Janice Jo Lee in the Grand River. Photo by E Frankie Traichel.
Swim ForeverMusic & Video by Janice Jo LeeI have been writing many water songs. Water has healed me in these past few years recovering from racism and patriarchy. Water reflects, holds us softly, and fits exactly to our bodies. It can also rise, drown, and destroy. Water is life and death, and I behold it with great reverence.
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I am a folk artist, storyteller, and an artist of the people. It is my responsibility as a folk artist to affirm our contemporary stories, emotions, and ideas through art, and carry these stories onward. Art is my tool to build just and joyful communities that are as free as possible from systemic oppression. I seek communities and audiences where my best self, vitality, spirit, and art are life-affirming. I want what I offer as a person to act as a spark or opening to emotional truth, social truth, untapped or forgotten joy, and self-power. I seek to create an open space which reminds us that human connection is full of beauty, wonder, and a life worth living.
Special thank you to my Umma and poet, Susan Kim, for the Korean translation. Janice Jo Lee is a folk-soul singer-songwriter, spoken word poet, actor, and playwright from Kitchener, on Haldimand Tract treaty territory. On stage, she creates looping landscapes with her voice, guitar, trumpet and Korean janggu drum. Her latest compositions are Ancestor Songs, contemporary jazz-folk melodies full of truth and power. An award-winning performer, Janice is a hard femme queer radical and is interested in using art to build flourishing communities based in justice and joy. | Website: janicejolee.com, IG: @janjolee
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