngster from New Orleans being made by his mother to “eat his vegetables” also swallowed a piece of the Sun and when he opened his mouth notes sparkled from him. You can imagine the delight. This little five-year-old boy singing like an angel from the Sun.
This young man was so comfortable in his voice; so at home with the Delight, the Love, the Faith and Commitment; so mischievously playful with this voice. As if it was a friend and not his own. Other cities might have missed Raymond but New Orleans has a history with extraordinary musicians. New Orleans knew this son of the Sun being well acquainted with genius beginning with the drummers in Congo Square to the trumpet of Louis Armstrong to the Neville Brothers and the Marsalis family. New Orleans knows her sons. What a shame that the Sun took back that which it gave. Raymond had to go to his Heavenly home before the rest of us got to know him.
Raymond released his energy to the New Orleans sky at the street corner of Elysian Fields Avenue and Chartres Street. Holy Ground. There should be a plaque there so that other children of the sun can come to know an angel left us at this spot... There should be something to memorialize the dreams Raymond Myles had for his people... some sort of honor guard to tell us to keep pushing... keep searching... keep looking... for A Taste of Heaven.
Originally published in Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea: Poems and Not Quite Poems (William Morrow, 2002).
Raymond Myles amplified the voice of everyday people.
Had he lived, who knows where his journey might have taken him.
A TASTE OF HEAVEN takes us down those untraveled roads.
Director Leo Sacks was a first-hand witness to Raymond’s trials and triumphs.
He is a Grammy Award-winning producer who has introduced the recorded legacies of Bill Withers, Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye, Earth, Wind & Fire, Luther Vandross, the Isley Brothers and the songwriters and producers Kenny Gamble & Leon Huff, to a new generation.
He has been a journalist at the highest echelon of mass media (NBC Nightly News, People, Billboard, The New York Times Book Review, CNN, CBS News, Village Voice).
He teaches at Rutgers University’s School of Communication & Information in New Brunswick, NJ.
stele-48033@mypacks.net
