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108 maconmagazine.com | June/July 2025 Learn more about Reese's music philosophy, performing at the BET Awards, and more in the extended cut on maconmagazine.com A n Atlanta-born R&B and soul artist, he's now a Macon mainstay, teaching and mixing magic as chief audiovisual engineer at the Otis Redding Center for the Arts, plus adding some ORCA flavor to Bragg Jam as a board member and organizer of Bragg Fam. Trust us – his résumé has range. Peep the details and see the full interview online at maconmagazine.com So, your real name is Reese Kitchens? Originally, Maurice Kitchens, Jr. But funny thing is, I have three Maurices in my family. My dad's Maurice Kitchens, Sr. and I have a brother that's Maurice – So I go by Reese. Explain ORCA in your own words. I think a lot of people talk about the history of Macon and what it used to be, and they don't put the work into continuing the legacy or bringing that next superstar. You don't have to go up the street to Atlanta. You can do it right here in Macon. The lifeblood in making this center is giving them an opportunity to have access to a real, live professional-grade Reese Soul INTERVIEW BY AMÉLIE HORACE PHOTO BY MATT ODOM F i v e m i n u t e s w i t h Artist. Teacher. Organizer. Reese Soul wears all the hats – and makes them look good. with Roberts Academy, Burdell-Hunt Elementary. We do have a producer's workshop, we have the engineering workshop, I'm about to work on a scoring workshop – so teaching kids to make music for movies, because that's something I do, sync licensing. Kids can do programs year-round, now that we have the center. It will be open to memberships where kids want to just come after school. Tell me about you. I'm originally from Atlanta, Ga., born and raised. West End. My dad's from Jones County. I ended up back in Macon when I was 15-years-old and, and I just found myself staying when I got out of college. I went there for football, and I was also a music major there. I quit sports for music. It was hard trying to do all those recitals, ensembles, football practice, games. You actually can do music forever. You definitely cannot do football forever. Some people might think I took the hard road. But hey, I love what I do, and I feel fulfilled doing it. What do you make for yourself? I still full-time produce. I make music for movies. I perform. I release music, still. Music is my life. I always said I never wanted to teach, ever. It's funny, because what happens is when you get to a certain level of what you're doing, teaching comes by mistake. Someone wants to know, "How did you do that?" I've done some cool things. I've made some music for The Isley Brothers.. I was the music director for Alex Isley, which is Ron Isley's niece. I love Christmas season. I always have Christmas songs working for Hallmark. What about your music? I just released a single, a wedding song, and then I have an EP coming out entitled Arrival. It's going to be a three-part EP this year. It'll be Arrival, Layover, Departure. studio, even in their earlier years. When they get to moving up in the world and getting in their artistry – ooohh, they've been doing that a long time. We have lessons, camps and workshops. One-on-one lessons if you want to do piano, guitar, vocal, drums, trumpet, engineering, pretty much anything. That, I think, is very overlooked [engineering]. I think when people talk about, "I want to learn music." People are like, "OK, do you want to learn how to play the trumpet, or the saxophone, or guitar?" And nobody says, "What if I just want to produce music?" But what if there's like an 8-year-old who's really technically creative and she's like, "I actually want to learn how to produce a song." They end up in the studio with me and they love it. Currently, we are doing Music Makers Workshop, and we've partnered