Artist Talk

A Listening Session with Angel Bat-Dawid & Naima Nefertari

March 8, 2026
11:00 am to 12:00 pm

An album cover featuring a photograph of two musicians seated comfortably on large chairs wearing decorative robes. Surrounding the perimeter of the album art are graphic characters of a Middle Eastern language interrupted by blocky and circular shapes.
Angel Bat-Dawid and Naima Nefertari. Journey to Nabta Playa (album cover). Photo credit: Courtesy of the artists.

In this very special event presented by Ars Nova Workshop, Angel Bat-Dawid and Naima Nefertari explore selections from the pioneering catalog of Don and Moki Cherry as well as selections from their own album Journey to Nabta Playa. The duo will be joined in conversation by journalist Marcus J. Moore.

A powerful meditation on memory, mythology, and ancestral science, Dawid and Nefertari’s collaboration draws deep inspiration from the ancient astrological stone circle of Nabta Playa nestled in the remote deserts of Nubia. Their music blends spiritual jazz, celestial electronics, ancestral instrumentation, and storytelling to imagine futures grounded in ancient knowing.

Organized in conjunction with The Living Temple: The World of Moki Cherry.

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Event Information

March 8, 2026
11:00 am to 12:00 pm

The Fabric Workshop and Museum
1214 Arch Street, Philadelphia, PA 19107

Harry I. Feldman Forum, First Floor

Free | Suggested $10 donation
Advance registration encouraged

Register

About the Participants

Naima Nefertari—daughter of vocalist Neneh Cherry and granddaughter of artistic visionaries Don and Moki Cherry—is a multi-disciplinary artist and musician based in London. Her practice interweaves sonic and visual forms led by interests in repetition, improvisation, and the abstract relationships between language, symbol, image, and sound. Nefertari is part of the duo Exotic Sin with Kenichi Iwasa. She is an archivist and coordinator for the Estate of Moki Cherry and Cherry Archive.

For this special conversation, she’ll be joined by the composer, clarinetist, singer & spiritual jazz soothsayer Angel Bat Dawid. The potency, prowess, spirit and charisma of Dawid’s cosmic musical proselytizing has taken her from relatively unknown improviser to borderline ubiquitous performer in Chicago’s avant-garde in a relatively short span of time.

Marcus J. Moore is an esteemed music journalist, event curator, professor, and author of two critically-acclaimed books: The Butterfly Effect: How Kendrick Lamar Ignited the Soul of Black America (2020), and High and Rising: A Book About De La Soul (2024). Marcus has been a contributing writer with The Nation and a senior editor with Bandcamp Daily, a platform he helped launch. He co-leads the popular jazz-focused “5 Minutes That Will Make You Love…” series at The New York Times. To date, Marcus has had famed musicians like Jon Batiste, Meshell Ndegeocello and Thundercat write about their favorite jazz compositions. Elsewhere, his music coverage can be found at NPR, Pitchfork, TIME, Entertainment Weekly, GQ, The Washington Post, Rolling Stone and The Atlantic, among other outlets.

Support

This program is presented in partnership with Ars Nova Workshop.