With over 30 years in Hip-hop, Common’s illustrious career continues to shine. The release of “The Auditorium Vol. 1” with Pete Rock, his performance with the Grant Park Orchestra, and his role in the Apple TV show “Silo” mark a season of gratitude and artistic growth for the South Side Chicago native (Photo Credit: Tacuma Roeback).
To have a 20-plus year career and a stellar discography in Hip-hop is a rarity, like a quarterback winning multiple Super Bowls or an MLB player with 3,000 career hits. But that’s the rarefied air that South Side Chicago native Lonnie Rashid Lynn—aka Common—occupies.
With the recent release of his exceptional album “The Auditorium Vol. 1” with legendary producer Pete Rock, Common remains one of his genre’s most influential artists, a vital link to the Native Tongues movement of the late 1980s and early 90s.
Almost 32 years since his debut album “Can I Borrow a Dollar?” when Boyz II Men’s “End of the Road” was the No. 1 song in America, to now when Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us” has radio in a chokehold, Common is as relevant as ever, blessed enough to receive what few artists get to enjoy while they’re living—their flowers.
Speaking of being recognized, Common will enjoy a homecoming of sorts when he headlines the Millennium Park 20th Anniversary Celebration when he is slated to perform with the Grant Park Orchestra on Saturday evening (July 20).
With his album, the Millennium Park performance, and continued role in the critically-acclaimed Apple TV show “Silo,” this year feels like a renaissance season for the rapper who grew up near 87th and Stony.
Common recently met with me to discuss the challenges and joys of performing with an orchestra. We also talked about what it was like working with Pete Rock and why this is a season of gratitude for him. He mentioned the successes of his school, Art in Motion, and his non-profit, the Common Ground Foundation, both of which aim to educate, empower and inspire youth.
For this writer, it was the fulfillment of a dream to interview such a venerable artist whose music has lived with me as a Florida A&M University sophomore in the mid-90s to even now as a nearly 50-year-old father with bills and a gray beard.
This is bucket list stuff right here.
Tacuma Roeback: So, you will be performing with the Grant Park Orchestra at Millennium Park. Can you talk a little bit about what it’s like being back here? What memories does this area and even Grant Park conjure for you?
Common: Grant Park was one of the places that, when you’re riding down Lake Shore Drive and getting downtown, you always appreciate the beauty of it. It’s one of those places where I’ll sometimes be like, ‘Chicago is a beautiful place.’ When I got to see it from other perspectives, I really enjoyed it, adored it and appreciated it in other ways. So my memories come from going to the Taste of Chicago to just coming down and hearing some music and also, at some point, performing at either festival or something here. So, I’m honored that I’m getting this opportunity to perform now. But it’s like, man, it’s a special place. Millennium Park. And just being in Chicago during the summertime is amazing. So I’m excited for a lot of reasons to be able to be a part of this.
Tacuma Roeback: As an artist, what are the opportunities, the joys and even the challenges of working and performing with an orchestra?
Common: If you’re performing the music you created from your catalog, you will hear it in ways that you’ve never experienced it or heard it. And the audience gets that. They get to experience it in this new way. They might come in wanting to hear this song, like that song that they loved — “The Corner” or “The Food.” But then they’re getting that experience when they hear it with this orchestra. It automatically adds another emotion to it, a depth to it that I didn’t know I would get when I first started even performing with orchestras.
The challenges that I first came across was just staying within the structure because with the orchestras you have to stay within the amount of bars. The timing has to be right because they’re playing from reading the music. So you can’t just go into a little zone where you’re ‘improv’-ing and freestyling. You’ve got to stick to the script is basically what you have to do.
It took me time to make that adjustment, but then we found a balance where it’s like, ‘Okay,’ we know at certain points in the song where I can go free, and the band can play it out. And at certain points, we have to stick to what’s on the sheet music. But it made me grow as an artist, and it also just inspired me.
One of the other opportunities about performing with the orchestra—I always thought about this with my live band—is that anytime you perform with a live band, each and every musician’s experience, their hard work, their spirit is coming through.
So with the orchestra, you’re getting that many musicians and people giving that ‘umph’—what their gifts are. They’re sharing their gifts. So, I liked the camaraderie that exists within the musicianship of performing with an orchestra, and we all in it together.
Tacuma Roeback: And speaking of camaraderie, The Auditorium Vo1. 1 with Pete Rock, those first two singles, just incredible.
Common: Thank you.
Tacuma Roeback: I read somewhere that that project began as a dream for you. Is that correct? And if so, could you elaborate on that?
Common: I was saying it’s a dream for me because Pete Rock has been one of my favorite producers in Hip-hop music—in music. I mean, he created his own sound. That’s not easy to do, and people know that sound and knew that sound. And his sound has evolved. He doesn’t sound like the Pete Rock beats we heard back in the 90s. As I was playing the album for one of my best friends yesterday, he was like, ‘Did Pete do that too?’ ‘Yeah, he did the whole album.’
So, it’s something to see his evolution and hear him making music during this time. Whereas, it’s not just his signature horns that you’re used to. It’s not the filtered baseline. He’s evolved as a musician. And that dream of working with him became even more of a dream because I dreamed of making some music that really was at the highest level—music that hit my spirit based on inspiration.
And [music] that was in the world of what hip-hop was created to be. It just had those elements. And, man, I’m hearing him scratching stuff. And I’m like, for some reason, it feels fresh. I done heard scratches my whole life.
But it just feels fresh for him scratching on some of these beats. And I think what we were able to do is everything I learned as a songwriter and a song-maker, I was able to put into this music. Everything he knows as a songwriter, song-maker and producer, he put in his music.
So, our songs actually can be better as songs, but we still keeping some of those elements because that’s who we are. I’m an emcee and say give you the bars. Even if I’m talking about something like a song about being lonely, I’m still gonna give you some bars within it.
We can have a musical song that got the baseline going, and then it’s like these keyboards going, but he still might throw a scratch in there. All of that, to me, is putting those elements of what we’ve come from into the music. But now, the music has even expanded because we know more about production and song making.
Tacuma Roeback: With the new album coming out and you performing here in Chicago, what does this season mean for you as a person and as an artist?
Common: This season, for me, is a time where I feel I’m being very grateful for what is happening. I’m being intentional about what’s happening by praying, acting on it and doing the work that it takes but still being able to let God do his part.
This season is about me enjoying these times when you have put in certain work, and you put in the work for an album. I want to enjoy it and really be intentional about putting music that will resonate across the board for me and then doing work that resonates across the board, like acting. I haven’t went out and did a lot of films. I’m doing the TV series “Silo,” which is on Apple TV+.
I’m not just gonna do any film just to be in it. I want to do characters I can grow in as an actor and like, express something else, and show another depth and aspect of me as an actor.
So, being very intentional with the work we’re doing in the community, with our school AIM, Art in Motion [in Chicago], watching it and seeing it expand. We had our first graduating class that was from high school. We started this school four years ago, and to see it go through the pandemic and now be in this space that is in…
I’m being intentional with making sure it’s continuing to grow, and we’re feeding our community in the right way. And with the Common Ground Foundation and our whole Free to Dream movement, it’s important. So, I’m being intentional with those things.
This season is about being grateful, operating in love and just being in abundance and doing great things.
For More Information
What: Common will perform with the Grant Park Orchestra as part of the Millennium Park 20th Anniversary Celebration.
When: The concert will occur on Saturday evening, July 20, at 7:30 p.m., at Millennium Park in downtown Chicago.
Why: This special event celebrates Millennium Park’s 20th Anniversary and South Side Chicago native Common and his illustrious career. Attendees will get to witness a unique fusion of Hip-hop and orchestral music.
Seating and Ticket Info: Seating on the Great Lawn is free and open to the public. It is first-come, first-served, and no reservations are required! Early arrival is recommended; gates open at 5 p.m. Online reservations are required for the Seating Bowl only. Visit gpmf.org for more information.
The evening will culminate with a fireworks display to celebrate Millennium Park’s 20th Anniversary.
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