June of 2022 was a special month for M³. We presented our first in-person festival in New York City, which featured 19 women and non-binary musicians from our first two cohorts as band leaders, along with the 12 musicians who comprised our 4th cohort, with screenings of their six world premieres of music-video duo commissions. For the first time since its inception, several cohorts gathered in the same room to experience live music together. The visibility, the possibility, the energy, the joy, the amazement, and the diverse audiences reassured us of the power of music as a way to communicate, share, and listen.
At our Closing Night Gala, we awarded M³’s first Lifetime Achievement Award to Shanta Nurullah, a brilliant sitar and mbira player and storyteller based in Chicago who has been creating music since the 1960’s. In her award ceremony speech, Shanta said: “Before [this], I really hadn’t gotten any recognition as a musician. That’s 50 years of doing this work….After a while, when nobody’s calling you, and your peers are not acknowledging you, you come to think, ‘It must be because I’m not good enough. It must be because I didn’t do the work, or I didn’t practice enough.’”
Her speech resonated with so many of us who have had this persistent feeling despite any achievement and success. There is still much more work to do, and this anthology is proof of that. The contributions for this anthology come from all corners of the world: South Africa, South Korea, Indonesia, Spain, Lebanon, Argentina and the US. From motherhood, grief, joy, the myths of musical education, pursuing a musical career against all odds, to racism or transphobia, all of these essays and poems force us to reflect on how we can and must move forward.
We extend deep gratitude to Naomi Extra as our Development Editor, who worked very closely with each artist in refining their writings and nurturing their voices through writing workshops and one-on-one meetings.
This third volume of M³’s Anthology of Writings arrives a little late because we are still mainly a team of two artists + one (Laura Krider, our amazing administrative associate and anthology’s proofreader, who has been providing crucial support to all of our operations). We are so proud to continue this publication, as we truly believe it provides another kind of far-reaching support for those reading around the world. We believe these writings normalize conversations that are oftentimes only whispered amongst ourselves and might keep someone who feels marginalized from giving up. As Shanta Nurullah said later in her Lifetime Achievement Award speech, “This is why M³ is so important. This is why you have to keep on doing this thing, and you have to keep on breaking down doors and creating situations for yourself and other women. Just don’t give up.”
From the editors,
Jen & Sara