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What is your legacy? How do you leave people feeling when you leave a room?
While these may seem like big, existential questions, they are at the core of singer-songwriter Kyshona’s latest album, Legacy. During the last week of February, she brought those questions — and some songwriting guidance — to Columbia.
Kyshona performed to a full crowd at Columbia’s Slayton House on Feb. 28, organized by the Merriweather Arts and Culture Center. Along with the Friday night performance, she also engaged with local students during a week-long residency in Wilde Lake and Long Reach high schools.
Her focus with the students was songwriting, acting as a coach to help them tell their stories through music.
“The thing that’s important for me, especially for the youth, is just reminding them … writing your feelings and thoughts is always a tool you can use, and songwriting isn’t something that’s meant only for artists or only for creative people who want to release music,” she said. “Songwriting is something you can lean on as a therapeutic tool, too.”
Her motto applies to both her performances and her work guiding others in the songwriting process: “I am a voice in a vessel for those who feel lost, forgotten, silenced, or who are hurting. Any time I am on stage using my voice, it’s with other people in mind.”
Though Kyshona is no stranger to writing songs with adults, she appreciates watching the growth and empowerment that happens when working with students, especially at an age when their “inner critic” is loud.
After offering journal prompts or a free write, Kyshona helps students identify the theme of their songs, saying it isn’t about the finished product but rather “about that process of writing it and the conversations that we have.”
She then works to help them identify the melody and, if desired, to record the piece so they have it to look back on as something they created.
One of her main goals for the residency was to help students feel “the privilege of what it’s like to have the mic.” Several students did just that, taking the stage to perform their cover songs and originals as openers for Kyshona’s Slayton House concert.
“It’s such an honor to have my students receive this musical residency and they’re thrilled to showcase their music and have the opportunity to perform on a professional stage,” said Andrew Bell, Long Reach High School Guitar, Piano and Music Technology Teacher. “Kyshona’s mentoring has been amazing. She’s done such a great job connecting with them and giving them valuable feedback on their songs and performances.”
A native of South Carolina, Kyshona currently resides in Nashville, Tennessee. It was while working as a music therapist in Georgia, though, where she found her voice.
“It was in hospital rooms and treatment centers that I started singing first,” she said. “I started writing songs as my own therapy, as a way to get my feelings out.”
Kyshona released her new album, Legacy, in spring 2024. The album is based on her familial roots and involved genealogical research at the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. She was connected with a researcher during the pandemic and discovered five generations of family history.
“[The researcher] showed me how to research and how to interpret a lot of what I was seeing as far as documentation … this is how you read a slave schedule, this is how you read the census,” said Kyshona.
She also realized that it was time to let go of some of the heavier family stories — a lesson she shares with her audience.
“This album has just been a way for me to say to my audiences that there are things we hold secret that I think it’s time to let go of because secrets manifest in the body in a different way — and trauma can be transferred via DNA,” she said. “I think of that as our country’s history, too. Why are we so hell bent on ignoring certain parts that might be painful, if it could be something that heals us?”
Reconnecting to her roots and working with youth has helped Kyshona remain hopeful.
She hopes her time working with the Howard County high school students helped to empower them and remind them that “what you have to say is important.”
“Y’all are witnessing history right now — living through it. What do you want to say from your perspective?,” said Kyshona. “There’s more ways to connect than on our phones. We can connect with people if we use our words.”
Celebrating the fifth anniversary of her song, “Listen” — which became an anthem during the pandemic in 2020 — Kyshona said the sentiment still rings true. As she continues to perform and work with others, including through her organization, Your Song, she hopes her “little song seeds” will become part of her legacy.
“These songs that I write in communities around the country, I like to think of those as me leaving little legacies around,” she said. “I may never know what happens after this song is written or what happens after I leave a town and I send them their final track but that melody will continue on.”
This article was written by freelance reporter Sarah Sabatke.
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