Thursday night, I went to see Dr. E (aka Elaine Richardson) perform at the McConnell Arts center in Worthington. Friday night, I went to see Jazz Moves Columbus at the Riffe Center downtown. I had been intending to post a full blog report about each, but the second half of the ballet presented an ugly scene I just couldn’t ignore. I would have been appalled at the presentation of race in the ballet no matter what, but the contrast with Dr. E’s performance the night before made it all the more unsettling.
Dr. E was performing a “Tribute to Jazz, Funk and Soul Queens” in celebration of Black History Month. Backed by a talented band, Dr. E’s performance was dynamic and entertaining. The first set was low-key; Dr. E sometimes singing over a quiet solo piano. After the break, Dr. E had changed her elegant red evening gown for a sparkly golden mini-dress, and the energy level followed. Her version of “Proud Mary” started with a slow chorus before kicking it up to the energy we’d expect from Tina herself. Dr. E’s exuberance on the stage, clearly evident in her playful rendition of “Lady Marmalade,” was infectious for the crowd. She followed her own song “Let Me Clear My Throat” about a woman demanding better treatment from her man with a comic interlude.
Over a low blues vamp, Dr. E and her piano player dramatized a series of phone conversations from a relationship that wasn’t quite what it seemed, before surprising us all by breaking seamlessly back into the chorus of “Let Me Clear My Throat.”But for me, it was the poignant moments that made the night. Dr. E introduced “Strange Fruit” with a monologue from the play “At Last” by Mary Weems. She seemed to pour all the experience of her own difficult life into the monologue about the hardships and achievements of black women performers throughout the 20th century. After singing a touching version of “At Last” in honor of Etta James, Dr. E noted that “Heaven’s got a good choir.” She closed the night with her own song “Elevated” about turning her life around for the sake of her daughter. Introducing the closing number, Dr. E testified about her struggles twenty-five years earlier to escape the street, to get out of sex work, and to overcome drugs and alcohol. I’ve seen Dr. E share her story before. She’s quite free with it, and the reason is clear. As she told us, she shares her story so that we will all understand that even those individuals who appear to be beyond hope are worth our time and our energy, because nobody is truly hopeless.
Jazz Moves Columbus opened with a multimedia presentation projected on the large screen behind the Columbus Jazz Orchestra, already seated on a low riser spanning the back of the stage. Old black-and-white photographs and grainy film clips gave way to modern color images, as sounds of chirping birds, kids playing, the clopping of horse hooves, the pulse of train engines, and bomb sirens layered to create a building sense of tension and anticipation. As Martin Luther King’s voice rang out saying “I have a dream,” it was clear that the partnership between the Jazz Orchestra and the BalletMet was aiming to present something dramatic and profound. The multimedia presentation reached its end, and the stark sound of rewinding tape blared out at the audience as the collection of time-lapse images rewound themselves to the beginning. I suspect the intention was to go back to the beginning and tell the tale from its start, but by the end of the night I wondered if we weren’t all stuck in the past more than we would like to admit.
As the band struck the opening chords of “Tutu,” the lead trumpet wandered onto the stage from the wing. Later, a saxophone soloist would join him. Moving seemingly freely around the stage, they literalized the wandering of Jazz improvisation. The first section of the program was called “Memories” and featured two pieces. For “CTA” a medium-sized ensemble of dancers playfully presented a couple trying to stay together in a crowd to a medley of songs by Chicago. “Miles To Go” had three movements: a trio of dancers that incorporated lots of back and forth movements as two men fought over a woman, a wonderfully elegant duet with lots of dramatic lifts in a routine grounded in unison, and a raucous ensemble of eight paired dancers that also split off into a strutting battle of the sexes. A brief multimedia interlude presented a series of distinctly Columbus and Ohio State clips over a jaunty piano reminiscent of old movie houses. The next section of the program, “Moving Forward,” featured the single piece “Topsy,” in which five dancers in black presented a jazzy amalgamation. The call and response of the lead saxes and answering brass was mirrored both in a strong left-right, right-left movement and a style that combined traditional ballet moves with the attitude of swing. The final section of the first half, “City Life,” presented a piece inspired by West Side Story called “A Time and Place…” Moving from an opening movement of gang tension to a touching duet, the piece closed with a unified ensemble that had switched to contemporary costumes and even mixed in some hip hop based moves in the breakout sections that counterposed the unified classical movements.
After intermission, the opening piece pointed to a second half that would match the first in excellence. “Pulses, Chords, Passion” opened with eight paired dancers – the men in all black, the women in boldly colored, sequined dresses. This sultry piece moved through various groupings and solos as the dancers moved about in an on-point stutter step, swaggering their hips suggestively. The use of modern moves (dancers leaning into each other as the only way to stay up and presenting sudden and dramatic arm movements) was just one of the things that excited me about this performance so far. Combining three of my passions – dance, music, and multimedia – it seemed like Jazz Moves Columbus was going to be a perfect evening. And this is when things fell apart. Or at least my notes do, because the next piece shocked me so much I barely moved again until the usher told me they were closing up and I stood up to leave the empty theater.
“Testify” opened with a pulsing organ rhythm as twelve paired dancers bounded onto the stage to James Cleveland’s “Get Right Church.” The men wore long sleeve shirts and buttoned-up vests that matched their trousers; the women wore ankle-length skirts and the highest necklines of the night. Alternating between an in-facing circle and straight lines, the dancers bounced up and down, miming the movements you might see at a revival church. They’d throw their arms in the air frantically shaking their hands as if “struck by the spirit.” There were some lifts. There was an interweaving motion between multiple pairs. But it seemed to me that there was nothing innovative or interesting about the movements of this piece. Unless, you might count the two male dancers who moved to the front of the stage arms around each other’s shoulders to do a frantic shuffle step while grinning at the audience. The crowd responded with the loudest cheers of the night, but I was uneasy. Something felt wrong, insincere, mocking.
Then it got worse. After the dancers left the stage, Byron Stripling, the orchestra’s director, grabbed a microphone and stepped down from the riser. As he came forward toward the audience, he began to speak with the cadence you would expect from a traditional black preacher. “I’m know y’all want me to sit down, but I got to say something.” He would repeat sing-song lines two and three times as the audience became more and more vocal. He knew the art well. He’d build the audience up, letting them release just enough tension before another dramatic pause. You could hear rustling and shifting in seats, but there was no music, no words, no sound. Stripling called out “I’ve got something to say,” and a man in audience responded “Preach it brother.” Here things get a little fuzzy, because I felt overwhelmed and physically ill as I realized what was happening: this is blackface. I don’t know the man who called out. It’s probably unfair for to me say anything about him. But I suspect he had never called out anything of the sort before, at least not in sincerity. The night before Dr. E. had testified, and her audience had responded vocally. I didn’t because that’s not how I act, not who I am, not my culture. I absolutely respect those that did, but why would I ever try on someone else’s culture as if it was a hat to pick up and put on my head. At some point or other, Stripling had moved into singing “This Little Light of Mine.” The band joined him and the dancers returned to stage for a brief encore, before taking a bow to the loudest applause of the night. I sat motionless in my seat, but a sizable portion of the audience stood to cheer enthusiastically.
Another multimedia presentation followed. I don’t remember much of the music because I was mesmerized as footage of civil rights protest and war protests were shown interchangeably with as many shots of injured police as of protestors. There were mobs. There was violence. But from the montage, you would know nothing of a cause or grievance.
The final piece “Motown Moves” seemed to start acceptably – men in black and white, women in simple black dresses, classical movement presented in a modern choreography – and I hoped for anything to restore my faith in the artistic endeavor of the night. After a few moments, two figures ran in and stood upstage facing away from the audience. Clad head to toe in a shimmering crimson fabric, they evoked the image of the pimp circulated in blaxploitation films, complete with fedoras jauntily askew. I assume these are the figures Dispatch reporter Barbara Zuck refers to when she says that the piece features “hilarious characterizations and costumes.” All of sudden, the two figures shed their jackets dramatically as they spun around to face the audience — they were the only shirtless dancers of the entire night. Their movements drew on hip hop moves but in a exaggerated sexual manner. At one point, they dropped to a plank position and repeatedly thrust their pelvises to the floor. They proceeded to disrupt the order of the rest of the dancers, cornering a lead female dancer to literally rip her dress off, revealing a crimson sequined dress underneath. There was a lot of complex choreography going on in “Motown Moves” that I would have liked to enjoy, but I was continually distracted by these two figures and the fact that I could no longer appreciate the incorporation of hip hop moves as I had in the first half of the night’s performance.
In closing, let me say a word about blackface and why I believe that a black man and two white men, none of whom were wearing black face paint, were performing blackface. To assume that blackface as a performance depends on the face paint is connected to the assumption that race is some sort of natural fact that can be read through skin color, rather than the cultural construction it really is. Blackface is about embodying a particular stereotype of race expressed outwardly through signs that are incorrectly thought to be true signifiers of a category that is in fact arbitrarily constructed. Dialect, singing style, costuming, and dance moves function as these signs just as easily as painted skin. Lastly, blackface is mostly about the relationship between the performance and the audience, a relationship in which the identification of difference reaffirms the identity of the audience in an inherently hierarchal fashion.
When I finally made it to the lobby, the almost entirely white crowd was amiably eating the ice cream sandwiches that been provided and talking over their favorite portions of the night. Overhearing excited snippets of conversation, I couldn’t help but wonder how the “pleasant” but temporary divergence from “pure ballet” reflected a problematic racial dynamic that I had naively thought was a thing of the distant past.
Give Us Free Records: Press
JAZZ
• A singer and Ohio State University professor who traded a rough life on the streets for the halls of academia, Elaine Richardson will offer an expressive night of music titled “Dr. E’s Tribute to Jazz, Funk and Soul Queens — From Sarah Vaughn to Chaka Khan and Beyond” at 8 p.m. Thursday in the McConnell Arts Center, 777 Evening St., Worthington. Tickets cost $8, or $10 the day of the show ($5 for students, free for age 12 and younger). Call 614-431-0329 or visit www.mcconnellarts.org.
Concert Review: Dr. E Live @ Vonn Jazz
Add a comment Sara Awad, Columbus Urban Arts Examiner
August 10, 2011 - Subscribe to get instant updates.
Singer and songwriter, Dr. E gave concert goers an evening to remember when she took the stage at Vonn Jazz Supper Club last Sunday. Despite pouring rain and an a few other minor technical glitches, Ohio's hometown girl was on top of her game.
The former East Lansing resident, whose musical style has been compared to legends like Stephanie Mills, Patti LaBelle, Ledisi and Jill Scott, kicked off the evening with songs from her latest album Elevated which was released last year. Guests swayed and cheered as she delivered crowd favorites like Dance to My Song and All of Me (by Ella Fitzgerald). Her soulful, pitch perfect performance was real and relatable, offering listeners an invitation to eavesdrop on the defining moments of her life, as it was musically compelling.
The Ohio State University professor, whose life experiences have led her from a series of abusive relationships and dangerous choices to her current status as a Christian and mentor, connected with her audience on a personal level, sharing love, laughs and testimony between songs, making sure that everyone was feeling good, and they ate it up, dancing and waving their arms every chance they could get.
All in all, the concert was a testament that it isn't necessary to have elaborate choreography, an intricate stage production or any of the other gimmicks many mainstream artists employ to pull off a successful and entertaining performance. It was all about the woman and her raw, unadorned vocal talent.
She closed out the evening with a roof-rattling rendition of Good Girl Down, digging into the female condition,celebrating its joys and pondering its challenges in unsparing detail. Song by song, she drew the audience in close,enlisting them as participants in the patchwork of highs and lows that make up the story of her life while demonstrating an expansive repertoire of musical styles that ranged from jazz murmur to soul hollar. All in all, she was a lady with much to say and no shortage of ways to say it.
If you missed Dr. E at Vonn Jazz last week, you will have an opportunity to catch her next performance at Ceviche Bar in Pepper Pike, Ohio on October 2, 2011. You can also hear her music featured on popular daytime television shows, All My Children, The Young & the Restless and the sitcom Dharma and Greg. Her CD Elevated is available for preview and purchase at www.reverbnation.com.
'Jazzy Soul Queen' to Grace Stage at JazzFest
By Stefanie Pohl
CREATED Aug. 4, 2011
Dr. E will be headlining JazzFest Friday night.
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MSU PhD, "Dr. E" headlines Lansing JazzFest! After battling a tough road to recovery and getting off the streets, Dr. Elaine Richardson earned a doctorate in English from Michigan State University. It was there she met Distinguished Professor Geneva Smitherman who went on to help her become an internationally recognized scholar. In addition to her two published academic texts Dr. E has co-edited three other books and is in the process of completing a personal memoir detailing her inspirational story of redemption. Currently Dr. E teaches literacy studies in the College of Education at The Ohio State University. To top it off, she is also a nationally adored recording artist enjoyed most by soul and jazz audiences for her warm, bluesy tones, infectious rhythms, and fierce live performances.
Dr. E will return to the state of Michigan to headline the 2011 Lansing Jazz Fest taking place August 5-6, 2011. She will lead a clinic Friday August 5 at 5pm on the MICA Stage at The Lansing Jazz Fest followed by a live performance you wont want to miss later Friday evening from 9:00 - 10:30pm on the Jackson National Stage.
We spoke with Dr. E to discuss the upcoming show, her clinic "Dr. E: My Music & My Life", and her connection with Lansing.
FOX 47 News: You're returning to the Lansing area for JazzFest. What were your experiences like here when you were getting your doctorate?
Dr. E: I had a great experience living in the Lansing area. While I was there, my children were a lot younger. In fact, they went to Spartan Village elementary school, which I'm told is not there anymore. I thought that was such a great experience for us. I lived in the graduate student housing there and it was amazing to live in that cosmopolitan environment. My neighbors were Korean, Somalian, just from everywhere. It was just so good for my children to grow up in a diverse environment like that. It's natural for you to see people and learn about people from different parts of the world. It was such a great experience for my children but also for me too.
I got a full-ride minority competitive doctoral fellowship. It was an affirmative action scholarship. It was an honor for me, somebody who came through a rough life and background of poverty, to receive help once I was able to reach out for help. I had positive people in my life who invested in me, and one thing led to another. I was able to meet Geneva Smitherman who was a university-distinguished professor of English at Michigan State University and she was part of the reason why I got the fellowship that I got. Being able to get that education and opportunity, for myself and for my children, it made a difference in our lives.
FOX 47 News: Are you looking forward to Lansing JazzFest this weekend?
Dr. E: I am! I am so excited. It's going to be great. And I have friends there too; one of our students that I met at Ohio State, Bonnie Wood, is in the PhD program in English at Michigan State. She graduated with her Masters at Ohio State University, so she's sort of following in my footsteps, which makes me proud. A lot of people from the English department are coming and giving me a big party, so I'm really looking forward to it.
FOX 47 News: What will be the focus of your clinic on Friday?
Dr. E: Turning your life into lyrics and melody. It's actually called "My Life and My Music" but that's what it's about. How I take life experiences, and how sometimes I get melodies and feelings and then I put the lyrics to it. And sometimes when I get the lyrics from my life, and I sing it to musicians that I work with, and we come up with the sound. It's about writing, and living, and how your music and your life can be therapeutic.
FOX 47 News: It is quite a female-driven lineup this year at JazzFest. How does this speak to the jazz genre today and your experiences in the jazz world?
Dr. E: I can't speak generally, but in my personal experience, I have been blessed. People have been embracing me. Right now I live in Columbus, Ohio - here, especially, there is a lot of love for female artists. Both vocalists and instrumentalists. I have a lot of support in the Ohio region as a female artist. I do feel, from what can I see, is that there is a lot of love for female artists. There could be a lot more! But there are a lot of people supporting female artists and female musicians, so I am happy about that. A lot of people could take some notes of what the Lansing Jazz Festival is doing in terms of female representation.
FOX 47 News: What should patrons expect from your performance Friday night?
Dr. E: I would say a lot of soul, and emotion. Improvisation. I think that performing is about connecting with the audience, with the vibe, and trying to ignite in people the message that you're trying to get across with your songs and your lyrics. That's basically what I'm about. I like to refer to myself as a 'Jazzy Soul Queen'. I love people like Etta James and Ella Fitzgerald and Patti LaBelle. I draw from a wide array of female vocalists, and I love being free. Performing and doing music for me is a form of freedom. So I like to just pray to get free while I'm performing and to inspire people. That's what I hope to accomplish.
For more information about Dr. E and all of the JazzFest performers, you can visit the official JazzFest website. You can also visit Dr. E's website to stream some of her music and find out more about her future shows.
Sharing African-American heritage: Singer with inspirational story to perform at festival
July 19, 2011
, For the MirrorElaine Richardson is an accomplished singer, songwriter and English professor at Ohio State University.
The 51-year-old will combine her passions for music, academics and community outreach when she sings as the headlining performer Saturday, July 23, at the African-American Heritage Festival at Penn State Altoona's campus.
Harriet Gaston, a chairwoman for the African-American Heritage Project, said that when Richardson reached out about performing, she knew that she would be a good fit for the festival.
"The goal is to promote the history and culture of the African-American community," Gaston said. She added that the festival is open to everyone, not just African-Americans.
The African-American Heritage Festival started in 1992. Gaston said that about 20 percent of Blair County is African-American and that the festival is an entertaining learning experience.
The event will feature arts, crafts, food and vendors that are influenced by African-American culture. The Smith Building will provide information on the history of African-Americans in central Pennsylvania.
Richardson, who found out about the festival while teaching at Penn State, said that she thought it was important that people learn about the African-American community, which is why she wanted to sing at the event.
But there was a point in Richardson's life when she didn't think she'd earn her Ph.D. or have the confidence to sing on stage.
Now Richardson commonly goes by her stage name, Dr. E., but years ago, growing up in a poor area of Cleveland, Richardson was a teenage prostitute, a drug user and a college dropout. No one knew who she was, and she even thought that this would be her permanent life.
"I think I'm the last person that people would think would earn a Ph.D," Richardson said.
"I've had people mentor me and invest in me, and it paid off, so that's why I'm a big advocate of not giving up on people, not counting people out."
Richardson found music at an early age, singing in church choirs and talent shows around Cleveland. But her confidence and enthusiasm was quickly swept away once she was raped at the age of 13, and she found solace in the wrong group of people.
"I just got involved with a lot of people who were involved with negative activities, and I felt comfortable in that crowd because I didn't have any self-esteem," Richardson said.
Even though she spent most of her time with "people in the underground lifestyle," including a relationship with a criminal, Richardson said that her mother never gave up on her.
"My mother struggled to keep me on the path toward education or toward a respectable life," she said. "It was a struggle for me to graduate high school."
But she did.
She enrolled at Cleveland State University, however Richardson said she was unprepared, taking developmental courses just to keep up.
She fell in with the wrong crowd of people and lagged behind on coursework. She flunked out of college, and the streets summoned her.
"I went full-fledged into the underground life," Richardson said.
She worked on the streets of Cleveland and sometimes New York.
She had her first child, Evelyn, in 1984 to a boyfriend. She had her second child, Ebony, in 1987, while working as a prostitute.
The birth of her second child was the turning point for her, because she thought that she had killed her baby.
"I was over nine months pregnant then, and I was on drugs, out there, and finally I went to one of my friend's house and said 'I think that my baby is dead," Richardson said.
She went to the hospital, where she was threatened with jail. Richardson said that she was "glad" about the possibility of going to jail because she needed to be forced into turning her life around.
Her daughter was born healthy, and Richardson started going to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings and participating in a program called the Second Chance Project. The Project was run by Andrew Edwards, a professor at Cleveland State, who was trying to help sexually exploited women.
"I just surrendered," she said. "I just didn't know what to do with my life, and I needed help. People said that I could still change in my life, and so I listened to them."
Richardson moved back in with her mother in Cleveland, and started going to school. She earned her master's degree in English from Cleveland State in 1993, then received her doctorate from Michigan State.
She taught at the University of Minnesota before teaching English and linguistics at Penn State for nine years until 2007.
"I loved living in State College," Richardson said. "My children were small and it was a good environment for me as a single parent with my children."
Richardson had a third daughter, Kaila, in 1991. Both Ebony and Kaila Richardson attended Penn State before going to Ohio State once Elaine Richardson moved back to teach there.
While teaching, Richardson continues her musical composition, which she started to do while studying at Michigan State.
"After going to therapy and talking about all of my traumatic experiences, I was able to get my voice back," Richardson said.
Richardson's 2010 album, "Elevated," a collaboration with Larry D. Marcus, a Billboard Award-winning songwriter, relates to her own experiences and those around her.
She said that even though her music is the product of African-American-influenced styles, anyone can relate to it, which she thinks is an important message that the festival promotes.
"Even though my music comes from African- American culture, it reaches across cultures, races, class and gender," Richardson said.
Strong Women In Music Concert Interview Series: The Opening Act, Dr. E
Strong Women In Music Concert at Penn State University | April 27, 2011
Interviews with MC Lyte, Dr. E and musical director Ronnie Burrage.
Led by world renowned drummer Ronnie Burrage, a live band composed of musicians Eli Byrne, Chulo Gatewood, Marvin Horne, and Adam Faulk accompanied the legendary MC Lyte for the Penn State Jazz Club Strong Women In Music concert held April 27th at Alumni Hall.
Penn State Student rappers Ugo, Equille Williams, Jackie Hodge and Drew Dub of the Hip-Hop/ Reggae ensemble Atlas Soundtrack (interview coming soon) also shared the stage with MC Lyte for a crowd pleasing performance of the game changing single “Self Destruction.”
EAR CANDI is pleased to present crew member Ebony Jeanette’s interviews with headliner MC Lyte, opening act Dr. E and musical director Ronnie Burrage.
A special thank you to the Penn State Jazz Club faculty advisor Eli Byrne for making it all possible!
The Opening Act: Interview with Dr. E
Opening the Strong Women In Music concert was soul songstress, songwriter, and former Penn State professor Dr. E.
A rising independent artist, Dr. E has performed at many notable venues such as Walt Disney World, The Cleveland Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, The Lincoln Theatre and more. She has captivated listeners with her unique brand of soul and continues to inspire through her personal story of redemption (See here).
Thanks again Dr. E for a great interview! – Ebony Jeanette
EAR CANDI: What does it mean to be a “Strong Woman In Music” to you?
Dr. E: Be who you are and keep grinding.
EAR CANDI: As the opening act for the Strong Women In Music concert, what do you feel right now is most exciting about your music?
Dr. E: Well, now I have gotten beyond the initial excitement when I first completed my project. Now I am proud of my music because it is a part of who I am and it makes me feel good that a lot of people like it and accept it and me for who I am. I am growing as a woman and a songwriter which is great! It feels so wonderful to open the evening for MC Lyte, she has always been an inspiration to me as an versatile entrepreneur and master of her craft.
EAR CANDI: Tell us about your day job, you were a professor at Penn State a few years back and currently at at Ohio State University right?
Dr. E: I am becoming more and more of who I really am and want to be. I used to think of myself as Elaine the singer-songwriter, Elaine the sister-girl from Cleveland, Dr. E the applied linguist who loves culture and African and Afro-diasporic cultures, Dr. E the community advocate. My selves are really not disparate. I am figuring out that I don’t have to separate my music life from my scholarly and outreach life. I am all one person and I take me everywhere I go. It’s cool!
EAR CANDI: You are a scholar and a songwriter wow! So what is your music writing process like? Does it just come to you?
Dr. E: I can have an idea and the music comes later, or sometimes I get the music and feeling and lyrics all at once, or I will experience an emotion or event and a song will come to me. I’ve had dreams where I saw myself singing a song I end up writing and other times, someone will just give me pre-recorded tracks and I”l vibe until something comes.
EAR CANDI: Who are you listening to the most right now on your ipod?
Dr. E: I’m listening to Georgia Anne Muldrow, Monica, Ronnie Burrage, MC Lyte, and Mary Mary.
EAR CANDI: What advice do you give to young girls who have made difficult life choices? How can they be Elevated?
Dr. E: We all make mistakes. Don’t let your past define your future. You are love made straight from the creator, no matter your circumstances. Get the support you need. Reach out and keep striving for your goals.
EAR CANDI: Where can we buy your music?
Dr. E: cdbaby.com/dreelevated
LIKE Dr. E on FACEBOOK!
Cleveland's next generation of top musicians walks among us today, but you might not have noticed them yet. Not much makes them stand out on the street — maybe it's the long hair, the leather jackets, or the look in their eyes that says we're hungry.
But on weekend nights, they pick up their guitars, grab their microphones, cue up fresh mixes, and turn Northeast Ohio's clubs into seas of pumping fists and bouncing bodies.
Already a few are earning national acclaim, and perhaps someday they'll all be known everywhere. Each of these 10 area artists are set to hit their stride in 2011, and most are slated to release new albums in the coming months.
Have a chance to see them live? Do it now, before all your friends are talking. After all, bragging rights are everything these days.
Cloud Nothings
Last year at this time, Dylan Baldi was an 18-year-old kid making skuzzy power-pop songs in his parents' Westlake basement. By the end of 2010, Baldi — better known by the recording moniker Cloud Nothings — saw his homemade debut EP, Turning On, reissued on Carpark Records, home of 2010 buzz band Beach House. He toured with Wavves and Les Savy Fav, and put the finishing touches on his full-length debut, which comes out on January 25.
"The new album sounds very underground — probably the most underground album out there," says Baldi, who once again plays every instrument on the album. Cloud Nothings' lush, loud, and low-fi noise pop has already caught the attention of The New York Times and Pitchfork. An expanded lineup will tour Europe and the U.S. all year, including a stop at the influential South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas.
Learn more at:
Catch them in 2011: Cleveland dates will be announced early in 2011, but you can usually catch them at the Beachland, Grog Shop, and Musica.
***
Dr. E
When Elaine Richardson isn't lecturing at Ohio State or taking care of her three children, she escapes to Cleveland's club and bar scene to sing sweet soul music as Dr. E. Last year, the singer, songwriter, educator, author, and mother released her debut album, Elevated — a smoky R&B cabaret on which she channels Billie Holiday and Erykah Badu while confronting her hopes and demons with beauty and groove.
"My music and my life are about love and education," she says. "I survived sex trafficking and abuse, and I write and perform from places of pain and triumph." Richardson is due to release a hip-hop-flavored mixtape with New York DJ KidRelly. An EP will drop in June on her Give Us Free Records label.
Learn more at:
Catch her in 2011: Stay tuned to Dr. E's website for upcoming performances, but you can often catch her at unique Cleveland-area venues ranging from Gibb's Lounge to the Savannah.
READ THE FULL ARTICLE AT clevescene.com
AMPED SOUNDS
Dr. E-Elevated
http://www.ampedsounds.com/dre.htm
The Dr. is officially in the house. Cleveland native Dr. E is a vocal powerhouse who only needs one tool, her lovely voice, to operate on the eardrums of all who bear witness to her musical talents. Her poised tone, fierce delivery and ability to fluctuate between octaves flawlessly will leave listeners in awe as this doctor prescribes medicinal melodies that can cure almost any emotional ailment. Her debut LP, Elevated, features a compilation of well-rounded and grounded musical compositions that will warm the hearts and souls of many. Inspirational passages fill the air as speakers release the power of this eclectic songstress on the enthusiastic and motivational “Elevated”. As the song’s title would suggest, Dr. E offers words of encouragement to weather trough the most tumultuous storms that people encounter throughout life. This bluesy mid-tempo groove couples Dr. E’s soulful voice with perfect instrumental arrangements and sequences. The subtle sounds of an open hi hat adds flair to the cosmic sounds of the strong kick and snare that provide the backdrop for this phenomenal track. The bass, hollow body and electric guitars flirt seductively with one another and compliment the prominence of Dr. E’s soothing tone. The song is as influential as it is relatable and can serve as an antidote to the Rainy Day Blues. Dr. E keeps the inspirational juices flowing with “Halle Berry”, a creatively woven ditty that proves that one must look deeper than the surface to find the true beauty and value of people and to recognize one’s self worth. She cements her lyrical intentions by stating: “If I looked like Halle Berry, could you get into me/Hold my hand and tell everybody that you really loved me/But I can’t be no Halle Berry, I can only be me… Take me or leave me” Her smooth voice gracefully floats between the various tones of her brazen mezzo-soprano range as she sings and scats throughout this Jazz-laced composition. The transitions throughout the falsetto blend faultlessly as the oscillating rhythms of the accompanying saxophone serenade the eardrums. This song is refreshing and educating, reiterating that self-worth is the only worth that really counts. Elevated is a musical elixir that’s mixed with multiple genres and various subjects. This therapeutic trip through tonal bliss may cause enlightenment, utopic arousal and rejuvenating mental stimulation and will most likely extinguish any antagonistic emotions that may currently exist. Results may vary. If the desired result is not met, press rewind and increase the dosage.
3.8 Skye P
http://soulcuts.wordpress.com/2010/12/29/dr-e-one-to-watch-get-elevated/
Dr E – One to Watch! – Get Elevated!
29 12 2010
Dr E released her debut album, Elevated, in 2010 to more than just polite ripples of applause. And with good reason! There are enough juicy morsels on Elevated to satisfy fans of jazzy chanteuses such as Billy Holiday and Queen Badu, while also offering up a diverse selection of accomplished grown folks music. As the 2010 lists come in from the great and good in the soul community, I hope that Dr E will be included, as she undoubtedly deserves at least an honourable mention. While Elevated may not be that wholly consistent, perfect first album, it nonetheless announces the arrival of an original voice on the scene with bags of personality and a refreshing individuality. Without a doubt, one to watch in 2011.
Take a listen to the album standout, the mature, real soul cut, Walk This Road! Niceness!
Ear Candi Magazine
Soul Music Spotlight review
Trending heavily across the world, soul music continues to blend tasty collections of Rhythm & Blues, Gospel, Neo-Soul, and Acoustics into mouthwatering grooves. Today we spotlight three soul sisters adding their own spices and flavors to the ever expanding genre.
Davina Robinson – The Rock ‘N Roll Soul Chick
Davina Robinson makes music fearlessly, and rocks the house with heartfelt vocal intensity and lyrical assertiveness reminiscent of rock goddesses Pat Benetar, Janis Joplin and Tina Turner.
In Osaka Boys, Davina delivers power rock with a sexy twist in a tribute to what she loves most about her city – all of the cute boys. Making Love To Your Girlfriend breaks it down with funky baseline and still rocks pretty hard with sultry vocals and smoking hot guitar riffs. Davina gets more personal with an angst tune called Never Good Enough where she boasts clever lyrics about living ones life by other people’s standards.
An American singer/songwriter based out of Japan; Davina’s Robinson’s 2008 debut EP, ‘The Blazing Heart‘, won accolades from the Billboard Song Contest, the Great American Song Contest, the VH-1 Song Of the Year Contest and the UK Songwriting Contest, among others.
The second release “Osaka Boys” is enjoying the #1 spot Reverbnation for Osaka, Japan and Davina is currently working on her first full length album which will be released winter 2011. Learn more about the rock and roll soul chick at www.davinarobinson.com
Dr. E – The Jazzy Soul Songstress
Indie-soul newcomer Dr. E’s debut album Elevated is both eclectic and intensely contagious – a credit to her impressive talent as a singer/songwriter. Dance to My Song starts things off on with a flirtatious sound that is ready for dance floors then slows the pace for Halle Berry, a smooth jazz ballad with lyrics so significant and personal- you can’t turn away. Kicked to the Curb is where Dr. E turns heartache into payback in this catchy R&B song about a relationship gone wrong. Like Kicked To The Curb, Put It Down is a solid R&B groove but with a more soulful delivery. The first notes of “Your Everything” immediately sends shivers down the spine as the striking melodies of the acoustic guitar take hold of you and bring forth more fully the meaning and effect of each and every love professing lyric.
The album transitions with Let Me Clear My Throat, a soul heavy track that returns listeners to down home blues with a sultry bass line and a smoky delivery.
Dr. E showcases the raw beauty of her vocals and her ability to invoke words with special shades of meaning that recall the spirit of Phyllis Hyman in her touching tribute to the late soul singer in Here’s That Rainy Day. The title track Elevated delivers an uplifting message of the unrestrained joy one feels when they continue to reach for their dreams and goals. Walk This Road shows off Dr. E’s deep, spirit touching vocals while Giving My Life to You goes gospel as Dr. E thanks her creator through emotional lyrics focused on inspiration, praise, and guidance. By the second chorus of the final track Good Girl Down, you’ll be singing along to the empowered lyrics and moving your body to the funk flooded groove.
Overall, Elevated is a raw, emotionally riveting exploration of the life and story of Dr. E. Her vocal versatility,positive energy, and meaningful lyrics make her a vital force on the indie soul music scene. Learn more about the powerful personal journey behind the jazzy and soulful sounds of Dr. E at www.giveusfreerecords.com
TaNeal – The R&B/Hip-Hop Soul Diva
If you are in the mood for some raw rhythm and blues with gangster girl flow – check out the newest songstress on the scene, TaNeal.
A new artist with a brand new track for every overplayed rap song about needing a dime; you can leave the change behind because TaNeal is way more than currency. Witty pop flavored rap lyrics, with hints of Baduizm in the vocals- Currency is a combination of old school R&B and Hip-Hop in response to new school slang. No more currency – women are way more than dimes.
Now or Neva has a Maxwell feel and starts out with TaNeal showing off her pretty soprano over smooth rhythm and blues. A song about the need to break free and be yourself. Worth a listen especially if you are in the mood for a soulful tun turned blue.
L2L is where TaNeal will make you learn to love her and get on the dance floor. This track is a fist-pumping dance groove and features a rap solo by R.Y.A.N. with the Drawing Board Experience.
TaNeal’s raw talent and street sass has gained her significant buzz giving her the opportunity to open for major R&B acts such as Day 26 and Shirley Murdock. Currently working on a new demo for her next album for hip-hop soul fans and if this next one is anything like the L2L or Now or Neva, TaNeal is on the fast track to being one of the hottest in Hip-Hop soul with her forthcoming project. See what’s next for this rising star at http://www.myspace.com/tanealnewartist.
Written by Pinkheadphones - Ear Candi Magazine "Crew"
Dr E - Elevated - 2010 - Give Us Free Records
Dr E is a relative newcomer on the scene yet carries with her a wealth of experience that is indeed enviable in today's climate of ever-younger, mass-produced and incision-sharp marketing techniques. With a pretty countenance, a vocal style that leans towards the Erykah Badu / Billie Holiday school of vocals and abundant with a sense of fun, grace and sass we have a set that works on the party areas of the soulful brain as well as giving us a jazzy twist and element of stylistic swish! I warn you that some songs may not be immediate, and that's OK - we are conditioned these days as we live in a time of immediate gratification. Songs such as "Dance To My Song" when given a few spins edge under the radar and hit home. This, to me, is clever and a sign of something and someone with a little more to offer than many today. "Halle Berry" for instance is a lovely sax-filled swayer that is clever in picking up the down-to-earth themes that India.Arie is so good at and, let's face it, tells things as they are. Dr E is one of those artists who scribes a good song and lays it down on the line. Doing this soulfully and with class is a good thing and you will not be disappointed!
"Elevated" deals with positivity and espouses, in a funky, slow and bluesy way the old adage that change comes from within. the greatest soul sings - mayfield, Brown, Franklin - all knew about this and instead of chundering on about bling, cars, the club or getting down in bed, Dr E offers real insightful stuff here and having worked through this painful process myself, I can really and wholeheartedly understand this groove and where she is coming from. Who said wisdom no longer flourishes? Having already alluded to stylistic breadth, fans of acoustic guitar and a rootsier sound will soon pick up on "Your Everything". How simple a song can be with a good voice and an acoustic guitar! I think I can see Dwayne Wiggins and Sheree Brown smiling. I certainly smiled when I took a listen to "Walk This Road". The sax here is delicious and the feel reminds me, slightly of The Temptations "This Is My Promise". Easily my favourite song, this song oozes superior style and effortlessly and, for me, makes the purchase of this CD a must on this and this alone. fear not though - check out more songs such as "Good Girl Down" and the sultry sax-drenched "Giving My Life To You". Tasty stuff and more than worth a purchase for these alone. Recommended.
Barry Towler
The Vibe Scribe
For the Love of Freedom and Fashion
The founder and president of Freedom and Fashion describes herself as a slave to end slavery. Constantly networking, fundraising, and sometimes sewing by hand in the dimly lit rooms of friends and family until 4am, Bonnie Kim and her board of directors work in the background to support fair trade organizations and NGOs that raise awareness about and provide resources for victims of human trafficking.
On Friday Nov. 6, 2010, at 6pm in Irvine, Calif., Freedom and Fashion will embark on their second annual showcase and trade show. Attendees will view the fashion designs of labor and sex trafficked survivors, non-profits working to end slavery, and fair trade companies. A video introduction to each organization will accompany the fashion preview; goods will be on sale before and after the show.
I asked Kim what neophytes should expect.
Their minds will be blown away. Period … It’s kind of fun being underestimated sometimes because we’re a nonprofit and people associate nonprofit with very janky stuff or ugly things … but we produce really high production value … We try to do it very top-notch quality for that reason … We set a new platform for what it means to look like a non-profit, and not look like a non-profit.
The show will also feature vocal performances by Dr. E née Dr. Elaine Richardson who is not only a fashionista, but a professor at Ohio State University, a survivor of sex trafficking, and author of the forthcoming book PGD to PhD: Po Girl on Dope to PhD. Dr. E is excited to work with Freedom and Fashion.
I love what they’re doing—turning fashion on it’s head, using it to save women and girls, inform people about the human misery that is going on around the word. It’s creative, it’s environmentally conscious, socially conscious. It’s inspiring.
Kim explains the organization’s intentional emphasis on fashion:
It’s fun … Fashion is an avenue that is cool … It gives us an opportunity to expose the truth slowly.
The truth is that sex trafficking is the second largest crime industry in the world. Dr. E defines sex trafficking as “women being sold like drugs or other commodities.” She clarifies:
Some people’s attitude is that adult prostituted women are not sex trafficked but sex workers and that they should be treated as criminals. This leads many would be caring human beings to be apathetic toward women who are raped, beaten or killed while they are in the throes of prostitution. Some people have more compassion for women and girls who’ve been kidnapped and traded internationally than for women within America. I think that most women involved in prostitution have psychological and emotional trauma like battered women and many are also drug addicts and need treatment.
Kim admits that her childhood molestation helps her understand the victim’s point of view, and her early introduction to porn helps her understand the perpetrator’s perspective. Both women see their outreach programs as a ministry designed to help others heal. Kim’s primary mission is to raise awareness about exploitation.
I know sex sells here, but it creates a lot of pain … Sex has been totally misrepresented in today’s society. Because of it I feel like it perpetuates industries like porn and industries like human trafficking. Unless we address these issues, this problem is just going to continue and get worse—women ending up being sex slaves or them feeling the need to, in order to survive, resort to prostitution or being in the trade. And that’s more overseas than here, but many times girls here for the love of someone else they would just easily give themselves away … and it’s not supposed to be like that.
These women working for the love of freedom and fashion are giving as Kim says “the best of the best for the least of the least” for their show on November 6.
In addition to the annual show, Freedom and Fashion, hosts smaller previews, hopes to acquire Los Angeles office space soon, expand to a New York City division, and develop an after school program that teaches young girls to sew and informs them about the dangers of sex trafficking. Donations are appreciated.
Iris Smith September 6 at 1:16pm
Last week at Gibbs in Cleveland Heights, Ohio, I had the pleasure and thrill of attending and being entertained by Cleveland native and now Columbus resident, “Elaine Richardson” or as she is professionally known “Dr. E” she has the energy of Anita Baker, a voice reminisced of Eartha, Kit, a little Teena Marie, yet so very much her own! Belting out tunes of Chaka Kahn and Rufus, (Tell Me Something Good) her own ditty about minutes on her cell phone, and tracks from her current CD “Elevated” Dr.E includes her audience in her set, making her live performance an exciting and memorable experience! Her CD “Elevated is a Cd about life, trials, love, God, looks… Life is what she sings about, she sings well of life’s tribulations’ because she has lived these tribulations’ but she sings also of success, of overcoming, of reaching new heights. She is bluesy, sometimes jazzy, loving and even a little country, and yet she is superb in her delivery of it all! If you can catch a live performance please do, you won’t be disappointed, and if you can’t, get her CD “Elevated” Visit Dr E. on Revebnation http://www.reverbnation.com/artist/index/doctae and Facebook under Docta E Richardson“Elevated”
This is a 13 track CD
1. Dance To My Music
2. Halle Berry
3. Kicked To The Curb
4. Elevated
5. Your Everything
6. Let Me Clear My Throat
7. Put It Down
8. Walk This Road
9. Breaking
10. Here’s That Rainy Day
11. Good Girl Down
12. Good Girl Down (Rob’s Mix)
13. Giving My Life To YouMy pick tracks are “Let Me Clear My Throat, Walk This road, Dance to My song, Here’s That Rainy Day and Dance to My Song”
You Can’t Keep a Good Girl Down
Dr. Elaine Richardson gets Elevated
Dr. Elaine Richardson has lived many lives. From the watchful eye of her Jamaican mother, who had a sixth grade education, but taught her children the ABCs; to the streets of Cleveland, where she became involved with drugs, prostitution and other criminal activities, losing many friends to death or jail, Richardson has defied the odds. “I’m so glad I don’t look like what I’ve been through,” she says. “My mother had this hunger for education and a better life.
“I think she sewed that inside of me, into my spirit, and when I was on the streets, I would feel in my spirit that I should be doing better, I could be doing better and that wasn’t what I was born for,” she says. “I always talk to people about that: We’re all born for the purpose that God created us for. We have that dream deep down inside us, and we can’t let bad things make us forget who we are and want to be.”
If you want to know how she made it from the streets of Cleveland and New York City to the head of the classroom as professor of English at Ohio State University; how she became caring mother, motivational speaker and accomplished vocalist, listen to her songs. While she doesn’t sing about the birth of her second child after being rushed to the hospital during a drug binge, or the hard times as she struggled through Alcoholics Anonymous and getting clean, she does sing about the parts of her journey that we can all relate to, and the ones that will uplift her audience. Perhaps, in many ways, that’s the best way to experience her story – through the songs that have bubbled up in her heart over the years and made their way onto the page, into the studio and on the 13 tracks of Elevated, her latest album.
Every day that you have another chance to live, you’ve got another chance to improve your life.
Elevated – Reviewing the Journey
The album opens with “Dance to My Song”, and opens with the lyric, “I’m gonna go to heaven, but not before I live on Earth.” From that moment, the clever lyrics and the dancing jazz rhythm tips the listener off that this isn’t a typical R&B effort. The most striking feature of the opening number is the voice, which has all the character of Billie Holiday, raspy and playful. If you stop after the first track, you’ll never realize the depth and versatility of Richardson’s instrument, which she begins to flex and stretch in the next track, “Halle Berry”, in which she asks the question: “If I looked like Halle Berry, would you get into me?”
“This album is what I wanted to express,” says Richardson. “These are the sounds I want to hear and sing, inspired by the people I meet, the things we talk about – even conversations with my girlfriends – girl talk, relationships and the world condition.”
The album closes with two versions of “You Can’t Keep a Good Girl Down”, followed by “Giving My Life To You”, the artist’s way of giving credit to a higher power for the gifts she’s been given. “Good Girl Down” might be one of the most interesting tracks on the album. It utilizes language clearly related to slavery and the civil rights movement, along with harmonies that are reminiscent of both gospel and traditional spirituals. Such it is with most tracks on Elevated. You find yourself transported from one time and place to another, from a highest high to the lowest low and from the most joyful to the saddest moments that have been a part of Dr. Elaine Richardson’s life.
Elevated Release Party and Concert
On Sunday, August 29, Richardson will celebrate the release of Elevated with a CD release concert and party from 5 to 8 p.m. at Gibb’s Lounge, at 1932 South Taylor Road in Cleveland Heights. The concert will also serve as a fundraiser.
“There are two things I’m about,” says Richardson. “I’m definitely about education. I really stress it to all young people, because no matter how intelligent you are, if you don’t have credentials, it makes it harder for you,” she says. “I always tell my family, friends, students and people I encounter that they should go back to school and go as far as they can. I believe in a second chance, a third chance, a fourth chance, in never counting people out.”
The second thing Dr. E is all about is hope: “I always try to give people hope that no matter what happens ... bad things happen to good people. Just don’t give up on yourself, because every day that you have another chance to live, you’ve got another chance to improve your life.”
Richardson is out there helping people improve their lives. Proceeds from her first concert on her independent tour went to the Cynthia B. Dillard preschool in Ghana. “I went there last February to visit the schools, and it really touched my heart,” she says. “The people there don’t have a well, don’t have water. They have to walk miles to get water that would probably make us sick.
“It moves your spirit when you go to someplace where they are so hungry for knowledge and education,” she says.
The proceeds from the release party at Gibb's will go to her alma mater, East Tech High’s Scholarship Fund. “I want to be associated with promoting the motivated kids, good kids who are going to school and want to go to college,” she says. “We’ll do whatever we have to do to make sure they have the money they need to get their degrees.”
Richardson, as Dr. E, will perform songs from Elevated, with the assistance of friends Russell Thompson, known for his involvement in the Gerald Levert band, and Dr. Mary Weems, professor at John Caroll University, who wrote "Breaking", which appears on the album.
“I’m really excited about how people have been responding to the album so far,” says Richardson. You really can’t keep a good girl down.
Tickets are $10 in advance and $15 at the door. For more information about the release party and to purchase the album, visit www.giveusfreerecords.com. Give us Free Records is Richardson’s independent record label, through which she raises money for educational causes throughout the world.
LISTEN: Dr. E - "Good Girl Down" (from Elevated)
'Elevated' takes Dr. E's music career to next level
Published: Friday, August 27, 2010, 3:51 PM Updated: Friday, August 27, 2010, 4:08 PM
Songstress Elaine Richardson, affectionately known as Dr. E, has come a long way from the days of singing in Miss Ross’ talent shows and her personal as well as professional growth becomes overtly apparent in her new CD, “Elevated.”
Just a few years ago, in 2006, Dr. E established herself as an independent recording artist when she started Give Us Free Records then released her first CD, “Coat of Flesh” along side the Ohio-based R&B Soul band Fleshcoat.
But, this time, she’s going at it alone and taking her music career to the next level. Dr. E's voice is comparable to Stephanie Mills, Erykah Badu, and Billie Holliday
With “Elevated,” Dr. E wants listeners to get to know her better as a soul singer. Therefore, this recording focuses on a live sound that features her soulful, jazzy vocals accompanied by some of Cleveland’s finest musicians.
Dr. E’s voice is comparable to the likes of Stephanie Mills, Erykah Badu, Macy Gray and even Billie Holliday. In fact, you hear remnants of all of those artists at some point as she blends a diversity of styles including hints of blues, jazz, gospel and pop.
“Elevated,” the fourth track on the titled CD, is a song you’ll want to play over and over again. It’s very catchy and almost everyone can relate to it on some level.
Others tracks that stand out are the bluesy “Let Me Clear My Throat,” the jazzy “Walk This Road,” and the soulful “Giving My Life to You” that features Russell Thompson on saxophone. “Breaking,” a poem for Phyllis Hyman – written by Mary E. Weems – is a great way to break up the music and a nice added touch as well.
Basically, you can’t put Dr. E in a box. You never know what to expect from her.
Now, the moniker Dr. E isn’t some stage name Richardson simply attached to herself either. It’s a title she’s worked extremely hard to achieve.
Richardson, a professor of Literacy Studies in the College of Education at The Ohio State University, is a distinguished alumnus of Cleveland State University, Michigan State, and a 1978 graduate of East Technical High School.
Additionally, she’s authored two academic books and is currently seeking to publish an autobiography titled PGD to PHD (Poor Girl on Dope to Ph.D).
This street/urban literature, educational memoir is centered on Richardson’s younger life through the neighborhoods of Cleveland and beyond as she battles drugs, alcoholism, abuse, single-parenthood and sexual exploration until she enters CSU, searching for a new identity and struggling to save her life.
Already, it is considered a must read for “at-risk,” urban youth – especially adolescent Black girls.
Musically, she’s performed as opening act for David Hollister and Martha Munizzi, at the Cleveland Rock and Roll Hall of fame, the Central Pennsylvania Festival of Arts, Ingenuity Festival, The Lincoln Theatre in Columbus and on Fox 8 News in the Morning.
Currently, she’s hosting a series of meet and greets to promote “Elevated.”
A CD Release Concert and Party will be held at Gibbs Lounge, 3560 Severance Circle, in Cleveland Heights on Sunday Aug. 29, from 5 to 8 p.m. Proceeds benefit the East Tech Scholarship Fund.
Ohio State University professor and recording artist Elaine Richardson performing at fundraiser for East Tech High School
Published: Wednesday, August 25, 2010, 6:46 AM Updated: Wednesday, August 25, 2010, 9:46 AM
Elaine Richardson, an English professor at Ohio State University, is also a jazz songwriter and vocalist, whose compositions have been heard on such TV programs as "All My Children" and "Dharma & Greg."
She's so high on education that when she presents a concert of her new CD on Sunday at Gibb's Restaurant in Severance Town Center, the event's profits will go to the scholarship fund of her alma mater, East Tech High School.
Her stage name is Dr. E, but years ago when she was a Cleveland State University dropout, high on drugs and working the streets of downtown Cleveland as a prostitute, she was nameless to her johns -- and futureless -- or so it appeared."I am so glad I don't look like where I came from," said Richardson. "So many of my friends are dead."
Prostitution was a big detour from her days singing in the children's Sunshine Band at Holy Grove Missionary Baptist Church. Every time she sang a solo, "The old folks would say, 'Shine, baby,' " said Richardson, 50. Her childhood came to a halt when she was 13, raped by a new acquaintance -- a friend of a friend. "I was just square -- naive -- when he asked me to go into a bedroom with him.
"From that time on I became a problem teenager."
In junior high, Richardson watched for the police while another friend -- "a tennis shoe pimp," she calls him, broke into cars. But soon, he went to jail, and she went on to East Tech.
"My mother did everything she could to turn me around," said Richardson. One bright light: She sang twice a year in a downtown Cleveland talent show run by a perfectionist producer. It was the show all the kids wanted to be in, but it was demanding.
"It was like you were training for the Olympics to be in that show," she said. But she loved the applause of the big auditorium's audience.
Richardson graduated from high school and went on to Cleveland State, though "I was never one of the kids people thought would go to college." There, she felt unprepared for higher education. "I was in developmental courses -- just wandering around CSU. I didn't fit in," she said.
She fell in with friends who smoked marijuana and drank, though she had never done drugs in high school. Soon she skipped classes, didn't do her work and flunked out. Then the streets beckoned.
"Then girls on the street looked like models -- they looked like movie stars," said Richardson. "I said, wow -- I want to look like them!"
She worked Euclid and Prospect avenues. Her drug use escalated. Richardson "graduated" to higher-paying New York streets. She had a baby girl, Evelyn, in 1984. Just before another daughter was born in 1987, she went on a binge and ended up in a hospital thinking she was carrying a dead baby.
But Ebony was born healthy, and Richardson started going to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings while in the hospital. "I was just ready to do whatever I had to do to keep my children," she said.
She returned to Cleveland when Ebony was 6 months old, moved back with her parents, went on welfare and went back to school. "I had plenty of support from family and friends," she said -- including a neighbor who took care of her girls while she was in class. "Once people see you trying to do something with your life, they help," she said.
In 1993, Richardson got her master's degree in English from Cleveland State, and went on for a tuition-free doctorate at Michigan State. After that, there were professorships at the University of Minnesota and Penn State, a Fulbright appointment at the University of the West Indies in Mona, Jamaica -- and the addition of another daughter, Kaila. In 2007, she was given Cleveland State's distinguished alumni award.
"I cherish that," she said.
The professor of literacy studies starts her fourth year at Ohio State this fall, and keeps on with the music composition she began while studying at Michigan State.
She wrote almost all the songs of "Elevated," the new CD -- a musical autobiography -- she will perform on Sunday. She collaborated with Larry D. Marcus, Cleveland native and Billboard Award-winning songwriter, who produced the album. It was recorded by Jon Guggenheim of C-Town Sound Inc. of Cleveland.
Richardson, who has written or co-authored five academic books, is eager to tell her story. "I hope I can help people to have hope." Even if they are sitting in a jail cell, as she did a few times, "singing and entertaining the girls."
She's shopping around her autobiography, "PGD to Ph.D," to publishers. (PGD means Po' Girl on Dope.) The book is in everyday language, said Richardson, who is a specialist in "discourse practices of Afro diasporic cultures," or black language patterns, according to her Ohio State faculty webpage. "People from where I come from will read this book," she said.
Maybe her message will get through to someone before it's too late, she said. "Life is a struggle, and you're going to fumble. But you still have a chance to better yourself.
"Everybody's life has a purpose."
by Jeff NieselCleveland SceneIn addition to writing a memoir, Ohio State University professor and aspiring actress Dr. E just released her debut album, Elevated, a collection of soul songs that recall Jill Scott. The autobiographical numbers deal with breakups ("Kicked to the Curb") and self-empowerment ("Walk This Road"). Dr. E hosts a CD-release party at 5 p.m. on Sunday at Gibb's Lounge. Tickets are $10. The concert is also a benefit for the East Tech High School Scholarship Fund. You can find more info at giveusfreerecords.com.
Send feedback to jniesel@clevescene.com.
Sweet RedemptionOSU professor's jazz CD celebrates triumph over drug addiction and more
Saturday, July 24, 2010 02:52 AM
By Kevin JoyTHE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
FRED SQUILLANTE | DISPATCHElaine Richardson at Vonn Jazz, where she will perform Sunday
|Richardson in 1993, upon completing her graduate studies at Cleveland State UniversityElaine Richardson still tears up at the memory of calling the ambulance.
So high on cocaine at nine months' pregnant that she assumed the fetus inside her 27-year-old body had no chance, she had reached the point of wishing to go to jail for the umpteenth time to save herself - and her unborn baby - from destruction.
She remembers the warning issued by the emergency-room doctor in Cleveland: If we find any drugs in your infant, we can press charges and take away the child.
"I was almost dead," said Richardson, now 50. "I was disgusted with myself. I wanted to get out, but I didn't know how."
Amazingly, her baby girl - her second child - was born healthy, providing motivation enough for her to ditch drugs and alcohol for good and to abandon a turbulent past littered with abusive men and scores of jail stints for prostitution.
Richardson did more than get clean.
At 36, she earned a doctorate in English from Michigan State University. She later wrote two books, and co-edited three others, on academic studies of American black-language patterns. She taught for nine years at Penn State University, taking a tenured position in 2007 to teach literacy studies in the College of Education at Ohio State University.
"She had a spark, ... (and was) imaginative, funny - a leader," said Ted Lardner, an English professor at Cleveland State University who served as Richardson's thesis adviser during her graduate studies in the early 1990s. "If Zora Neale Hurston had a goddaughter, she could be Elaine - a deep student of life, studying it up close and unguarded."
In between academics, Richardson escaped into music, singing with various ensembles and composing jazzy original fare, including some that was later featured on All My Children and Dharma & Greg.
On Sunday, she will perform in the Far North Side venue Vonn Jazz to celebrate the release of her first full-length solo effort, a culmination of two years spent crafting motivational tunes inspired by her metamorphosis.
Onstage, she uses the name Dr. E - a nod to hard-earned redemption and the fruits of a better life.
The album's title: Elevated.
Finding trouble
She found her voice at age 5, projecting so loudly that church elders began assigning the youngster solo parts in the children's choir.
As a teenager, Richardson ruled the fiercely competitive talent shows of inner-city Cleveland with her five-piece R&B ensemble - the Five Shades of Love, an inseparable group of girls from East Technical High School.
"It was like American Idol," she said. "And we were Destiny's Child."
Yet her life had become chaotic after a string of violent boyfriends and a rape at age 13 that led the confused eighth-grader into occasional prostitution.
Although secondary schoolwork was manageable, her enrollment in the remedial program at Cleveland State - where a lack of self-esteem combined with socioeconomic isolation in the classroom and association with students who smoked marijuana - was short-lived.
"I didn't know where I fit in," Richardson said.
She fell back in with unsavory men, opting to sell her body on the streets of Cleveland - and, later, New York - for quick cash and self-validation. She was raped and frequently beaten, she said.
Even after her first daughter, Evelyn, was born, a 24-year-old Richardson persisted in her degrading habits.
"That's how foggy and messed up my mind was," she said.
College just didn't feel possible. And music seemed miles away.
Making changes
The downward spiral continued until a second child, Ebony - born with a clean bill of health despite Richardson's late-pregnancy drug use - inspired a turnaround.
She enrolled in Alcoholics Anonymous, where group therapy and a strict code of personal conduct helped her kick drugs, too.
In the back of her mind, meanwhile, was a flier for Project Second Chance, a Cleveland State program for sexually-exploited women seeking to return to college. She first spotted the leaflet during a jail stint in the city's justice center.
"I was desperate to stay in school and do something with my life," she said.
Change, though, didn't come easily or quickly.
Richardson received D's on term papers, the prose dubbed awkward and chock-full of black slang, influenced by her time on the streets and the dialect of her Jamaican parents.
"She was very bright but had fallen off the mainstream onto a path that made no sense," said Andrew Edwards, a Cleveland State professor of social work who mentored Richardson during her recovery from substance abuse and academic rebound. "Intellectually, I knew something was there.
"I said: 'We're going to make some changes.'"
She was angry but used the frustration as a stimulus, revising and rewriting - and eventually earning a stream of B's and A's, and deciding on a major: English.
She sought advice from professors and the college tutoring center. She worked late into the night.
In 1991, Richardson graduated.
Before long, though, she realized that her criminal past would do her no favors in the job market. Dressed in a business suit and heels, she fled a career fair before visiting a single booth.
A classmate suggested graduate study, with the potential of fellowships and funding.
"People started referring me," Richardson said. "Everything I tried out for, I got."
With a third child, Kaila, now in the picture, she remained determined to balance babies and books.
She found a catalyst in Talkin and Testifyin : The Language of Black America. Almost a decade before the concept of ebonics became widely known, the 1986 book by Michigan State professor Geneva Smitherman detailed the study and attitudes toward the teaching of "Black English."
"That book just turned me on," Richardson said. "It was affirming to know I wasn't ignorant, I wasn't stupid."
In 1992, she and Smitherman met on campus. The graduate student impressed the visiting scholar with her confident manner and knowledge of the subject.
Smitherman suggested to her admirer: Come to East Lansing.
Gaining momentum
During the first of three years spent at Michigan State, Richardson landed a full-ride minority doctoral fellowship that allowed her time to perform on weekends with a Cleveland band that mostly played Jewish weddings (" Hava Nagila - that's the jam!" Richardson said with a laugh.)
The side pursuit, though, ended during her second year of study after Smitherman insisted she buckle down.
Instead of dashing off to gigs, Richardson kept the melodies in her brain, scribbling down lyrics in between perfecting her research on teaching academic writing to speakers of black-vernacular dialects.
Her choice of study drew from personal experience.
"My elementary-school teachers, even my parents would say: 'Don't come in here with that ghetto language,'" she said. "I knew something was wrong with how we talked, but nobody ever told us it had a history, it had a name, it had patterns."
She took a teaching position at the University of Minnesota in 1996 and, two years later, the job at Penn State.
At a 2007 linguistics conference in Columbus, she met Dave Bloom, a literacy professor at Ohio State who called Richardson's presentation "brilliant." The effort inspired him to ask whether she'd ever considered becoming a Buckeye.
A job in the College of Education had opened, a near-perfect fit for her expertise. Richardson landed it.
"I think that Dr. E is a role model," Bloom said, "not just for young people who may be in situations like she was in, but for all of us in terms of how to bring one's life history in a positive manner to what one is currently doing."
Cynthia Dillard, an OSU multicultural-education professor who founded a preschool in Mpeasem, Ghana, that Richardson visited in March, notes her colleague's resolve.
"A real life, however it's been lived, really influences the work of teaching and learning," Dillard said. "That's what she brings to bear."
Marking time
A cursory listen to Richardson's Elevated yields appealing, glitzy strains of soul and jazz with distinctive vocals akin to those of Erykah Badu or Macy Gray.
A closer review, however, suggests deeper pain: song titles such as Kicked to the Curb, Good Girl Down and the album's title track, marked by a bridge that sums up her evolution:
Moving on to let go of my past / This is my future, now is my chance / I'm breaking out of this funk at last / And I've got to keep my faith
"I don't want it to be preachy," Richardson said. "But it's really a metaphor: Let's do something to make a difference."
Proceeds from the Sunday concert will benefit Dillard's preschool.
Richardson sees a bit of herself in the Ghanaian children who have so little, her graduate students who challenge new ways of thinking and her middle daughter who graduated from OSU in June and works as her mom's music publicist.
"She has compassion," said Ebony Richardson, 23. "And she gives you this sense: Even when you're from the bottom, you can still come out on top."
Elaine Richardson, who is unmarried and maintains relationships with all three daughters, is also shopping a 319-page memoir - PGD to PhD: Po Girl on Dope to PhD.
She doesn't want to glamorize her past - but she doesn't want to bury it, either.
"I really do believe the only reason why God let me live is so I could tell my story," Richardson said. "I did things I'm not proud of, but I want somebody to feel like they can make it, too.
"Education saved my life."
kjoy@dispatch.com
What’s a (Black R&B) Gurl to Do?: Leela James, Yahzarah and Dr. E
New Black Man - Mark Anthony Neal
Even as we witness the erasure of real Black women in R&B, Leela James, Yahzarah and Dr. E. offer three different models of making sure the voices of Black R&B gurls are heard.
If you are a female R&B singer and your name is Alicia Keys, Mary J. Blige, or Beyonce it is perhaps the best of times; you have unprecedented access to mainstream media, your music is radio-friendly in the broadest sense (I must hear Key’s “Un-thinkable” fifteen times a day) and to many fans, you are not simply an R&B singer, but a pop star, worthy of a morning or two, sitting on the set of The View. But alas, if your name is not Keys, Blige and Beyonce, the situation is considerably different.
Take the examples of Erykah Badu and Janelle Monae. Badu, whose New Amerykah, Pt. 2: Return of the Ankh, is easily her most accomplished recording since Mama’s Gun was released a decade ago, literally had to strip on the screen—albeit with a hint of avant-garde agitprop—in order to get people excited about her new recording. Months after the “controversy,” few talk about what might be one of the most stellar R&B releases of the year.
Janelle Monae’s The ArchAndroid is another fine recording from an artist, I would argue, who has yet to find her voice, but Monae was largely marketed as the quirky Black girl who dared to imagine herself in the context of Fritz Lang’s 1929 film Metropolis. Kudos to Monae for imagining outside of the sphere (yet another iteration of Afro-Futurism), as Rob Fields argues in his fine review of The ArchAndroid, but I wonder if critics and others would have found the talented Monae as compelling had she simply played it straight (whatever that might mean in 2010). Truth be told Monae succeeds, in part, because she is not your regular R&B gurl—the anti-Keyshia Cole if you will. No doubt Monae will have to reboot Brave New World the next time around to remain as relevant as she is now.
The point is that there seems to be little space in the world of contemporary R&B to be a regular Black gurl—or a god-fearing, honest to goodness grown-ass black woman, full of desires, anxieties and ambition. Indeed, conventional wisdom suggest that in this environment legendary singers like Roberta Flack, Aretha Franklin and Diana Ross (the Keys, Blige and Beyonce of their generation) would not have survived the first three or four years of their solo careers. But even as we witness the erasure of real Black women in R&B—perhaps mirroring the same erasure in mainstream culture in general—Leela James, Yahzarah and Dr. E. offer three different models of making sure the voices of Black R&B gurls are heard.
Leela James’s new release My Soul finds the singer at a bit of a crossroads. James possesses an instrument—big, gritty and grown—more apt to evoke Mavis Staples and Betty Wright in their prime or seasoned contemporary veterans like Bettye LaVette and Sharon Jones, than anything that passes as popular on your local urban radio station. Clearly a hip-hop baby, James’s strategy has been to do R&B’s version of the time-warp dance, a strategy mined to varying success by traditional R&B types like Raphael Saadiq, Solange Knowles and John Legend (particularly on Once Again) and “alternative” critical faves like Amy Winehouse and the aforementioned Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings.
On the heels of her recent recording of covers, 2009’s Let’s Do It Again, and now recording on the revamped Stax label, James seems more intent to musically fit into this century. Though the smoker “I Ain’t New to This” (a reminder that she’s paid some industry dues) and “So Cold” are credible attempts by James to sound relevant, her voice is a constant reminder that she was not built for this era—her voice simply articulates a depth and complexity that has long been gone from R&B.
James is more successful when she manages to meld and update classic Soul/R&B sensibilities with a contemporary urgency as she does on tracks like “Supa Luva” (with a closing nod to The O’Jay’s “Forever Mine”) and “I Want It All.” Ultimately James sounds most comfortable wrapped in throwback grooves, such as the 60’s house-party groove “Let It Roll,” the sweet “The Fact Is” which samples The Moments’ “Lovely Way She Loves” and My Soul’s standout track, “Mr. Incredible—Ms. Unforgettable,” where James is paired with Raheem DeVaughn.
Last year Washington D.C. native Yahzarah, appeared on Foreign Exchange’s stellar Grammy nominated Leave It All Behind, including a brilliant take on Stevie Wonder’s “If She Breaks Your Heart” (originally recorded on the Jungle Fever soundtrack). The Ballad of Purple Saint James, Yahzarah’s third full length recording and first since 2003, is an extension of her collaboration with Foreign Exchange’s Nicolay and Phonte Coleman. Yahzarah, like Eric Robeson, is of a generation of R&B artists who have made peace with their marginal status in relation to mainstream radio airplay and visibility.
While some drive-time programs like Michael Baisden’s have done well to make sure that audiences hear a Leela James and Eric Roberson, Yahzarah is simply not on enough radars; more unfortunate for audiences than Yahzarah. For example, The Ballad of Purple Saint James’s lead single “Why Dontcha Call Me No More” is every bit as infectious as Janelle Monae’s “Tight Rope” or Katy Perry’s “California Girls,” yet Yahzarah remains in the pop and R&B ghetto, a treasure to be enjoyed by a select few willing to put in the labor to find good music beyond the mainstream.
Like most post-Soul babies in the recording industry, Yahzarah’s music evidences the democratization of the radio airwaves in the last two decades. So while “Why Dontcha Call Me No More” is perfectly pitched to a pop world that “Hey Ya” helped birth, throughout The Ballad of Purple Saint James, one hears an artist giving witness to a full range of musical influences, though always remaining grounded in the sounds—Soul, Jazz and Rhythm and Blues—that helped change a nation two generations ago.
On tracks like “All My Days” with Darien Brockington and the beautiful “Shadow,” the cosmopolitan Soul—a Soul that sounds like it’s been somewhere else—of Foreign Exchange rings out. Yet on “Have a Heart” you can hear the impact of 3+3 era Isley Brothers—the track is a deft reimagining of “Voyage to Atlantic” that is all Yahzarah’s. The artist gives a nod to classic Doo-Wop on her stripped down, multilayered voiced rendition of “Dedicated to You,” a Sammy Cahn standard recorded by Ella Fitzgerald in the late 1930s and famously by Johnny Hartman and John Coltrane on their 1963 duet album. On a track like “Starship,” Yahzarah channels mid-1980s era Prince.
The clear highlight of The Ballad of Purple Saint James, is in fact a ballad. Logging in at over six minutes, “Last to Leave” is a big-ole, old-school slow jam that recalls the era—the late 1970s and early 1980s—in which Quiet Storm radio formats (birthed in Yahzarah’s native city) were first popularized. When Ruben Studdard sings, “They don’t make em like you no more…” he could have been singing about Yahzarah’s “Last to Leave.”
If Leela James and Yahzarah have come to terms with their relative marginality to the mainstream of Black culture, Dr. E’s Elevated is reminder that for many artists it is simply the music that matters most. Dr. E aka Elaine Richardson, Ph.D has a story to tell and the music becomes the ideal site for stories that matter—to herself, to grown-ass Black women, to a generation of Black and Brown gurls who need to know that what they feel in their hearts and their spirits is ultimately what matters most.
Released independently on Give Us Free Records, Dr. E’s Elevated channels the sassy Black Gurl that sits at the root of the black musical experience in this country from Bessie Smith to Leela James. Vocally, Dr. E’s instrument recalls the lighter and playful side of Patti Labelle’s voice during her formative years in the Bluebelles. Not surprisingly, Dr. E. is a student of Black music idioms exemplified by the bluesey “Let Me Clear My Throat” and the jazzy “Walk This Road.” Dr. E’s humor comes through on the funny, but defiant “Halle Berry” as she sings, “if I looked Halle Berry, could get into me” before responding “I can’t be no Halle Berry, I can only be me, wanna be me, gonna be me, take me or leave me.” The track captures the insecurities that adult black women often experience and that rarely get a hearing in contemporary R&B.
Virtually all of the songs were written by Dr. E, who is also a Professor of Education at the Ohio State University. The one song not written by Dr. E. is the Van Heusen and Burke standard “Here’s that Rainy Day.” Though the song has been recorded numerous times, it is perhaps most memorable to Black audiences as a song that the late Phyllis Hyman recorded early in her career. Dr. E’s fine rendition clearly recalls Hyman’s version, thus the song serves as both the tribute to the late Hyman and a reminder of the chronic depression that led to Hyman taking her own life—a depression that Dr. E. and a far too many Black women deal with.
With tracks like the title tune “Elevated” and “Good Girl Down” (“they tried to label me/table me/play on me/hate on me…” Dr. E. taps into the kind of spirit that she herself deployed as she transitioned, in her own words, from “P.H.D. to Ph.D.”: a “poor ho on dope” to the nationally recognized Literacy scholar that she is now. There are so few spaces for Black women to tell these stories and despite so many talented artists having to toil in obscurity, Dr. E’s Elevated, like Yahzarah’s The Ballad of Purple Saint James and Leela James’s My Soul gives voice to what so many would rather ignore.
(first published on now defunct jazzandsoul.eu)
Music is a remedy and Dr E definitely knows all about healing with her incredible songwriting and vocal range. Elevated is a very nice introduction to her musical universe and it presents different sides of her personality and talent.
What stroke me first is the amazing quality of her voice and the way she plays with it, making it very high-pitched and reminiscent of Erykah Badu on some songs and then very deep and sensual, putting a spell on the listeners. For me, this ability to extend her vocal range so widely is very refreshing and welcome, in a time when some self-proclaimed singers can barely produce decent notes. The great variety also makes it very easy to listen to the album over and over again, as it is never monotonous. Then, something that I really appreciate about Elevated is its eclectism when it comes to the productions. We are on a journey from classic soul to jazz, blues, gospel and acoustic music, which is a way to follow the different moods and experiences Dr E went through and describes. The use of instruments is amazing and a great place is left to the actual music, which is what I love more and more. The sax, piano and guitar made me want to smile and cry and dance, and this is what music is supposed to do: touch you deep inside and allow you to relate to the emotions the artist wants to share.
Last but not least, Dr E writing skills are also remarkable and make this album one I will definitely have in heavy rotation. It is not really surprising to discover that the singer is also an author, educator and motivational speaker, as the quality of her writing and the positive message she spreads are obvious in Elevated and the album is very inspiring and uplifting. As for the vocals and productions, the themes she touches upon are quite varied and are a description of her journey through life, one many of us can relate to. She sings about love, from wanting to give herself to her special one (Your everything) to heartbreak and pain (Kicked to the curb and her interpretation of the jazz standard Here’s that rainy day), but also about being yourself and achieving your dreams (Halle Berry, Elevated, Walk this road and Good girl down) and finally about God in Giving my life to you.
If you are in need of muscial healing, I would highly recommend you get a dose of Elevated, at least once a day. It will put a smile on your face and make you feel inspired and motivated to face whatever is waiting for you.
http://carminelitta.com/2010/06/20/album-review-elevated-dr-e/
Welcome to the latest edition of Ray's Local Reviews. I have a real treat for all you music lovers out there. Whether you are in to Jazz/Blues/Soul or not, I'm sure this artist will blow you away. She goes by the stage name of Docta E. Richardson, real name Elaine Richardson, originally from Cleveland, OH. She contacted me a few weeks ago through Facebook and asked me to take a listen to her latest effort, a three song CD sampler entitled "Real Life".
The three songs on the CD are titled "Good Girl Down", "Elevated", and "Let Me Clear My Throat", and NO, it's not a cover of a song with the same title by DJ Kool. Docta E. has generated a very soulful yet powerful style that on "Let Me Clear My Throat", reminded me of the late great blues singer Koko Taylor in her prime. The next song "Elevated" is a slow groove about empowerment, and The Docta proves to all that she has power and finesse and mixes them perfectly. "Good Girl Down" is a slightly more uptempo song with a message. That message is you CAN'T keep a good girl down, and this girl is good. Check out her website www.giveusfreerecords.com and find out where she is playing next and go see a show. With the love of Jazz/Blues/Soul music that Northeast Ohio has developed over the years, her style and voice are welcome additions.
Fleshcoat featuring Dr. E
Coat of Flesh
("Give Us Free" Records)
By Eddie Fleisher
Published: October 10, 2007
If you believe R&B has become nothing more than a sexed-up subgenre of hip-hop, turn off the radio and buy Coat of Flesh, a collaboration between Fleshcoat, a C-Town outfit whose music has appeared on several daytime soaps, and Dr. Elaine Richardson, a Penn State professor and Cleveland native with a solid set of pipes.
Coat feeds on the positivity of Richardson. Her lyrics deal with career, love, faith, and the blues. On such tracks as "Back to Work" and "I See Heaven," she digs deeper than her mainstream counterparts -- that's for sure.
Fleshcoat's jazzy touch works perfectly with Dr. E's soulful voice.
The Daily Collegian
By Stacey Federov Collegian Staff Writer
Dr. E, Penn State prof, brings blues to Arts Fest The stereotypical professor knows nothing about drugs, jail or prostitutes. But Dr. E isn't a stereotypical professor. Dr. E, an applied linguistics and English professor at Penn State whose full name is Elaine Robinson, will perform her brand of soul and R&B at 2:30 p.m. Sunday on the Allen Street Stage as part of the 41st annual Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts. She said she has been singing since she was a teenager in Cleveland when she was a part of group she formed with her friends called the Shades of Love. She became entangled in a lifestyle of crime shortly after that, but she said willpower helped her overcome it. "If you want to overcome certain circumstances you can, if you have your mind made up," she said. She fronts the group Fleshcoat who released their first album, "Coat of Flesh," in September 2006, but will be performing solo at this year's Arts Festival. "I have been trying to get into the Arts Festival [music lineup] since I've been in State College," she said. "Finally, the stars lined up, and it was my time."
Cleveland Call and Post article on Dr E by Rhonda Crowder (April 2007)