This week on the Catholic Playlist our new featured artist is Sam Rocha. Sam began playing guitar at the age of 5, and began singing soon thereafter. His musical influences cover a wide range of genres from folk, Latin, funk, soul, hip-hop, and jazz, but he claims his roots are in church music and the Mexican folk tradition. Over the past ten years, he’s performed with various ensembles playing everything from gospel and contemporary Christian music, blues, pop, neo-soul/nu jazz, Latin folk, and Latin jazz.

His debut collection of music, titled “Late to Love” and available on Aug 28, 2014, is musically inspired by the genealogy of soul music that scans the genres of spirituals, folk, gospel, country, R&B, blues, funk, jazz, hip-hop, neo-soul and nu-jazz. Artists such as T-Bone Walker, Ray Charles, Gil Scott Heron, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye, Bill Withers, and Curtis Mayfield—with dashes of Willie Nelson and Pat Metheny—serve as the “old” foundation for something entirely new: Augustinian soul music.

“Late to Love” is an original concept album that performs a reading of Augustine’s Confessions through soul music. It’s not a generic ode to a saint or holy person, nor it is a neutral and uncontroversial celebration of an important ancient book. From beginning to end Sam offers a bold and fresh reading of Augustine’s Confessions where the form is the content, where melody and verse take the place of assertions and argument. This music is truly something totally new and original.

In Catholic Playlist #53 we’ll be playing the title track “Late to Love”, where the chorus sings, “Late / have I loved you / beauty so old / beauty so new,” adapted from Augustine’s Confessions.

You can learn more about Sam Rocha and his new album here at Wiseblood Books.

You can sample the songs and perhaps pick up the brand new album starting on Aug 28, 2014 here on iTunes:

Please join us in welcoming Sam Rocha to the Catholic Playlist Show!

Interesting Factoid: Sam is musically illiterate – he doesn’t read or write music, despite having a PhD in philosophy of education.