About Luis:
Luis McDougal (b.1997) is a Dominican-American guitarist and composer whose work bridges jazz, Latin American traditions, contemporary classical, and political consciousness. A graduate of Berklee College of Music (B.M.) and Manhattan School of Music (M.M.), he is a featured artist for the Bachata Jazz project. He has performed at Carnegie Hall and collaborated with artists like Aisha Syed, Rafael Solano, Samuel Torres, and Erin Rogers. In 2024, Tetro Guitars built Luis a custom instrument that now plays a central role in his creative process. He is currently recording two albums exploring the guitar’s percussive, harmonic, and compositional potential. Luis is co-founder and president of Institute for Music Evolution (IME), a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization that promotes a culture of critical artistic thinking through programs like its annual SoundBirth Festival, public concerts, and community volunteering.
Life is in a constant state of evolution, and the responsibility of an artist is to communicate, engage with and challenge our realities which are perceived through the human experience.
Excerpt from manifesto:
My responsibility as an artist is to challenge people to question their society and to consider the possibility of changing the world as opposed to accepting it as "just the way things are". I want my music to engage myself and others into realizing that there is more to music and life than what we are currently experiencing. In music, this would be done through the exploration of extremes in every sense so that we open new avenues of sound in contexts not previously explored. This idea highlights what I think are the two most important values in art and society: freedom and connection to reality. Society, with all its intricacies in politics and culture, is in a state of perpetual motion that I believe should be communicated in art. In this world of extremes (such preventable brutalities as poverty, slavery, world hunger, war, etc.), I think it makes sense to take this idea to music. I'd like to offer my perspective and invite others to reflect on/challenge the possibility of real democracy, real freedom from exploitation and coercion, and critique of nationalism.
Photos by Adam Sissler