Meet Jaiel | Performing Artist & Entrepreneur

We had the good fortune of connecting with Jaiel and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Jaiel, how has your perspective on work-life balance evolved over time?
Balance means a lot to me – it’s funny I even have it tattooed on my right arm. It’s a concept that is constantly evolving for me, but I’ve also come to believe that evolution is the nature of balance. Much like when you’re balancing a physical scale – the more you add items on and take items away, the more the balance changes. I’ve found my life works the same way, that in any given season I’m constantly adding things on and taking things away to try to find the balance. For that reason, I think balance can be a wonderful tool.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
My name is Jaiel – which is Hebrew and means “Of Great Use”. I start with that because I think it sums up who I am in a nutshell. I am a singer, songwriter, dancer, actress, model, producer and entrepreneur and I believe my mission is to create experiences (music, concerts, movies, books, etc) that reach women and girls who are evolving.

I got my start dancing and singing in church, and I grew up always wanting to be a performer! As a little girl I was obsessed with Shirley Temple. I come from a musical family and am no.4 and the youngest girl of 5 children and we were always singing and performing individually and collectively. In 2014 I graduated from Rangeview High School in Aurora, CO – there I was heavily involved in theatre and show choir. In 2018, I graduated with honors and became the first Black woman to graduate from Colorado College with a degree in Music.

My two EPs “Black Girl Songs” and “The Magical World of Black Girlhood” really are an extension of the work that I found myself infused in and surrounded by during college. The true seeds of these projects began while I was doing a production of Ntozake Shange’s For Colored Girls directed by Idris Goodwin. That was the same time of year that the infamous “Yik Yak” incident happened and in the midst of all the talks/debates about free speech I couldn’t help, but think about how no one seemed to address how there were actually Black students, particularly Black women who were affected and didn’t feel safe on campus. I remember there was this school wide assembly and we were asked to give statements. I stood and recited a portion of Maya Angelou’s Still I Rise. That coupled with pouring my heart out as the Lady in Red during For Colored Girls I think really cemented this connection for me that I wanted to be the type of artist that spoke directly to those Black women who felt unheard and unsafe.

The Lady in Brown’s whole opening monologue is a staple for me and is one that I visited all the time during those days and still do!

Something about hearing those words, in the midst of all that I had experienced and all that was going on at that time- it awakened something in me. It felt like a door or a pathway opening in front of me. I think it was probably a thread from Peg (listen to the EP and you’ll get that haha) And I carried this heart and this idea, I want to create Black Girl songs. And from there, not just songs, but media, experiences, everything! I became obsessed with this idea that I could be the one that created a righteous gospel, in which Black girls could be born and handled warmly.

That time would ultimately lead me to my senior thesis which was a project called Black Girl Songs: Black Women’s Storytelling through Music. It was based on a series of interviews i did with Black women in my life which served as the source material for the EP called “Black Girl Songs”. I coupled it with a research paper which explored the ways that Black women’s storytelling can be a healing practice and a resistance practice and when told through art and music can be a transformative practice. It was a beautiful synthesis of what I had learned in my sociology courses, my music and dance courses and everything in between. I argued that the counterstories (which is a Critical Race Theory term) Black women tell through music (and now I would say through life and existence) provide the framework for transforming the world.

Fast forward, to when I got the idea that I was finally ready to start making music again specifically I wanted to write an EP, which was probably around Summer 2020. I just started writing what was in my heart and mind at the time. I knew that I wanted to rerecord/recreate some of the songs from the first EP but at that point I didn’t know that it would end up being like Black Girl songs extended but God knew lol. And then over the last 2 years these stories just started to emerge and resurface over and over. In Summer of 2021 I ended up doing this project for New York Stage and Film and I started re-exploring these ideas as well as some new ideas about generational connections for women and my own ancestors. It was around then that I was listening to this sound my producer Callum had sent over (that little bell or whatever at the beginning of Magic) and I just had the thought (totally inspired by Janelle Monae’s Archandroid world) what if I wrote this intro as an intro to a fairytale. And then I wrote Peg’s Journey ( the princess is named after my 6th time great grandmother Peg who was emancipated from slavery on April 12th, 1800) and this whole world of The Magical World of Blackgirlhood just started to emerge for me.

I’m a huge Harry Potter and Disney and Marvel fan and so I think my imagination just took off and I started creating this world or really it’s like a parallel universe where Black girl freedom is the norm. I remembered how in Ytasha Womack’s Afrofuturism: The World of Black Sci-Fi and Fantasy Culture poses this question Can you imagine what an injustice-free world would look like? (2013:41). “If you can’t see it, how do you know when you’ve achieved it?”. This became such an important statement in my thesis and subsequently in all of this. I wanted to create a world where Black women and girls are free to be themselves, fully and completely, they are loved, and celebrated.

I released “The Magical World of Black Girlhood” EP on Friday April 22, 2022 in honor of my paternal grandmother’s birthday.

It’s been a long, but joyful and rewarded process. I love exploring the world through my art and creating/making music that not only makes you think, but also brings joy/ makes you feel! That’s what I aimed to achieve through “The Magical World of Blackgirlhood” – the music and the visuals!

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Hmmm – that’s a fun question. My favorite place to take people when they’re visiting is Quince Coffee House! For dinner, we would go to a couple different places. We’d have to start with Pete’s Kitchen on Colfax because to me that’s a Denver staple and then. if it were a fun Friday night we might find ourselves at Milk Bar down in the arcade!

If you’ve my music video for “Top Down” you’d learn that my favorite place to go in high school was South Broadway- we’d spend the day wandering in and out of all of the vintage shops and book stores. On a perfect weekend, we’d have an unlimited spending budget and go shopping at Little Piece of My Heart haha!

Then we’d get some late night Voodoo Doughnuts, and round the night with tea for me or coffee if they like that at The Bardo coffee house.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
My mission as an artist, entrepreneur, and advocate is to reach women and girls (specifically Black women and girls) who are evolving; and provide a space for them to heal, awaken, & celebrate! So my shoutout is dedicated to all of the incredible women and girls in my life – both near and afar – who shine lights so bright it beckons me to do the same.

Website: https://linktr.ee/jlynnettemitchell

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/asweethippie/

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-eARl3GYL_mOkllnFauPLg

Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/1oViJrCRUGxLNXLoFQ5B0p?si=DYpsqQd5SECtf4kIa8n7IQ https://music.apple.com/us/artist/jaiel/1383528874

Image Credits
Bryanne Elaine Anika Kan Grevstad Lila Schmitz Jason Edelstein Sophia Capp Tom Pitta