Episode 4 | Our Aesthetics: Celebrating Black Sounds
“We’re almost there, my dear.
I want you to welcome joy.
The upcoming nutshell of pure Black joy.
Black freedom. Black poetry. Black longing. Black longing for joy.
Black longing for freedom. Black longing for poetry.
I want you to let your body remember what they feel like.
Keep breathing in and out...
Relax your jaw...
Your eyes...
Your forehead…”
About tUkU matthews:
tUkU is a composer, singer, and performance artist, exploring the relationship between words and melody; voice as archive to sonically weave community. A Dora-nominated theatre composer and a poetic songwriter who excels at uniting text with complex harmonic songlines, tUkU honours the place singing takes in Black woman culture. tUkU’s comes to music through a powerful musical lineage, from the Bey family of artists, in Canada and the US, prominently rooted in jazz culture.
In this episode, we are guided by SOSA (aka The Sauce), a soft-spoken sound and music art therapist, who welcomes a new patient for a session. Although the patient arrives full of doubts and anxiety, SOSA uses the power of Black aesthetic sound to offer solace and healing. An entirely FUBU call to the heavens, forever out of reach from the white gaze, this episode does a deep dive to unpack, understand, express, and celebrate the nuanced texture of sound-makers that are committed to Black collective aesthetics.
Featuring tUkU matthews, Edythe Rodriguez, Tata Henieriette and jamilah malika abu-bakare
‘I have been singing with my mother and sister since I was a child.’
The recipient of a Chalmers Arts Fellowship, tUkU created a project titled diary of a salt. eater, to set to melody select poems from nayyirah waheed’s salt. for Black woman chorus. In research into ways of being, tUkU recently participated in collective process work facilitated by philosopher/writer/activist Bayo Akomolafe. tUkU is currently composing and recording her solo song set entitled luna’s re-. CATEGORY:WOMAN is tUkU’s debut as a film composer.
‘More than anything, the experience of listening shapes my choices of expression as an artist and inspires my day-to-day movements as a human being.’
About Edythe Rodriguez:
Edythe Rodriguez is a Philly-based copywriter, hardcore Bustelo drinker and non-violent Beyhive member. She loves neo-soul, battle rap, and long walks through old poetry journals. Her work is either published or forthcoming in Obsidian, Brown Sugar Literary, Call and Response Journal, and Alebrijes Review.
Art that Influenced the Episode:
Breath
Sounds and Words by Alexis Pauline Gumbs and Toshi Reagan
We Real
Poem by Kevin Coval, feat. Gwendolyn Brooks, Produced by Saba the Pivot
Meditation by: Dora Kamau
Song by: Moor Mother feat. Elaine Mitchener and Dudù Kouate
About the Writers:
Jo Güstin is an intersectionality writer, playwright, director, producer, and comedian who celebrates Black and queer joy and creativity using fiction and comedy. After Cameroon, France, Germany and Japan, the multilingual novelist behind
9 Histoires lumineuses (2017) and Ah Sissi, il faut souffrir pour être française! (2019) now lives in Toronto (Canada) where she launched the creative production company DEARNGE SOCIETY.
The award-winning storytelling podcast Contes et légendes du Queeristan and short film Don’t Text Your Ex are her first creations under the trademark. In 2022, she launched (Make It Like) Poetry, a collection of weekly spoken-word poems in French and English on her YouTube channel Vidéwokes. She is also performing her comedy special Je n'suis pas venue ici pour souffrir, ok? for the French-Canadian audiences, and field-testing her upcoming play Life Is Too Short To Be Straight with the support of the Ontario Arts Council.
About the Audio Series:
Speech Sounds is a 5-part audio-series showcasing sound artists, griots, and poets working while engaging in a conversation around memory and culture for those within the African diaspora.
Speech Sounds is funded by the Canada Arts Council and the Ontario Arts Council. Speech Sound has received financial and in-kind support from OCAD University, Writing While Black collective, ROOM Magazine as well as our donors. Thank you to everyone who believes in our project.