From a young age my Father decided to educate myself and my siblings about things that formal education cannot teach. He would bring home novels that he had picked up from the book shop that a child of my age wouldn't necessarily pick from the library book shelf... He would sit down with us and conjure up mathematical equations for us to solve... He would correct our grammar at any given opportunity... point out historical buildings whilst pressing our noses on the windows in the back seat... educate us about what he classified as REAL music (Otis Redding, Teddy Pendegras, Motown, Queen etc) And sit and tell us the origins of the English language... All from a man who was born and raised in a small village in a west African Country called Ghana. Fuelled by his input and my own creative instinct, by Primary School I began to write.
Despite uncertainty,I was compelled to write.I was encouraged to indulge in all things creative. My sister and I briefly went to tap and jazz dance classes. My most significant artistic experience was the Anna Scher Drama School where I had the opportunity to establish my love for performing.
By secondary school I had formed a bond with two girls who shared my interest in the performing arts. We would spend break times and lunchtimes singing,dancing and writing. We would brainstorm in the run up to performances,from the songs we would sing to the clothes we would wear... we named our group... ermm... a name too embarrassing to mention!*cringe*.
After secondary school I continued to write here and there... on scraps of paper, in the back of old school exercise books, and even on the back of the receipt paper I used to pinch from the till at my retail job! But I was unsure of what to do with my material. Inspired by the likes of female rappers Lauryn Hill, Lisa 'Left Eye' Lopes and Da Brat, and the inspiring lyrics of NAS, I formed my words into bars of 8... then 16... EUREKA! I began to rap. I used to stay up to tune my radio into the Tim Westwood show on Radio 1 just to hear what exclusive hip hop joint he was going to 'BLAST OFF' (hahaa!!).
I struggled to find a voice that I could use as a vessel to deliver my lyrics in a rap capacity... accent/intonation?? Feminine/aggressive?? After a few sessions with producers and a couple of scratchy recordins, I soon outgrew rap and ceased to write.
At university I began to write again,inspired by the more free-flowing and often structure-free call of POETRY. I watched a few poetry performances at university events, which I responded to with a tilted head and pricked up ears. A spark had been ignited... Two years after graduating from university, with the image of these poetry performances ingrained into my memory and a couple of hard knocks later,I returned to my love of writing and decided... POETRY would be my release...
My comments are posted as 'herdkilla' but I am philtaman just so you get the connection. I like rap and don't believe you can outgrow it but I write lots of lyrics, and mostly they start out as poems that I put to music, some as proper songs, some as more spoken word. Your blogs have made me think about putting my works on a blogsite. Thanks for the inspiration.
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