A ‘Hamilton’-Style Prison Rap About the Risks of Pride

Filed
1:00 p.m. EDT

04.19.2026

Written by a person at Sing Sing jail, ‘Pleasure’ is a spotlight of the primary album by famed jail program Musicambia.

This essay is a part of Redemption Songs, a limited-run e-newsletter that spotlights one track every week by incarcerated artists. Enroll now to get a brand new track every Sunday afternoon till September:

The Message Behind This ‘Hamilton’-Fashion Jail Rap? Pleasure Can Be Harmful

Hear when you like: Lecrae, Kirk Franklin, “Hamilton: An American Musical”

A little over a decade in the past, Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical about Alexander Hamilton grew to become a cultural juggernaut, bridging the worlds of hip-hop and Broadway. And it appears one of many many locations the place Miranda’s fashion traveled was actually up the river — to Sing Sing jail, in Ossining, New York.

I instantly considered Miranda once I heard “Pleasure,” the lead single on the brand new album by The Cambia Collective. The band options former Sing Sing prisoners who’ve labored with Musicambia, a nonprofit that teaches music in prisons. “The Musicambia Songbook,” because the album is known as, comprises songs written by women and men in New York correctional services. It will likely be launched on June 26, and there’s a present in Brooklyn on Could 12.

The album’s backstory begins removed from New York, within the prisons of Venezuela, the place 1000’s of women and men study to sing and play devices in a program referred to as El Sistema. “Pleasure and vanity develop not solely within the prisoners but in addition of their households and communities, and the consequences of the work lengthen to the subsequent era,” the New York Metropolis-based violist Nathan Schram wrote in an essay after a 2013 go to. “I heard a pregnant lady sing a heartfelt lullaby to her unborn little one.”

That journey impressed Schram to start out Musicambia, which brings skilled musicians to show, construct ensembles and placed on concert events in prisons in New York, Kansas and different states. They share school and college students at Sing Sing with Carnegie Corridor’s Musical Connections program, and collectively these applications are on the forefront of jail music schooling right this moment.

Heavy restrictions throughout American prisons preserve applications like these small, serving a whole bunch of individuals relatively than 1000’s. However they’re an excellent instance of the various alternatives throughout the nation for individuals to volunteer in prisons and jails, educating no matter they know. And there may be actually proof that instructional applications scale back the probability that contributors will return to jail.

However Musicambia lecturers see their objective as a lot larger than that.

In an inner handbook, Sing Sing Program Director Elliot Cole writes that in a democracy, “we’re collectively accountable” for the ways in which our prisons fail to assist individuals succeed on the surface. (Full disclosure: Elliot is a buddy and we’ve got performed music collectively.) Cole writes about music as each a metaphor and a literal technique of restore in our damaged society, the place we discover what’s “out of tune” and search concord.

“Pleasure” options admonishing rhymes concerning the risks of ego, over intricate horn and string preparations and drums that alternate between an ordinary hip-hop backbeat and a militaristic snare sample. The rap incorporates a Miranda-esque call-and-response centering the phrase “pleasure.”

The track was written by a Musicambia scholar credited solely as D.S. in accordance with jail guidelines. In an emailed assertion, the New York State Division of Corrections and Neighborhood Supervision mentioned it restricts full names for incarcerated performers “in an effort to guard the privateness of the incarcerated particular person and secondly out of respect for any victims impacted by the person’s crime.” Up to now, the division has tangled with First Modification advocates over censorship.

D.S. is serving 25 years to life for a homicide that he maintained at trial was self-defense, and that he was traumatized having beforehand been shot himself. “The regret that I really feel for taking a life is immeasurable,” he wrote to me from Sing Sing. “It’s not sufficient for me to BE SORRY, I needed to DO SORRY … I can’t change my previous however hopefully by my music, certificates in ministry and school schooling I can change the long run.”

D.S. is now studying bass guitar with Musicambia, and he advised me he’s taking psychology and sociology courses. “Incarcerated people have a sure stigma round us,” he wrote. “However music launched by us humanizes us, will increase the empathy and reduces the preconceived notions of us.”

In the track’s refrain, “pleasure” serves as an acronym — the “prime purpose people die early.” The phrase “people” is a mouthful, and Cole, the trainer, advised me the opposite possibility was “idiots.” However D.S. was adamant about sounding respectful.

Partly as a consequence of huge upheavals in New York state prisons brought on by an unauthorized officers’ strike, Musicambia selected to not try recording within the jail. The album incorporates a mixture of lecturers, supporters and alumni who’ve left jail. D.S. agreed to have Kenyatta Emmanuel, with whom he served time, carry out the rap, each on the album and on the live performance in Could.

D.S. cites the Bible’s warnings about pleasure as inspiration, but in addition is aware of that in the correct context, pleasure — to your progress, for your loved ones — could be constructive, too. “My track is to encourage the individuals to be prideful of who you’re in Christ, the place you got here from, and what God has in retailer for you.”

Cole advised me that the biblical affect is even clearer once you hear D.S. ship the track himself.

“He carries himself like a preacher, or the highest scholar within the class,” he advised me. “When he raps, he’s obtained his personal voice. He’s not attempting to sound like individuals on the radio.”

D.S. turns into eligible for parole in 2031, so maybe sometime we’ll get to listen to him.

LINER NOTES:

Track: Pleasure | Artist: The Cambia Collective | Songwriter: D.S. | Vocals: Kenyatta Emmanuel | Bass: Elliot Cole | Drums: Karl Ronneburg | Guitar: Jan Esbra | Violin 1: Katie Hyun | Violin 2: Trina Basu | Viola: Nathan Schram | Cello: Hamilton Berry | Trumpet: John Carlson | Saxophone: Peter Hess | Trombone: Nick Grinder | Combined, produced and organized by: Elliot Cole | Extra mixing: Christopher Botta | Mastering: Joseph Branciforte | Location: Determine 8 Recording, Brooklyn, New York