 “I
am a devout poet. I believe that the right words offered
in the right way can be music holding us together. When
we can speak the language of essence, we will be able to
commune in a space miles above dogma and the confines of
individual traditions. And we can develop into evolved human
beings capable of radiating profound love, light and service
to others. I believe wholeheartedly that art in community
is noble work that fosters beauty and meaning into our lives.
That art is vital and necessary. I believe in the sacredness
of breathing.”
-Kamau Daáood
Poet and community arts activist Kamau Daaood
is the author of The Language of Saxophones: Selected Poems
of Kamau Daaood, City lights Publishers, a 2005 Southern
California Book Award Finalist and winner of the 2006 National
Black Writer’s Book Award for Poetry.
He founded The World Stage Performance Gallery in Los Angeles,
a non-profit arts organization along with Master Drummer
Billy Higgins in 1989. He served as its Artistic Director
for sixteen years. Kamau’s career as a poet began
as a young member of the Watts Writers Workshop and the
Pan African Peoples Arkestra under the direction of pianist,
Horace Tapscott in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
He spent over a dozen years as an instructor and curator
for the City of Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department
at the Watts Towers Arts Center and William Grant Stills
Arts Center in the 1970s and 1980s. During the 1980’s
he taught African-American Music class at California University
at Northridge and Otis College of Art and Design, as well
as teaching in the Poetry in the Schools program in the
Los Angeles Unified School District.
In 1997 Kamau recorded the critically acclaimed CD Leimert
Park, M.A.M.A. Records, winner of the Josephine Miles Pen
Oakland Award. He has also performed on numerous CDs as
a guest artist.
Amid Daaood’s numerous honors and awards he has received
the Association of Jazz Journalist Award for a Lifetime
of Service, 2006; the Charles Mingus Award, presented by
Watts Towers Community Action Council Cultural Affairs Department
and Community Redevelopment Agency, 2005; a California Artist
Fellowship, 2002; a Durfee Artist Fellowship, 2000; a Cave
Canem Fellowship, 2000; the L.A. Artcore 10th Annual Award
for Lifetime Contribution, 1998; and the Charles R. Drew
University Jazz at Drew Lifetime Achievement Award in1997.
He has received commendations from Los Angeles County and
City, California State Assembly, United States Congress
and Senate for his work in community arts.
Kamau has been the subject and featured poet in several
award-winning documentaries, including Life is a Saxophone
produced by S. Pearl Sharp, 1984; Leimert Park: The Story
of a Village in South Central L.A. by Jeannette Lindsay,
2005; and the PBS documentary Race is the Place, Paradigm
Productions, 2005.
Kamau has performed his work at countless venues that include
the Dunya and North Sea Jazz Festival in Holland; Earshot
Jazz and Bumbershoot Festivals in Seattle; the Steppenwolf
Theater and Guild Complex in Chicago; the Getty and MOCA
Museums in Los Angeles; the National Black Arts Festival
in Atlanta; and the Schomburg Center in Harlem.
Kamau Daaood has spent over thirty-five years performing,
curating, teaching, producing, coordinating, organizing
and creating art in schools, churches, prisons, storefronts,
arts venues, libraries, festivals, conferences, radio, television,
museums, and galleries locally, nationally, and internationally.
He is a native of Los Angeles.
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