Music

Before he became a best-selling writer, Dan Brown was an aspiring musician. In 1989, he self-produced an album of children’s music he arranged on synthesizers, titled “Musica Animalia.” It sold around 500 copies, and Brown soon forgot about it.He had better luck as a novelist, with page-turners like “The Da Vinci Code,” “The Lost Symbol” and other thrillers that collectively have more than 220 million copies in print.Now, three decades later, Brown is reviving his musical career with a hybrid children’s album and picture book that grew out of the music and poems he wrote for “Musica Animalia.”The book, “Wild Symphony,” which Rodale Kids plans to release in September, is aimed at 3- to 7-year-olds. The story features a mouse conductor who recruits other animals to perform in his orchestra, dispensing wisdom about the value of patience, kindness and respect along the way. Readers can listen to the musical accompaniments for each page with a smartphone app that uses augmented reality to scan the page and play the music for “Bouncing Kangaroo,” “Wondrous Whale” and “Brilliant Bat.”Brown says the story and music were inspired by classical works like “Peter and the Wolf” and “The Carnival and the Animals.” He is also simultaneously releasing an album of the music that he composed, performed by the Zagreb Festival Orchestra in Croatia.Dan Brown’s “Wild Symphony”“Dancing Boar”While it’s somewhat surprising that Brown — who is known for his adrenaline-fueled and occasionally bloody suspense novels — is writing for the pre-literate crowd, “Wild Symphony” has some of his hallmarks. In classic Dan Brown fashion, there are clues and puzzles sprinkled throughout the book; observant readers will find letters of the alphabet floating in the illustrations of blue whales, cheetahs, kangaroos and tropical fish. (The letters form anagrams that spell a musical instrument when placed in the right order.)Brown was closely involved in the process, from choosing the illustrator, Susan Batori, to overseeing the development of the app, said Mallory Loehr, the senior vice president and publisher of the Random House Books for Young Readers Group. He traveled to Croatia to work with the Zagreb orchestra on the recording.Music has long been a favorite mode of expression for Brown. As a child, he played piano to entertain himself (his parents wouldn’t allow a TV in the house). After college, he tried to make it as a musician. He founded his own record company, called Dalliance. He later moved to Los Angeles to become a singer-songwriter and pianist, and joined the National Academy of Songwriters. He still plays the piano nearly every day.Brown wasn’t planning to make a splashy public return to his musical roots. The project came about in 2018, when his friend Bob Lord, the chief executive of PARMA Recordings, rediscovered his long-lost children’s album and asked Brown if he had thought about having the music performed by an orchestra. Brown gave a recording of “Musica Animalia” and the text to his literary agent, and proposed the dual book and album. To make the story cohere, Brown wrote more poems and musical pieces and added the mouse character to guide the reader and give the story an arc.The orchestral music was recorded by PARMA Recordings, and is being distributed by the classical-music publisher Boosey & Hawkes.“Wild Symphony” will be Brown’s biggest musical release to date: Rodale is printing 150,000 copies of the book, and rights have sold in 27 countries.Follow New York Times Books on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, sign up for our newsletter or our literary calendar. And listen to us on the Book Review podcast. More

Last summer, there was no escaping “Welcome to the Party,” Pop Smoke’s breakout single. It was a terrific kind of claustrophobia. The beat is tense and ornery, and Pop Smoke, with a voice as soothing as industrial machinery, was a lordly narrator of impending mayhem. Rattling car windows, the song was a reminder of how New York hip-hop once sounded, and dominated. Booming out of nightclub speakers, it was an incitement to dance-floor insurrection.“Welcome to the Party” was the anchor of Pop Smoke’s debut album, “Meet the Woo,” but the real emotional core was “PTSD.” On an album full of tossed-off threats and rowdy bluster, a soundtrack for rumbles in dark basements, here was a song about the cost of all that conflict. “My PTSD starting to kick in so I gotta get high,” he rapped, before detailing all the things he needed to escape from. On other songs, he sounded ready for war; on this one, he sounded like he’d just come home from one: “I spent 20 on my wrist and 20 on a chain/I be spoiling myself so I can ease the pain.”And yet there is no ease to be found.Pop Smoke, who was killed at the age of 20 early Wednesday morning at a home in Los Angeles, was at that ascendant place in his career just after local renown bubbles up into something bigger and more promising. The place where new opportunities compete for space with old tensions. He’d just released his second album, “Meet the Woo, Vol. 2,” which debuted at No. 7 on the Billboard album chart, and he was evolving from the most charismatic figure in the Brooklyn drill scene — one of the most vibrant in hip-hop right now — into a genuine breakout star, not bound by place or style.It’s been some time since Brooklyn has had a genuine hip-hop prospect, certainly one who channeled the bruising energy of the 1990s. Melodists have run the genre for a decade now; Pop Smoke — with a voice that recalled Lloyd Banks and DMX — punched through that sweetness like a sneering heavyweight. In the wake of his success, other aspirants from the scene — Smoove L, Fivio Foreign, Sheff G — were beginning to draw wider notice. And Pop Smoke found himself spending more time outside of Brooklyn, a beloved new character getting a taste of how life looked from the Hollywood Hills.Part of the cruel logic of sudden fame is that it presents unanticipated hazards. Pop Smoke was killed in an apparent home invasion robbery; in the hours following his death, internet sleuths made plain how easy it was to track where he was staying in Los Angeles based on social media posts. Those posts were intended to be totems of triumph, emblems of the new life that his music was affording him. They also may have been a road map.“Where we come from, it ain’t sweet,” Pop Smoke told me, when I interviewed him last summer, about growing up in Canarsie, where gang life was omnipresent. He detailed a youth shaped by ambient dread about what may lay just around the corner. “I had a gun in school. I had guns in church,” he said. “People was trying to kill me.”His motivation, he said, came from the opportunity to provide some semblance of hope to children who “got to carry their guns to school because it ain’t safe, but they still got to make sure they get they diploma ’cause they mom could be happy. I do it for them. That’s me.”When I spent time with him and his friends last summer, just as Pop Smoke was beginning to gain real attention outside of his neighborhood, there was still an air of wariness that hung over them. When they were approached in SoHo by an aggressive fan, everyone stiffened up just a bit while sizing up the potential threat. While driving out to Canarsie from Manhattan, he and his team drove quickly and defensively, speeding past other cars on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway.But Pop Smoke also was basking in the attention. When clerks in a clothing store put on his music, he grinned wildly and talked to them like friends. When some teens in an Uber spotted him and began waving frantically, he rolled down the window and gave them a nod. And back in Canarsie, he sauntered around a crowded basketball tournament like a returning prince, swaddled by love.His ascent was not without hiccups, particularly in regards to law enforcement. In October, he was scheduled to perform at Rolling Loud in Queens — the first local iteration of the important hip-hop festival series. But the New York Police Department prevented him and a handful of other local acts from taking the stage, saying they “have been affiliated with recent acts of violence citywide.” D.J.s at the festival that weekend spun Pop Smoke’s music heavily in symbolic protest, to rapturous crowd response. Last weekend, he was advertised on the bill for a concert in Brooklyn that was celebrating the drill scene. But while other acts performed, Pop Smoke did not.That disruption at home seemingly only fueled his ascent everywhere else. Last month, he attended Paris Fashion Week, sitting front row at Off-White, and was photographed alongside the designer Virgil Abloh. He recently completed his first movie role, as a charismatic basketball-playing hooligan, in Eddie Huang’s forthcoming film “Boogie.”Even as he began to expand his musical approach on “Meet the Woo, Vol. 2,” Pop Smoke was indisputably himself, his sandpaper voice and stop-start flow immediately identifiable. He became an avatar of hip-hop’s turn from the polished back to the rugged. In recent months, he had collaborated with Nicki Minaj, Travis Scott, H.E.R., Quavo and more, exporting the particularities of Brooklyn’s sound and importing others into it.Often, charisma is the Trojan horse that carries new sounds, styles or ideas into the mainstream. Pop Smoke, with a quick smile matched with cool menace, was a perfect ambassador. But he was hungry for what success had in store for him, the places it might take him. “I like learning new things and experiencing new things,” he said. “You can’t stay the same.” More

LOS ANGELES — Even by today’s get-famous-quick standards, Pop Smoke became hot at microwave speed.He released his first album, “Meet the Woo,” last July, and in the months to follow, he collaborated with Nicki Minaj, Travis Scott and others. His second album opened this month at No. 7 on the Billboard 200 chart.He had moved on from his family’s duplex in a middle-class section of Brooklyn, and, at 20 years old, was living in a rented four-bedroom home owned by one of the “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills,” with a backyard pool featuring expansive views of the Hollywood Hills.Before dawn on Wednesday, several people broke into that home, at least one holding a gun and at least one masked, according to the Los Angeles police. Someone staying there contacted a friend on the East Coast, who then called 911. Within minutes, the call was relayed to Los Angeles and the police were at the home, but it was too late; the intruders had fled and a person inside had been fatally shot. Pop Smoke’s record label, Republic, confirmed that he was the victim.There were no arrests Wednesday, and the police said they were still investigating a motive.A number of celebrities in Los Angeles have been victims of home invasions in recent years, and fans of Pop Smoke, whose real name was Bashar Jackson, wondered whether he had unwittingly provided bait to thieves by posting photos of cash, and his address, on social media.The loss of another rising star hit the hip-hop universe hard on Wednesday, with many artists posting their condolences. Several others have died by shootings or overdoses in the last couple of years, a dark cloud over the industry coinciding with its rising fortunes thanks to new, freely available platforms including SoundCloud and TikTok.Pop Smoke emerged last year as the first breakout star of Brooklyn’s growing drill rap scene with the hits “Dior” and “Welcome to the Party,” which became the ubiquitous hip-hop song of the summer. A gravel-voiced rapper with a barklike delivery, he quickly honed a signature approach that recalled the rougher New York rap of the 1990s.He was scheduled to go on tour in March following the release of his second album, “Meet the Woo, Vol. 2.” Just last week, he returned from a trip to London, where he sat for a series of radio and magazine interviews.He had come far from Canarsie, Brooklyn, where he grew up the child of Panamanian and Jamaican parents. A stream of mourners on Wednesday paid a visit to his family home, one half of a two-story brick-and-siding duplex on East 105th Street.In an interview with the music website Genius last year, he said he created his stage name from two childhood nicknames: Papa, given to him by his Panamanian grandmother, and Smoke, part of a name his friends had given him.A next-door neighbor, Jessica Lowe, 25, said that the rapper often carried her groceries up the steps when she was returning home from shopping, and was friendly with her entire family.She said she was “more than shocked” at news of his death. “I thought it was a joke,” she said.“Obviously in this world it seems possible, but it’s just like, ‘Why now?’ “ Ms. Lowe said.Pop Smoke is one of several notable rappers to have died in the last couple of years. Accidental drug overdoses have claimed the lives of established rappers including Mac Miller and up-and-comers like Juice WRLD and Lil Peep. Shootings have killed Nipsey Hussle, XXXTentacion and a host of rappers well known in their local scenes.Pop Smoke had had legal problems: He was arrested last month on charges of transporting a stolen $375,000 Rolls-Royce to New York from California (he needed the judge’s permission to travel to London) and previously had to wear an ankle monitor as part of a court diversion program connected to a weapon charge, which was eventually dismissed. “I was literally wilding for respect,” he told The New York Times last year.Even as he was on the path to becoming the biggest New York rap success story in recent memory, the New York Police Department prevented him from performing at the Rolling Loud festival in Queens last October, citing safety concerns.In Los Angeles, he was living in a home owned by Teddi Mellencamp, a “Real Housewives” star, and her husband, Edwin Arroyave. Josh Adams, 35, who lives a few blocks away, came by on Wednesday, looking on as the police blocked the roadway and helicopters circled overhead.“Where he comes from, what he represented, I can relate to a lot of the stories he talks about in his music,” said Mr. Adams, a video editor who grew up in South Los Angeles.But Pop Smoke was also musically unique, he said. “He just had this real muffled, deep voice, and you kind of almost end up talking like him after a record of hearing him.”Pop Smoke’s lyrics were unabashedly profane, but original, Mr. Adams said. He pointed out that the rapper inverted the meaning of “thot,” a derogatory term for a sexually active woman, by proudly identifying as a “thot” himself.Mr. Adams started chanting the hook of “Welcome to the Party.”“The vibe, the way he sung the song, it was one of those records and one of the artists and one of those sounds that the world could resonate with,” he said.Fanny Jooste, who lives across the street, said she had no idea a famous rapper had been living there, adding that the people in the home were usually quiet.She said she was surprised that the security vans that patrol the neighborhood at night hadn’t happened upon the crew in the act.Many of the homes on the road have multiple security cameras pointing at the street, though most, including the one where Pop Smoke lived, do not have gates. Many fans online noted that the day before he was shot, the rapper had posted photos on Instagram showing a stack of cash and a gift bag label with his Los Angeles address.In recent years, the homes of actors, musicians and athletes have become popular targets for burglars. Rihanna, Ms. Minaj, Emmy Rossum, David Spade and the baseball player Yasiel Puig have all been victims, according to ABC News.In October 2018, the Los Angeles Police Department said that the homes of stars were targeted for specific reasons.“Initially, it was believed that these homes were being burglarized at random,” Capt. Lillian Carranza said at a news conference. “The victims’ homes have been selected based on social media postings and touring or travel schedules of the owners.”Neighborhood residents and fans continued arriving on Wednesday, staying only briefly once they realized the police were not letting anyone near the house. From time to time a car would drive up to the police tape, a Pop Smoke track thumping from the speaker, and turn around after its passengers snapped a few photos.Mr. Adams would not let his 11-year-old daughter come by, however.She had discovered Pop Smoke on TikTok. “That’s my daughter’s favorite rapper,” Mr. Adams said.“She’s not taking it well,” he said. “The first thing, she’s like, ‘All the rappers are dying.’”Louis Keene reported from Los Angeles and Derrick Bryson Taylor from New York. Reporting was contributed by Jon Caramanica, Elizabeth A. Harris, and Sean Piccoli from New York. Susan C. Beachy contributed research. More