Somiah Nettles: Poet, Pianist, Deeply Spiritual and Inwardly Beautiful

Victorian Voice:

Let me link you to a wonderful person, a very young poet, pianist, a deeply spiritual voice, a person of inner beauty who radiates her artistic gifts in forms that are infectious.

https://substack.com/@stingingnettle

https://stingingnettle.substack.com/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=substack_profile

Drink deeply, really deeply of the wine of poetry and poetic prose that sings, often quite funny, sometimes with sorrow, from the heart of a young woman who plays concert-level piano and who includes art that evokes, that awes, that jolts.

Somiah Nettles notes that she had been Catholic only a month and that God is already bored with her.

Here is a small sampling of the haiku of Ms. Somiah Nettles:

1. The day Summer bloomed (5)

a mosquito sucked and sucked (7)

the pop off my arm. (5)

2. Here I am trying (5)

to write my way through this life (7)

with two worn-out hands. (5)

Haikus in Bed

Read from the diary of Somiah Nettles, these being but short samples:

Feb 2

1. There is a tenderness in the subtlety between morning and noon. The final 30-minute gap seamlessly binds them, lifting the sun a few inches higher. How I adore winter and the enduring trees—fresh pine and oak, a hissing fireplace—its aroma drifting beneath my bedroom door. It is February and freezing! * * *

2. The snow is slowly seeping through the earth, and march promises rainbows and Chopin! Surely, by then, they would have heard my calls. There will be no more ghost stories; however, the one about the woman and the fig tree sends yearning down my spine. February is a hug, a kiss, a flashing red light that signals a stop. It comforts and controls, tricking you into believing this is all there is. But then you make it to the other side: “What a gullible thing you are,” says March. “The rainbows and music are here!”

* * *

Feb 5

I've always struggled to understand my place in people's lives—I kept wondering where I fit in, where I was wanted, and where I wasn't. I wanted a friendship that was innocent yet passionate, sapphic even, yet devoid of lechery. I craved sisterhood so vehemently that I considered joining a convent, but I'd grown to believe God created like-minded females all over the world and that, as a result, I didn't need to go to such lengths to find her or for her to find me.

Feb 12 - Letter to Tito [“Uncle” in Tagalog]

What a torturous thrill!—the shrills of your mother. There is no grief without love, no love without grief—a haunting but healing hymn. Feed from my hands like a tall child, uncle, and may your strength be renewed! How confident I was, like a doctor. How sweetly you smiled as illness ravaged your body—those long, delicate fingers fit for ivories. The Lord has lit His porch light for you. How faithfully you’ll live among the angels!

Crescendo of Days (prose)

Somiah Nettles has a wonderful variety of artistic passions, which she shares so able, for example, with her “Musical Mondays,” a sample of which is here:

Welcome to Musical Mondays, where I, Somiah Nettles

Victorian Voices

, introduce you to a different classical composer on the first Monday of each month in an effort to, in the words of the Berkeley Piano Club, "cultivate and encourage the study, understanding, and appreciation of great music."

This month, I'd like to introduce you to Florence Beatrice Price, the first African American woman classical composer, pianist, organist of notable reputation, and music teacher, who was born on April 9th, 1887, in Little Rock, Arkansas. Price was the daughter of dentist Dr. James H. Smith and pianist, singer, and businesswoman Florence Irene Smith.

* * *

[Ms. Price was a child prodigy, who] after graduating as valedictorian from high school at the age of 14, Price went on to study piano and organ at the New England Conservatory of Music, where she began writing her renowned Symphony in E minor. * * *

* * * In 1912, she married prominent Arkansas lawyer, Thomas J. Price, and they moved back to her hometown of Little Rock, Arkansas, where she continued to teach privately and became heavily involved in composing until racial unrest in the city broke out due to Jim Crow Laws and a lynching took place near Thomas's office.

* * *

[After her 1931 divorce, supporting two daughters as a single Mom [Nota bene: in those days during the Depression!]] * * * In 1932, she and her housemate, fellow composer Margaret Bonds, entered the Wanamaker Foundation Awards. Price won first prize for her Symphony in E minor (Bonds won first place in the song category), and on June 15th, 1933, it was performed by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, making her the first African American woman to have her work performed by a major American orchestra. That night, George Gershwin (American composer and pianist) himself was in the audience. The Chicago Daily News declared Price’s Symphony “a faultless work, a work that speaks its own message with restraint and yet with passion… worthy of a place in the regular symphonic repertoire.”

As if the powerful narrative of Somiah Nettles wasn’t testament enough, she provides links to sound recordings and live performances of the music of Florence Price.

Please, enjoy the post from Somiah Nettles here:

Musical Mondays No. 4

I invite you to Victorian Voices of the wondrous Somiah Nettles. Please, link to her “Victorian Voices” page, which, unlike Armando here, is full of rich color and art worthy of her gifts.

I often adduce to Victorian Voices and wonder at the artistic, poetic gifts shared by this talent. Somiah Nettles is an artistic voice of a high order, and I love her work!