SUNSTAR FEST GOES VIRTUAL
The 2020 edition of the Sunstar Festival: Women & Music had the worst possible timing, set for the very weekend COVID-19 shut everything down. This was before most musicians and arts groups had fully embraced streaming, so the Kelly Strayhorn Theater was forced to skip a year of the festival that began in 2009.
With the 2021 edition, we’re still in streaming mode for the most part, so KST brings us the four Pittsburgh artists booked last year — INEZ, Clara Kent, Brittney Chantele and Chandra Rhyme — presenting the Saturday night concert Mic Check Unplugged.
Those artists will also sit down with podcasters Girls Running S--- — Markeea “Keea” Hart, Janita Kilgore and Mia Marshall — on Thursday and Friday for Instagram Talk Back Sessions about being Black women in the Pittsburgh music scene and how they weathered the pandemic.
“I’m truly honored to be a part of this lineup of amazing Black women and femmes,” Chantele says. “The talent involved is absolutely mind-blowing, and that includes the production team and staff that all came together to make it happen.”
The unplugged theme provides a chance for these women to step out of the box and experiment with their sound.
INEZ in charge
Sunstar finds INEZ, an artist from Homewood who told her story in sultry neosoul style on her 2019 debut, “Voicemails and Conversations,” in the process of working on her second album.
“LP2 is going to be a bit ‘darker,’ ” says the singer, who was named WYEP’s Artist of the Year for 2020. “It’s even more personal, and I want live orchestration and instrumentation to help move the album forward vs. simply programming sounds. I’d also like the orchestral players I tap to primarily be Black residents of Pittsburgh. They’re here, just finding my core group now to lock in sessions with.”
One of the things to watch for in the fivesong Sunstar set from INEZ, who is also an audio engineer, will be her own guitar playing.
“Violin was my first-ever instructed instrument,” she says, “but I chose drums over it because it came more natural. Learning guitar/bass has been just as much of a self-care activity as the need to wanting to be as self-sufficient in producing records and showcasing my musicality. I really want this year’s focus to be on my multi-instrumentalist abilities. But working on fully earning the title is something I’ll be patient with.”
Along with originals, INEZ will pay tribute to one of her influences by performing a cover of a Nina Simone song.
“Nina paved the way for so many Black artists to live in their truth without fear of political retribution,” she says. “But outside of activism, she was a hell of a songwriter/storyteller, and her pathos was undeniable. The way she could play a piano fugue solo over a jazz song was indicative of how great a musician she also was. She’s an inspiration, for sure.”
Kent’s covers
Kent, a fellow neosoul singer-songwriter from Homewood, has risen from the scene as a solo artist, a member of the hip-hop collective Tribe Eternal and a visual artist under the name Bounce. Her breakout year was 2018, when she released her debut, “A U R A,” and opened for Wyclef Jean at the SXSW Music Festival.
For Sunstar, she will offer a set of covers by Frank Ocean, Moses Sumney, Cleo Sol and Lianne La Havas, with acoustic tracks created by her music director, David Brown.
“I decided to refrain from doing any original work to introduce a different side of my vocal ability and warm up the audience to sounds and textures I plan to use for my future projects,” she says.
The last time Kent performed out live
was Feb. 29, 2020, with the now-defunct Starship Mantis and then the next day at Carnegie Music Library for Boom Concepts and Chamber Music Pittsburgh’s “Because She Said So.”
Since then, she’s done a few digital charity performances for Return to the Heart Foundation to provide care to reservations during the COVID-19 epidemic, and for Indigenous Peoples Movement and Seeding Sovereignty for the Radicalize the Vote Campaign.
“I’m learning how to unlearn many things, making room for what truly matters,” she says. “Pacing myself, learning to be fully compassionate with myself and others, and truly embodying my artistry and all its authenticity has been an eyeopener. Sometimes it takes a full halt for you to see what blessings you have within and out. I have a lot of great projects that have grown roots now, and it feels really great.”
The singer is pushing forward while battling chronic hemolytic anemia, a disease that creates excessive internal bleeding and other symptoms like chronic bone pain. Her friend Tahirah Walker created a GoFundMe campaign (which is at 50% at gf.me/u/y2hw8j) for diagnostic testing and holistic pain treatment.
“My body is constantly fighting to stay afloat, and it has been extremely challenging,” Kent says. “I’m so grateful to my community for rallying behind me. They have truly saved my life through their loving support, gifts, donations and words of encouragement. I’m beyond grateful.”
Pop goes Chantele
A month before the pandemic, Chantele released her second album, “The Golden Opportunity,” a hip-hop/R&B concept record about the hardships she endured as a young woman in the military.
So, we’ll be hearing some of those songs at Sunstar?
“Nah,” she says. “I won’t be performing those songs anytime soon, unless they are requested or if I’m doing a specific social justice/activism performance. I’m performing my newer songs plus a fan favorite from my ‘A Fire on Venus’ album.”
Chantele, who grew up in North Fayette and has been an artist-activist force with 1Hood since 2018, is working on a third album with musician-producer Ryan M. Tedder (not to be confused with the Adele/ Beyonce collaborator), rapper-producer Livefromthecity and producer Aaron Karsh (aka K-Ron). This album will circle back to the themes on “Venus,” her 2019 debut.
“My next album is another pop album all about queer love, so I’ll be sticking to performing those works,” she says. “I think my listeners/fans can expect similar topics of songs, but I’m working with a different team on this project so it will sound pretty different in terms of the instrumentals.
“My goal is to be a pop artist, so I think this album will be more in line with that type of sound.”
A new Chandra
Chandra Rhyme grew up in Flint, Mich., balancing both gymnastics and dance before choosing the latter and moving to Pittsburgh to train at Point Park University.
“It’s crazy, because I originally visited Pittsburgh back in 2006, for a big dance convention,” she says. “Fast forward to 2012, I entered into my freshman year of college at Point Park and have been here ever since.”
While getting her bachelor’s degree, she began branching out into pop, R&B and hip-hop and in 2017 released the single “Sis Please” under the name Rhyme (she’s since added Chandra). The following year, she got a shot to open for Warren G, and in 2019, she released the EP “Goin’ Up,” praised for its “Cardi B-style brashness.”
Last March she released “Hit It Right,” an admittedly “riskay” single that has been streamed more than 300,000 times on Spotify.
“I originally wrote part of ‘Hit It Right’ while waiting in the car parking lot of a grocery store and liked how each word correlated to one another,” she posted upon its release. “Fast-forward to a studio session where one of the co-producers played the beat and I thought of the part which ended up being the chorus. I instantly knew it belonged there, which made the song literally write itself. I wanted to create something that felt fun, sexy and where a woman is the one in control of her body and what she likes while not getting too easily attached to the person she’s with.”
For Sunstar, she says, audiences can watch for her “stepping into multiple worlds crafted to the mood of each song. They’re all different from one another. So I wanted to tell a story to take those who will be watching on a journey with me.
“This festival is very special because it allows me to be able to perform again so that people can see another part of me as Chandra Rhyme.”
Sunstar’s shine
Ideally, these artists would have been able to mix it up in a live setting, particularly since they’ve overlapped. INEZ and Kent recently released a beautiful video for “Clouds,” in which they are seen, all formal in white, riding horses and dancing in a field.
When things open up, we’ll see more of them together. For now, they come to us virtually via a festival — founded by former KST executive director Janera Solomon — that they cherish.
“It means a lot,” INEZ says. “Having a festival uplifting Black women and femmes, given this city’s treatment of us, is important. Getting to look at a bill packed with this amount of talented Black women is something to be proud of and even more proud to be part of.”
The Instagram Talkback Sessions, free on IG LIVE @KSTheater, are 6 p.m. Thursday with INEZ and Brittney Chantele and 9 p.m. with Clara Kent and Chandra Rhyme.
The Mic Check Unplugged concert is at 7 p.m. Saturday. Admission is Pay What Makes You Happy at kelly-strayhorn.org.