Solange's latest album, "A Seat at the Table," is a bonafide hit. The 21-track set has already topped the iTunes charts and it's expected to enter the Billboard album chart in the same position. This is a feat that Solange should be incredible proud of. The 30-year-old wrote, arranged and co-produced the entire album.
In a behind-the-scenes video, Solo gives us a glimpse of her creative process. She's seen jamming with studio musicians, working with engineers and producers, and penning lyrics. And intermittently, there are cute cameos from her son, Julez.
This short looks gives us a hint about why the album took years to come together. Solange was invest in building a work of art from the ground up.
She said in a statement.
"A Seat At The Table, Beginning Stages" is a look at the early days of jam sessions, experimentation, and the exploring of sounds and ideas for the album.
While some of the jam sessions featured did not make the album, they helped to create and identify the sonic tone, and the early lyrics and concepts I wrote for the project.
This video is broken up into 3 different parts. The first and second parts happened in Long Island and New Orleans where I first started to jam and collaborate on ideas with the incredible artists and musicians featured (as well as some other incredible artist and musicians who are not shown here). A lot of these days would just start with me singing a melody or someone playing a synth part or bass line, and would transition into an hour long jam.
The third part is me taking all of these jams to New Iberia, LA with just my engineers and creating the actual song structures, building the sounds, and writing the lyrics and melodies.
I later took these songs to Los Angeles to work with Raphael Saadiq to help amplify the production, as well as record the vocals alongside Troy Johnson. When I look back at the beginning stages, I remember the powerful energy that set the tone, and that I'm so grateful followed us everywhere during the creation of this record.
Director Ava DuVernay is taking on mass incarceration in her new documentary "13th." The title refers tot he 13th amendment of the U.S. Constitution which makes illegal involuntary servitude "except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted." It is this clause, the film argues, which sets the stage for the over incarceration of Black people in public and private prisons.
With appearances from Michelle Alexander, Jelani Cobb, Khalil Gibran Muhammad, DuVernay makes plain the problem and the path to correcting it.
DuVernay will make history when the film opens the New York Film Festival on September 30. The film will be available on Netflix and in select theaters on October 7.
"Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise" chronicles the famed author's remarkable beyond her time as a respected poet and essayist. Directed by Bob Hercules and Rita Coburn Whack, the documentary explores her rise to prominence.
In a new clip from the film, Actress Diahann Carroll recalls going to see Angelou perform in the late 50s. Angelou was a gifted performer then known as Miss Calypso. She released an album of the same name in 1957.
Shots of Angelou singing and dancing in barefeet are shown between interviews with Carroll and Don Martin, who danced with her.
These moments are so important to see. They remind us of Mother Maya's humanity. While she will be remembered forever for her literary feats, she lived a full and diverse life.
The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival, and is not yet slated for wide release. But if you're in Washington, DC. You can catch a screening at the AFI Docs Film Festival from June 22-26.
For the past four years, filmmakers Bob Hercules and Rita Coburn Whack have been working on the first ever documentary on the life of Dr. Maya Angelou. They have started a kickstarter campaign to raise money to cover the cost of finishing this project to be broadcasted on PBS in 2016.
Black women living in Rome, Italy take some time to talk about the ups and downs of the experience. The short film from Pizzoli Media, gives us a different look at life abroad. While many of the women recall positive interactions with Italians like being complimented often, one of the women recounts a violent encounter on public transportation.
A documentary highlighting the career and legacy of Nina Simone is coming to theaters this month. The film will release at NYC’s Miles Gallery and LA’s Sundance Sunset on October 16th and will open nationwide on October 23rd.
“People could not heal if they did not know the truth,” declares Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu early in filmmaker Lydia Hicks’ new documentary-in-progress, Rediscovering the Scientist. Indeed, healing by way of seeking truth is the major driving force of this absorbing new film, which critically examines erasure of people of color in science history and highlights multicultural contributions to the field.
A new documentary, Generation Soweto, takes a look at South African millennials and how the country has changed in the two decades since the end of apartheid.
An upcoming CNN special called "Children for Sale: The Fight to End Human Trafficking" features Jada Pinkett Smith traveling to Atlanta for a look at human trafficking happening here in the United States.
Is your hair strange? Is your hair professional? Why natural and not straight? These are some of the questions explored in HAIR FREEDOM, a short documentary by Zindzi Rocque Drayton on the natural hair movement, Black beauty, and the term "natural hair."
Trigger warning: disturbing images and fictionalized depictions of brutality, violence, and death
Jacqueline Olive is a documentary filmmaker living in Florida. Her most recent project is the feature film, Always in Season, which aims to explore the history of violence and terrorism that Blacks faced through lynching, as well as ongoing efforts to reconcile and seek justice for the heinous race-based murders of Black people for over a century.
Fum Fum KO is a filmmaker. She recently began directing and producing a wonderful new documentary web series titled, "Art is Cool," where she interviews and profiles the work of a Black woman artists. The first episode is up, and it features Austin, Texas based mixed media visual artist, Beth Consetta Rubel.
The "Light Girls" documentary will air on January 19 on OWN. In a new trailer, women recall the taunts and insults they've received because of their complexion. Image activist Michaela Angela Davis says in the clip, "Black women have been cultured to compare and not connect."
It's been a hell of a year for Beyoncé. She's released a groundbreaking album and made history.
It's been a year since the midnight release of "BEYONCÉ," and the global sensation released a new mini documentary to celebrate it. Bey continues the theme of giving the world a closer look into who she is as a person.
At South Shore Fine Arts, Indigo and her friends are given the opportunity to participate in visual and performance arts after school. But when school ends for the summer, it's up to the parents in south shore to find a safe and affordable 'education' for their daughters. Despite finical and family troubles, parents enroll their kids in summer programs with the hope of preparing them for more than just the fall semester. In Chronicles of the Summer, we see how much the girls learn as they deal with the personal and artistic challenges that shape their identity during a critical age. Confronting notions of a 'poor education', this community redefines what is worth learning.
Lacey Schwartz grew up believing that she looked different from her the rest of her Jewish family because of a dark-skinned Sicillian grandmother. It wasn't until she was an adult that her mother revealed that her biological father was a Black man she'd had an affair with.
