San Francisco Ca USA
By Sason Bishope Parry
San Francisco, CA – Some concerts entertain you. Others remind you why live music can still feel magical. On Saturday night, September 26, Oakland’s own Fantastic Negrito stepped onto the stage at Davies Symphony Hall in a striking red suit, surrounded by the San Francisco Symphony, his powerhouse band, and conductor Jonathan Taylor Rush. On paper, it sounded like an unlikely collision: the raw swagger of blues, funk, rock, and soul meeting the elegance and precision of a world-class orchestra. In reality, it felt as if they had been waiting for each other.
From the opening moments, the Symphony didn’t tame Fantastic Negrito’s music. It made it bigger. Strings added drama, brass brought muscle, and the orchestra opened new spaces around songs already built on rhythm, emotion, and grit. With orchestral arrangements by Andrew Joslyn and Rush confidently guiding the massive ensemble, the evening moved effortlessly between sophistication and beautiful musical chaos.
Fantastic Negrito also arrived with a serious band of his own. Bryan C. Simmons and LJ Holoman brought layers of keys, Brian Braziel powered the drums, and guitarists Vincent Maclauchlan and Matteo “Teo” Quale added some of the night’s most exciting musical fireworks. The two young guitarists were especially impressive, playing with confidence, precision, and the kind of fearless energy that made you pay attention whenever they stepped forward. Rather than disappearing beneath the Symphony’s enormous sound, the band gave Negrito’s music its pulse, grit, and street-level swagger. With the orchestra surrounding them, all those individual layers of voice and instrumentation somehow came together as one huge, singular sound.
And then there was Fantastic Negrito himself. Born Xavier Amin Dphrepaulezz, he remains one of music’s great originals: part bluesman, part rock star, part preacher, part comedian, and always an unpredictable storyteller. His voice can shift from a wounded whisper to a gravelly roar in seconds, and Saturday night gave him an enormous musical canvas. The program drew from across his catalog, opening with A Boy Named Andrew and Scary Woman before moving into the working-class fire of Working Poor. I Hope Somebody’s Loving You brought a warmer, more vulnerable mood, while Honest Man reminded everyone how naturally Negrito can turn personal truth into something communal.
Then came the glorious genre-hopping craziness of a medley featuring Chocolate Samurai, Eat Less Sugar, and Beat Salad, followed by About a Bird before intermission. If that sounds eclectic, welcome to Fantastic Negrito’s universe. Trying to squeeze his music neatly into “blues” has always missed the point. Funk, gospel, rock, soul, roots music, punk attitude,
and flashes of psychedelic weirdness can all show up at the same party. Add a symphony orchestra, and somehow the musical gumbo gets even tastier.
His humor was just as important to the night. Between songs, Negrito joked, told stories, played with the audience, and made the grandeur of Davies Symphony Hall feel surprisingly intimate. Looking sharp in his red suit, complete with distinctive accents and a feathered brown hat, he talked about his father, growing up in a large family, and learning early that if he wanted attention, he had better learn to stand out. Mission accomplished. That larger-than-life style has become part of his identity, but beneath the colorful clothes and showmanship lies an artist whose life story gives these songs unusual weight.
Long before three Grammys and world tours, Dphrepaulezz endured a near-fatal 1999 car crash that left him in a coma for weeks and permanently damaged his playing hand. His first run through the major-label music business had fallen apart, and for years his dream seemed to fade with it. Then came one of music’s great second acts. In 2014, he was busking on Bay Area streets and at BART stations, testing his songs on commuters who hadn’t exactly bought tickets to hear him. A year later, at 47, he entered NPR’s inaugural Tiny Desk Contest with a raw performance of Lost in a Crowd, filmed inside an Oakland freight elevator. He won!
That unlikely victory helped introduce Fantastic Negrito to the world. His next chapter brought international touring and three consecutive Grammy Awards for Best Contemporary Blues Album for The Last Days of Oakland, Please Don’t Be Dead, and Have You Lost Your Mind Yet? From BART stations to Davies Symphony Hall, you couldn’t write a much better Bay Area music story. That history made California Loner one of Saturday night’s most affecting moments. Negrito introduced the song with the story of his father, then let the music carry the rest. Against the sweep of the orchestra, his voice sounded exposed and enormous at once. For an artist capable of filling a room with personality, some of his strongest moments came when he allowed vulnerability to take over.
The second half kept shifting gears with Sex Is Overrated, California Loner, Bullshit, and Good Feeling, then moving into In the Pines, Lost in a Crowd, Plastic Hamburgers, and Please Computers. The sequence showed how naturally Negrito can move between vulnerability, humor, social commentary, and pure musical fire without losing his identity.
In the Pines was especially haunting. Fantastic Negrito has always had a gift for taking American roots traditions and dragging them into the present rather than treating them like museum pieces. Surrounded by an orchestra, that tension between old and new became even more striking. And hearing Lost in a Crowd carried its own beautiful symmetry. This was the song that helped launch his Fantastic Negrito rebirth through the Tiny Desk Contest more than a decade ago.
Hearing it now at Davies Symphony Hall, with a full orchestra behind the man who once played for commuters passing through Bay Area transit stations, felt like watching a circle close in real time. The audience knew it, too. Davies is accustomed to reverence, but
Saturday night brought something closer to a revival. People shouted, laughed, cheered, shifted in their seats, and gave their hometown hero the kind of love that can’t be manufactured. Negrito seemed genuinely moved. At one point, he acknowledged fans who had traveled from Europe, thanked them for the journey, joked about their experience in America, and offered a heartfelt, “Thank you for being here.” That mix of humor and gratitude summed him up perfectly. Fantastic Negrito has every reason to celebrate where he is, but he performs like someone who remembers exactly where he has been.
That may be why this collaboration worked so beautifully. The San Francisco Symphony brought scale and elegance. Jonathan Taylor Rush brought control without stifling the music. Andrew Joslyn’s arrangements created space for two very different musical worlds to breathe together. Negrito’s band brought groove, muscle, color, and youthful fire, with Maclauchlan and Quale delivering standout guitar work, Simmons and Holoman adding rich keyboard textures, and Braziel driving the rhythm forward. And Negrito brought the one ingredient no arrangement can manufacture: a lifetime of stories.
As the final stretch unfolded with songs like Lost in a Crowd, Plastic Hamburgers, and Please Computers, the energy inside Davies kept climbing. By the end, the hall was on its feet, and the ovation felt bigger than mere appreciation for a great performance. It felt like recognition of the journey itself. A damaged hand didn’t end it. A failed first chapter in the music business didn’t end it. Years away from the spotlight didn’t end it. Starting over in middle age didn’t end it. Fantastic Negrito kept going.
Saturday night, the kid who learned to stand out in a family of fifteen stood center stage in one of San Francisco’s great concert halls, dressed as if there were no possibility of missing him. Behind him sat the San Francisco Symphony. Beside him stood a band bringing its own remarkable fire. In front of him, an audience rose to its feet. Somewhere between Oakland grit and symphonic grandeur, a comeback story became a homecoming.
That was fantastic.
For more info on Fantastic Negrito go to: www.fantasticnegrito.com
For more info on SF Symphony go to: www.sfsymphony.org