Artist Talk: Jamila Woods

Jamila Woods is a Chicago-bred soul singer, songwriter, poet, educator and organizer. Her work focuses on themes of blackness and womanhood, with recurring emphases on self-love and the city of Chicago. Woods is a graduate of St. Ignatius College Prep and Brown University, where she received a BA in Africana Studies and Theater & Performance Studies. Her new album Legacy! Legacy! - to be released in May via Jagjaguwar this year – builds with each song a sonic and lyrical monument to historical black and brown icons of literature, art and music, and how these icons tried to push beyond the margins a country had assigned to them.

In a conversation with writer and journalist Christine Kakaire, Jamila Woods will give an insight into her creative and writing process. For example, they will look into some of the inspirations and lyrics of her three album singles ZORA, EARTHA, and GIOVANNI. Black history and ancestry being an important theme in Jamila's practice, the conversation will explore the importance of artistic as well as familial legacy and lineage in her work. And connected to that - how ancestry influences her own sense of identity and how that shows up in her work. The talk discusses how Jamila Woods uses music and poetry as her contribution to a conversation on blackness and feminism, how she connects art, community building and political work, and how she uses language in an empowering way. 

Music before and after the talk by: Hoe_mies

In a new series of Artist Talks, Music Pool Berlin invites musicians to talk about their practice for others to learn and be inspired.

GIOVANNI

ZORA