AphroChic Magazine: Issue No. 8

Sounds
Jennah Bell is an intriguing multiplicity of
musical influences. Equal parts country, folk,
R&B and musical theater, her sound is instantly
familiar, yet all her own. We sat down with
Jennah to talk about her own musical history,
the path to becoming a singer and the value of
having space to dream.
AC: When did music first become a part of
your life? And when did you know it would be
your career?
JB: Music has always been a part of my life.
I grew up in a very musical household. My mom
studied music and my father was a songwriter.
For me the start of it was between seeing Annie
the musical and hearing Stevie Wonder's Superwoman
for the first time. I guess Superwoman is
kind of like a musical — the epicness of it.
As for the career path, I think that I knew
that I wanted to do it because I kept choosing
it. I attended the Berkelee School of Music in
Boston, but I didn’t necessarily apply with the
idea to become a professional musician. I don't
think it was that direct. But I think after getting
there, and having that experience, I was more
certain that I wanted to pursue it. But I don't
think it was ever a hard line decision, per se.
AC: Tell us a little bit about Oakland. Living
in LA now, how does Oakland feel when you
remember it? How has it changed? And where do
you hear it in your music?
JB: I left Oakland for Boston when I was 17.
So the Oakland that I grew up with is drastically
different than what it is now, especially because
[of] the influx of tech to the Bay Area. But the
Oakland I grew up with — I think it was like
living on an island. Now that I've lived in other
places — New York, Boston, LA now — Oakland
is a very special place, with its own language,
its own baseline for artistic endeavors. And I
think that really influenced the way that I approached
writing songs and just being aware
of the language that I was using and what story
I was trying to tell, especially because poetry
was such a huge part of Oakland's art scene
when I was growing up. I think that the mosaic
of culture and art in Oakland leaves its own
print on everybody. But it's not any one thing. I
think that's why I often feel multiplicity in my
expression, because I don't ever feel like one
thing.
AC: What do you mean when you say,
“multiplicity in your expression?” Could you
elaborate that on that more?
JB: Sure. Oakland is on the smaller side
for a city but it's really dense. So from block to
block, you're somewhere else. So I had a lot of
very impactful experiences that at the time just
seemed like the norm, being from there. But
then leaving the Bay Area, it became very clear
that all of those things made in an imprint on
my personality. So I use the term multiplicity, I
guess, as a way to touch on the lack of singularity
not only in my experience, but also my personality.
It’s kind of all over the place. It’s all of the
things I've ever experienced and is never really
been streamlined to one thing.
AC: What was your first experience with
acoustic guitar? What about the instrument
convinced you to make it your focus?
JB: Well, my first experience with the
acoustic guitar was not pleasant. I played piano
and flute and had a brief stint with the drums
before I started guitar. I'd started writing
poetry and I’d started to think about songwriting
and I thought that if I learned how to
play guitar, it might change the expression of
my writing. But when I picked it up, I felt like
I was fighting with it the whole time. I didn't go
through the usual teaching avenues with it and
it was a very complicated instrument for me to
try to learn intuitively. At the same time, I did
develop a style pretty early on, because I didn't
know what I was doing.
My stepmom played a lot of James Taylor,
so I was very conscious of finger picking and
the more folk / country style. And I saw people
with guitars — Tracy Chapman, Richie Havens
— but there was no one artist I really saw and
felt like, that's why I want to play the guitar. I just
knew that pianos confused my brain. And that,
even though guitar was difficult, it was about
patterns. I think more in patterns than I do
anything else, so the guitar felt like if I learned
the patterns, I could just play them up and down
the fret board.
Over time, I started looking at guitar as
its own way to write music, as opposed to the
marriage between what I was writing over the
music. So I never did the guitar in any kind of
depth until after I left college. Then I was like,
Wow, there's a lot more here that I haven't even
begun to think about."
AC: I feel like when we listen to your music,
it's folk and there's country and there's a little
R&B in there. It's very ethereal as well. Can you
take us on the journey of how your sound came
together? Was it all at school or did it start later?
JB: I know, my parents would be very upset
at me for saying this. But when I was attending
Berkelee, I was at school — I was not in school.
I think that, having left home and realizing how
I learn and how I absorb, it was a much slower
process for me than institutionalized learning
gave room for, especially for something like
music. So there were moments where I could
grasp something. But processing it out, understanding
it, actually took a lot longer. So being
in a music school had its benefits, but also an
extreme amount of intimidation for the speed at
which I was absorbing things. My problem was
articulating that I knew these things. A lot of my
teachers were like, “You get it, but you can't tell
me what it is that you get.” So I never really got
into what Berkelee was for.
What I took out of the experience, plus or
minus a few teachers who just got where I was,
and let me be, was my room. I was extremely
shy — I still struggle with stage fright — so I
was in my room, writing. I was the person who
would leave in the middle of the party and go
to a different room and start writing. It was
writing more than anything. The performance
didn't come until I moved to New York. But
when I was in Boston, I was just in my room,
learning. Learning how to record myself,
what my voice sounded like in a microphone.
Looking back, I probably wrote like 100 songs
in my first year. It just felt natural. Singing
wasn't really in the forefront of my mind.
I didn't think of myself as a singer. I introduced
myself as a songwriter. So yeah, I was
in my room, recording, figuring out the whole
guitar thing.
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