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01/21/2020 11:00 PMOne of Guilford High School’s (GHS) most accomplished alumnus, Mo Pleasure has spent the better part of three decades playing music all over the world with Ray Charles, Janet Jackson, and Earth, Wind, and Fire. Now he’s returning to Guilford for a benefit concert that is deeply personal to both him and the town.
Pleasure will be joined by several local musicians as well as members of GHS’s music program on Saturday, Feb. 1 for a benefit concert extravaganza—the fifth in a series that Pleasure has headlined going back to 2009—that supports the Guilford ABC (A Better Chance) program.
Guilford ABC is the local chapter of a national organization that brings students of color from underfunded high schools to high performing districts to live and study. While the program originally focused on private schools, Guilford was one of the first public schools to participate in the program back in 1974, according to the Guilford ABC website.
Pleasure met his wife, attorney Lori Harris Pleasure, through the program. She was one of the first participants in the program, according to concert organizer Jeff Zeitlin. Mo Pleasure was a longtime Guilford resident, the son of an elementary school principal who helped found the Guilford ABC chapter.
Beginning in 2009, Pleasure has returned to GHS, bringing his tremendous talent and experience to both entertain residents and give back to a program that did a lot of good for him and his family.
This will be the first concert since 2016. Zeitlin told the Courier that these concerts are always a raucous, fun experience, full of local flavor and led by a world-class musician who has always kept Guilford close to his heart.
“It’s a bluesy, jazzy, with a little bit of pop thrown in,” Zeitlin said. “And I think the audience tends to react in that manner.”
Pleasure is probably best known for his 10 years work with seminal genre-fluid group Earth, Wind, and Fire, when he served as the group’s musical director. Zeitlin said he expects to hear plenty of songs from that era of Pleasure’s career, which is always popular with audiences.
Pleasure is also including members of the GHS music program, including jazz band musicians and singers, who “always get the biggest reaction” from the audience, according to Zeitlin.
Guilford ABC is entirely supported by donations, Zeitlin said, with the concert, along with proceeds from the Hole in the Wall thrift store on Boston Street, making up a large part of the organization’s funding. Students participating in the ABC program stay for their entire high school careers and live in Guilford, he said, and are able to take part in other educational activities in the realm of arts and culture, including trips to New York City and New Haven for shows.
Zeitlin said many alumnae of the Guilford ABC program have gone on to have prominent careers in various fields, with Lori Harris Pleasure being a notable example.
For more information about Guilford ABC or to purchase tickets ($20 to $40) for the concert, visit www.guilfordabc.org.