Akosua: Blog

5 days till my big fundraising concert and I am literally counting my blessings and giggling with joy as I write this.

A little time off pays off and I am so happy that East Bay Community Foundation has chosen to support my work with a matching grant.

I mean...how magical... my efforts are now doubling before my eyes. And each good intention of each person who contributes also doubles. That is powerful stuff.

I am intensely grateful and it drives me to keep doing what I need to do to make all my dreams come true.

This journey is delicious. I do not know the path but I know the destination. I am constantly growing and finding new ways to be truly me.

Don't miss me too much if I drop off again to mastermind and manifest my next stepping stone.

I will always come back better than ever.

I guarantee that an album that will change the way you feel music is coming soon...

xoxo
*akosua

Hey Darlins'

I promise, this is not at all like Where's Waldo? In fact I'm much more difficult to find these days.

6 months, no shows, no press releases, no press clippings, no photo shoots, or headlining.

I've been hibernating, cultivating, incubating the next breath.

Although life can be so unglamorous at times /or/ completely delicious-while standing still-I'm still alive, blessed with this gift that keeps me going.

Got me a day job to pay the bills. I haven't quite yet reached the equation through which music can make me a living, but I am on my way.

20 x (what I love to do) has me writing songs at 7am. Now I am 30 minutes late for work which means these songs are worth negative money and I 'll never be able to afford... to think that way.

I choose my music over anything, any day. This is but a perfect pause.

I can promise that I'll be back soon and that my sleeves are full of surprises and new tricks to make your heart wish and want again.

Miss you,
*akosua

Tonight found me. Huddled. Holding my guitar between my heart and my hard drive. Giving birth to sound. I wanted to stop for fear of writing sappy love songs for you. I managed to remember that I am the one I am in love with now. Now in this new freedom to rest, to think, to breathe to create. I remember my child self. My higher Self. And I am in with love me again. I have found me.

Oh to breathe and feel the music welling within. Spilling without pause. I did not realize that this space would give so quickly and so generously. If only I could be still in it more often. I almost ran tonight. You know it's Friday night and normal people are at the movies or with their boyfriends or whatever. Oh but I am at home knowing that I thrive in solitude. Knowing that it's best that I don't move for danger of forgetting the sentiment of motion. It occured to me in the shower today...the pull to create is so intense, I try to run from it because I know it begs for solitude and I am so tired of being alone.

You found me. And, ironically, you said that I would never be alone because of this art. But you are not an artist and you fear you have nothing but this world. I know you are wrong but I closed my eyes and felt the gravity of your dilemma. Would it be selfish to ask you to be with me, when I have this art and you have nothing but this world and you fear this world does not love you. I will love you. Will that be enough? You know if I stop loving you, all you will have is the world, and this world does not love, and you fear you will be lost.

Find something. Please. So that you can be. With me.

Yes, I have this lover, this life partnership with this art, it blooms and grows and I am committed, but I am often alone within it. With it I find myself alone. Never lost but alone.

i.

I promised myself I would not become a starving artist. Yet here I am. Starving for words. Sounds. Images escape my memory.

I squint into the sun instead of opening my eyes because there are too many jobs to be done and the weight of this sits on my eyebrows dragging them downward to press on my eyelids making my eyes turn into little slits of hope. Sometimes even pressing water to fall.

I tell you, what I do is not for fun. Mostly it is to ease the pressure in my brain. To break through the inane-ness pf life’s misunderstandings. And when I open my mouth to sing you a song, it is because that is the only way I know how to breathe.

Art is a necessity. You make think it pretty but, it’s just like piss and shit. Like transcendence. Essential to life.

When is the right time to be creative?

If I can carve a reality thru a sonic breath with literary depth. Then life is worth living.

ii.

I work to the sound of clocks ticking, the metronome of life beating against my years.

If I could stop the clock I would not go back in time to change the days or forward to chart my way. I would just breathe. It’s like holding breath underwater, the depth of these dreams.

I have forgotten my own heartbeat. I’ve been running on existential pressures never catching up with my own measure of time.

I promised myself that I would not become a starving artist.

And here I am.

Starving for time to stop the clock and work only by the click of my own heart. To dream. To create. To breathe.

MIdnight feels like morning and my eyes are still dry from the winds of Hamatan.

This morning when I wake I will miss lifting my head to peer out the window at the gray and red of the long drive way and the green of the never ending bush beyond.

This morning when I wake I will miss the echo of the halls in my father's house. The taste of sweet bread and paw paw, is just beyond my lips if I close my eyes I can be there again.

Here every face is brown and I am everybodys sister.

My auntie jumps up and down at the sight of me. She is deep in her 80's and her skin is taught and shiny, her eyes like onyx on a cloud of white. I bend to embrace her small frame and feel greatful to be home. She wants to take me up that spiral mountain to Oboe. She wants to know if I will still race her down the red dirt road. I bring her water and yams with fish and red pepper. She has traveled a long way. She has come with her head wrapped in black and her body dressed in black and white still mourning the death of her mother.

A cow groans.
An owl hoo's at the window.
I press my toes flat to feel the cool floor.

This home is so new, most guests get lost in the red dirt maze that proceeds it's gate. We meet many at the main road and lead them through to join us for a house warming.

Here the power goes out four times a day and one must not take water for granted. Forget the microwave, light the pilot on the stove and get a pot to heat your stew. Put the fish in the oven and lay down by the window before the heat gets you.

Blink a dry eye.
Draw a dry breath.
Scratch the dry skin.
A lizard leaps onto the tile floor.
I watch the red ball sun turn into a diamond against the black tar sky.

I hear the door bell ring and listen for the laughter of the children from the nearby village as they run away.

They are always gone before I can reach the gate making me wish we did not need to have one.

A wild chicken runs thru the gate, I chase it for a little while.


Flying across the black tar sky I meet snow capped mountains and
a yellow California sun. It's too cold here.

Midnight feels like morning. 12 is 8 and now I am up late instead of early.

Somewhere in Gbestile my father is rising to the click and clack of workers outside our house. He peers out the window to screen the brown double gate for a visitor. There is always one or two.

I miss his face. His slow aged walk. His voice reflecting off of the walls and ceilings of that house. We spoke of forgiveness with turned down eyes. We were bitter in our goodbyes. Who will bring him sweet bread and mango this morning?

This morning when I wake I feel feel at home and out of place at the same time.

Friends,

I'm preparing to go across many seas to see my second home.

It's been quite a long time since I've been to Ghana and I trust it will be a truly satisfying and moving journey.

*
Enjoying dinner with a kindred spirit the other day at Cafe Gratitude, I read that "love is an act of endless forgivness," and "to forgive is to give as before."

I am currently constantly in sync with forgiveness and letting go.

*

I have taken an interest in kalidescopes and wind up toys.

*

Hope to see you at Gratitude Nights, I'll be sporting a new hairdo.

Much Love
*akosua

P.S. I'm working on a project called Musical Medicinals.

Wanna try one?

Go to my music section and listen to One Note for Inner Peace.

Prescription Notes:

Listen in headphones with eyes closed and heart open. Allow the Self to be filled with peace.

My Darlings,

I hope your lives have been filled with abundance and excitement.

I've been a busy busy bee, but I wanted to take some time to let you know about a few exciting things falling into place before my Nov. 8th concert.

This Thursday November 2nd, I will be on KALW's (91.7) Africa Mix playing live at 9pm.

This Sunday November 5th you can catch me in the Contra Costa Times Sunday Spotlight column.

See you soon,

*akosua

Peace All,

I just attended a prescreening of a film called "Catch a Fire."

The film portrays the struggle to end South African apartheid through the life and struggles of Patrick Thibedi, one of the many freedom fighters whose name has not been widely known.

After the viewing there was a Q and A with the director of the film, the leading actors, and Mr. Thibedi.

This experience touched me profoundly. I highly recommend that you see this film. More importantly, I recommend that you talk about this film and all that it asks us to continue to remember.

Every now and then there is a film, or a book, or an event that really inspires, ignites, and re-awakens.

Tonight I caught on fire because my heart was taken once again to Soweto, Tembisa and to all the places where I was taught how to heal and to forgive.

Catch a fire.

Much Love
*akosua

Last time I saw Ledisi on stage she said, "It takes only one person to change your life."

I've been meditating on those words and I realize that people change my life everyday when I allow it.

I have been seeking a catalyst and now I realize that the change I seek is all around me.

If you are seeking a catalyst in your life, remember that change starts from within and all that is without follows. (Even with just a seed of intent to allow change.)

Thank you to all the wonderful people who have been changing my life and my mind lately. You know who you are!

Thank you to me for allowing it.

Much Love
*akosua

Seasons are changing and I am feeling more inward than ever. In between studies of Vivaldi and the Avant Garde I am contemplating what it means to be an artist, how to stay inspired when there is hardly time to breathe, how to write when your mind is spinning. I think that as artists we create in the midst of personal and societal wars, we rebirth in the throws of doubt, sleeplessness, heartbreak, fear, and ecstasy because we must in order to survive. Contemplate art as a necessity.


The season is turning cold and the light from the sun is dimming everyday, bowing to more gray. And I find myself more and more in my room huddled with my guitar between my heart and my hardrive giving birth to sound.

My two new babies are called "Ship with no Anchor" and "Leap of Faith.

You will be hearing them soon.

Much Love
*akosua

Hey Ya'll

Well new things are growing. A certain song or two is itching me in all the right places. I started a new one a couple of weeks ago, it's called "When I Rise," and when I sing it my soul stretches to deeper depths and my spirt flies to heigher heights and I hope yours will too.

This week I've been spending time with family, thinking so much about distance, loss, love, and change. I'll come back to Cali more full and with more fever to write.

P.S. There is a live CD with many of the songs you've been asking for coming soon!

Much Love,

*akosua

What a fabulous summer this has been indeed. So much performing and meeting amazing folks who are my angels on this path. End of August is back to school time and I will be sure to be back with new tricks. You've all been asking me when is my next show....well I think we'll be seeing each other in October.

Much Love,
*akosua