One of our most treasured MusiQology collaborators is poet and performance artist Ursula Rucker, who most recently lent her voice to MusiQ Department artist Bridget Ramsey’s “Save Your Love For Me” single and video. Ursula sat down with MusiQology contributor and Penn undergraduate Izzy Lopez to talk womanhood, the place of art in society, and fusing music and poetics.
A Philadelphia native, Ursula Rucker is a spoken word poet and performance artist whose poignant work has been an inspiration to Izzy throughout her undergraduate career. Her spoken word poetry appeared on the Roots second album, Do You Want More?!!?!!, and she has written five of her own albums including Supa Sister (2001), Ruckus Soundsysdom (2008), and She Said (2001). This past October, Ursula was the first artist to host the Barnes Foundation Artist Takeover Series, in which local artists are invited to interpret the idiosyncratic art collection at the Barnes Foundation in any way they choose. Izzy and Ursula discussed this performance as well as Ursula’s life in music and poetry and how her conception of her own womanhood has shaped her career.
MusiQology: I went to your performance at the Barnes Foundation this past October, and that was a really cool show. What struck me so much about your performance at the Barnes was how multi-media it was. You had projections, dancers, and singers in addition to your spoken word performance. What is your process like as you’re developing these interdisciplinary pieces? Do you focus on the poem first and form the media around it or does it all come to you at once?
Ursula: Honestly I’m still learning my curatorial process, intentions, and style. It’s something I’ve just started doing within the last two years, and the Barnes was the biggest thing I’ve curated thus far. I think I’ve always have a respectful approach when I’m collaborating with other artists. So that’s number one, to respect their approach and the way they do things. You want to stay open, not be too tied to your way of doing things, though if you’re curating, it is going to be your way, to some degree. But it’s going to be everybody’s way, so you’ve got to learn how to combine the ways. Then make a cohesive, cooperative plan where everybody feels comfortable but is loose enough so that we can improv and be organic. That’s always how I do it.
MQ: In comparing pieces you’ve done that are just your poetry performance to these multi-media, curatorial works, do you think the pieces are going to be stronger because they’re pulling in more artists? Are you ever concerned about losing some creative control because of the nature of collaboration?
Ursula: Oh no, not at all. Everything has its own place. When I’m solo, that’s solid. Me solo is why I’m able to do the curatorial stuff. Nobody would even care to ask me had I not built such a strong presence, identity, or whatever. I do my shit at the highest level possible. But I’m always stretching. That occupies its own space. That’s the corner stone. That’s not going anywhere. So no, I’m not intimidated or worried at all.
MQ: I want to transition to my central question for today which is about womanhood and a career in music and art. I’ve listened to your poem “What a Woman Must Do” many times and that poem dives straight into this theme. Is there anything about womanhood as an identity for you that has informed your work? If so, has the way you identify with or speak about womanhood changed over the course of your career?
Ursula: Womanhood has, naturally and organically, everything to do with me as a poet, as an activist, as a person. When I first started performing, I was almost always only on a bill with all men. This was in 1993. It doesn’t happen as often now, because I rock solo a lot. But from 1993 until 2001 this happened until I did my first album. Always with hip-hop. I would be on the bill with all male MCs, like testosterone coming out. And I was never intimidated. I didn’t give a shit. I would get out there and toss my shit all over everybody. I didn’t really care. Also, I always get nervous, but even though that happens, there’s a confidence that is innate that I don’t really plan. I don’t know where it comes from. But it’s definitely rooted in being a woman.
I’m a woman and I’m a mother of four black sons in America. I’m strong. For real, I’m strong even when I’m not. When I feel weak, when I feel like “Oh God…”, there’s a strength, there’s a current that’s always there.
MQ: I love that, that there’s a strength that’s completely rooted in being a woman. I think so often when we talk about women in X industry, women in poetry, women in music, women in science, etc, there’s this narrative of “I am a woman and therefore I have to overcome my womanness and ‘man up’ and get tough in this all-male industry.” But I really like that perspective, “No, the strength comes from being a woman.” That being a woman is very powerful and very strength-giving.
Ursula: As a woman, if you’re a performing artist and you find yourself in an arena with all men, you just have to naturally just assert. “You will respect me.” I know this for certain. A lot of men won’t even approach me or come or talk to me based on the content of my work. If they see me doing a show live and how I do it, even though I’m funny and kind and gentle, they won’t talk to me. When they see me like that, they don’t want to try it. And I’m glad.
MQ: I’m wondering, you say that you have to assert yourself in male dominated spaces. Do you have any particular techniques to do that if you’re feeling particularly intimidated in a space?
Ursula: Confidence!
MQ: What is confidence to you?
Ursula: That’s a good question, because it’s not easy. Especially for someone, an artist, who is going against the grain. You’re a woman, you’re different, you’re like a submarine. It’s below the surface. There’s a lot of work to be done there. It’s hard to build that confidence because a lot of people size themselves up to other people. I had a long time of doing that. I had to fight past and through that. It takes time, you gotta do the work. It’s not easy. You can’t just get out there and be cocky. Cockiness is not going to help.
Confidence is quiet. People will just feel something. They won’t be quite sure what they’re feeling but it’s confidence. It’s like, “You can’t rattle me. You can’t fuck with me.” That’s it. It takes time. But it’s worth the time and the effort. I guarantee.
Read a breakdown of Ursula’s work with MusiQology here.
MQ: I can really relate to that because in my own work I try to tackle difficult topics, much like you do in your poems, and I feel most confident when I know I’ve put good work into the piece. When you are working on a piece that feels very vulnerable or exposing, how do you find the confidence to present that? Does the confidence come from the level of craft you’ve put into the piece?
Ursula: There’s a lot of things going on. There’s the act of liberating yourself that I think is the real essence of it. You’re liberating yourself of any kind of censorship to tell your story, to tell a story authentically, bravely, not really worrying about what other people think. You don’t want to be insulting or disrespectful of anyone’s religion or sexuality, you know. There are things you have to do but outside of that, you’re free.
There’s no other feeling like it. I just can’t compare it to anything. It’s the freest place I’ve ever been is in that moment when I’m “Ursula the Poet.” Whatever way I chose to do my poetry, just “Ursula the Poet.” I’m free. I’m free from all the worry, the anxiety, the angst. I put it all in the poem and it’s my therapy.
MQ: Thinking about women’s liberation, especially in the context of the rampant sexism that plagues our society, would you advocate for more women to be able to do art for themselves as a way of finding freedom?
Ursula: I think everybody should do more art! Not only do it but love it, share it, spread the magic of it, tell everybody what it’s done for them. Because if you really do it — if you do it for real — it’s going to do something for you. You will suffer. But I don’t subscribe to the idea that you must suffer. Until everybody becomes an artist, you’ll still suffer because there are still some people who aren’t ready to be free and artists are more free than anyone. And if they don’t become an artist, I know lots of people who are just art supporters because they love art and they don’t create art themselves but the mere fact that they love art means they have an artist’s heart. And that’s not to say that all artists are good. Because there are some crazy ass, mean ass artists out there. It doesn’t work well for everybody!
MQ: But it can work a lot of the time.
Ursula: It definitely works, oh my God. I’ve taken it into the darkest elements. But art is magical.
MQ: There’s so much accompanying music in your poems. Does the music in your poems come from the words — do the words call to you to add music — or do you add music into emphasize your words’ meaning? How does that relationship work for you?
Ursula: Honestly when I first starting performing my poems in public, it was with music. I would do readings but when it started to ramp up, I started doing it with music and everything changed. I haven’t stopped since, and that was 1993. I learned so much by working with musicians and producers and having been coaxed and forced out of my comfort zone and it has been amazing. I can hardly put it into words, even though I’m good with words. I just don’t know where I’d be without it. Not to mention the moments when I listen to the things that I need to listen to. When I feel completely stressed and anxious and my organs feel all out of place on the inside, I listen to Alice Coltrane. If I put her on, scientifically, the frequency of the sound, gets me right. It’s not only that I love the way that it sounds aesthetically, but it actually scientifically heals me.
It’s not just art. It’s also science, when you have to figure out how to merge the rhythm of your words and intention of your words, language, idea, and emotion with that of a live instrument, or a track that was created electronically. It’s science. It’s math. It’s figuring out the formula, what’s going to work.
MQ: Do you think adding music into your poems helps make them more accessible to a wider audience that may not normally consider themselves “poetry people”?
Ursula: For sure. Absolutely. No doubt. The way that I do what I do, it’s not a style. It’s who I am. When I share my poems, even when it’s a capella, the lyrical, the melodic, the way that I do it, I’ve taught myself how to share that with people. The poems are still accessible a cappella, but the music definitely helps people understand them.
In the beginning, when I first started recording music, people would say, “you’re saying the deepest shit, the darkest shit, but the music is like a trick.” The music pulls you and all of a sudden you can’t get away. You’re listening to you and all of a sudden it’s scary because you’re saying some real shit but then the music sounds good and it’s just like, “Oh my God what’s going on?”
And I have a whole dance music life. The very first thing I ever recorded was house music. I always do house. Dance, electronic, whatever. So I never stopped doing that. So that’s a super cool, because I can still do it the way I do it but it’s a dance track so people don’t know, you know what I mean. And people are out there on the floor dancing and I’m trying to save the world ! And they’re dancing and then they’re like, oh wait a minute! It’s the best!
MQ: That’s the ultimate musical Trojan horse.
Ursula: Exactly! It’s the best. I never want to stop doing that. I always said if I ever stop making my own solo projects, I never want to stop collaborating. It’s all fun, but that’s like, really fun.
MQ: You mentioned that when you listen to Alice Coltrane that it immediately grounds you. Do you have any other artists or songs in your life that are as important to you?
Ursula: Prince, all day every day any time. Bob Marley, always able to help me. There’s a band from the 70s called Heatwave, that’s my favorite band of all time. Anytime I listen to Heatwave, it’s a big inspiration for me, their writing and their melodies. And Teena Marie. She died 7 years ago but she’s always been one of my biggest inspirations as a woman and a poet who sings. Her voice was just incredible and she was this little white girl from California and nobody could believe that she could sing like a black woman in a church. She was funky and she was free and she was beautiful and she wrote the most beautiful songs.
Listen to Ursula on The MusiQology Podcast on Spotify.
MQ: You are a Philadelphia based poet. Do you think the city of Philadelphia is an inspiration for you?
Ursula: Are you kidding me? I’m so Philly, it’s ridiculous. Everybody who knows me, even if they’re not from here, everybody knows that I am a Philly jawn. I am the ultimate. I love my city. I complain about it. I talk bad about my city if I want to because it’s my city but I won’t let anybody talk bad about my city ever.
It’s such a great teacher. It’s such a real teacher. It’s doesn’t protect you from the real shit in life. It gives you everything. It gives you the history, the art, the architecture. The architecture is unrivaled in this country. If you ask me, Philly’s architecture kills every other state’s architecture. The people who are from here who’ve made moves and have changed the whole entire way that people look at a thing. Whether it’s science or art or politics, Philly is a hotbed of originality, of uniqueness. It’s so gritty. Everybody is afraid of Philly. And they should be. It’s not all shiney and glamorous, but we still have all that stuff and thensome. The most important thing we have here that is completely magical and makes us the most special is the indigenous energy. The Native American energy, the African energy. People who really built this place, who worked and toiled and prayed. This whole entire city is sacred ground and that’s that.
But it’s rough as shit! This is my slogan, “I love it with all its bumps, bruises, and bright spots.”
MQ: I can see how you are Philly through and through, not only having lived here for so long but also how your work mirrors this Philly ethos of beautiful flow and gritty content, and what a wonderful thing to be, and great for Philadelphia.
Ursula: Oh and also, and I’m sure you know this already, but Philly might be, or maybe there’s a shared top spot with New Orleans, but musically this city is at the top of the list, historically. The best of the absolute best of musicians and music artists, if they don’t come from here, they came here, spent real time here, and earned their chops here. Like John Coltrane, Nina Simone, you know. So many people. People don’t even know that Billie Holiday is from Philly.
Any band, any top act that’s performing now, any artist, top musician in the band or the music director is from Philly. That’s real. I know a lot of musicians and they’ve all been on tour with top everybody. Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, Snoop Dogg, they always want Philly musicians. Always.
Izzy Lopez is a writer and student at the University of Pennsylvania, majoring in English. Her essays have appeared in The Red Cedar Review, r.kv.r.y. quarterly literary journal, and her poetry has been featured in The Penn Review, and F-Word Magazine. Beyond the page, Izzy is a playwright whose play, Four Weeks, was produced in the 2016 Philly Fringe Festival. Izzy’s work centers around interpersonal relationships and what it means to be human. Visit her website: www.izzydlopez.wordpress.com to read her published work.
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