Tallahassee artist Donna Cotterell hears freedom in Far Out Funk & Blues Festival

Tallahassee artist Donna Cotterell launches a celebration of groovin’ beats and moody blues this summer at the Far Out Funk & Blues Festival.

Cotterell is bringing together acts like Loose Ends featuring Jane Eugene, Zac Harmon, and Klymaxx featuring Cheryl Cooley, Nellie Tiger Travis, Scottie Clinton, DieDra, and Keith Rodgers at the Tucker Civic Center for the festival on July 26. The festival was rescheduled from it's original date in April.

Let freedom sing

The 1960s streets of San Francisco were filled with a counterculture of peace and love, as the streets of black America flooded with violence. The “long, hot summer of 1967” arrived in American history on the heels of the Selma march to Montgomery in protest of Black voter suppression.

Just months prior, the assassination of civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. traumatized the people and rattled the movement. Racial tensions culminated in one of the country's most violent and destructive riotous responses to injustices and inequities faced by African Americans at the time, Detroit’s 12th Street Riots. The damage was felt, and the country cried out. Some marched, some preached, and others made music.

That summer, Aretha Franklin’s release of “Respect” hit the radio, James Brown dropped “Say It Loud I’m Black and I’m Proud,” and Funk was born as a call to freedom. Funk music combines syncopated expressions of negro spirituals, blues, gospel, R&B, and Afro-Cuban beats with urgent social commentary.

Today, it continues to serve as a conduit to liberation, rooted in the ideology of Black Power.

Artist, activist, and producer of The Far Out Funk & Blues Festival, Donna Cotterell believes it's time to reignite this call for new generations to create a new world that uplifts black culture and its people.

Together with purpose

Cotterell’s deep roots in the capital city region go back six generations to Leon County and five to Gadsden County. As she grew up with six brothers and sisters, music could be heard blasting through any radio, stereo, or tape recorder in the Cotterell household.

“My father loved the blues. I can remember hearing BB King, Fontella Bass, Dorothy Moore,” Cotterell said. “As my siblings got older, they introduced me to countless Motown artists.”

Inspired by these sounds, Cotterell took a year of piano at the age of 8 and, by 15, had transitioned to the theater. She began training through summer intensive programs and, by high school, had evolved into a regular part of the local community theater scene.

Cotterell trained mostly at Stage West Theater in West Springfield, Massachusetts, focusing on improvisational theater. She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre Arts from the University of Massachusetts in Boston and a certificate of Drama Therapy and Psychodrama from Omega Theater in Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts.

For Cotterell, art gives balance; it connects us to people, places, and things. Her life’s artistic ambition has been to open up her creative mind and visualize a world where all things are possible.

Indaba Theatre days

In 2015, Cotterell combined these two disciplines when starting Indaba Theatre, her healing-focused theater company using Theatre of the Oppressed and Drama Therapy Techniques. Both approaches to devising theater and community healing are based on storytelling, embodiment, play, and performance as a way of standing witness and creating change.

Originally based out of Brockton, Massachusetts, and eventually finding a home in Tallahassee, Indaba Theatre has created a safe, supportive environment where people feel free to express themselves authentically and creatively.

With its name originating from the Zulu language, signifying a gathering or meeting with a specific purpose, the ultimate aim of the theater company’s practice is to develop original productions that delve deeply into communal storytelling for healing.

“Theater is therapeutic because it affords us the opportunity to reflect on the commonalities and complexities of life in a safe space. If you don’t walk out of a theatrical performance transformed, then it hasn’t done its job,” Cotterell said.

In addition to producing theatrical productions and musical events, Cotterell serves as an acting coach and Creative Kids Summer Camp founder and director.

Cotterell has once more harkened back to her heritage to inspire her newest artistic project, The Far Out Funk & Blues Festival.

Peace and liberation

Funk remains Cotterell’s connection to activism. The festival flourished as an intuitive response to a tangible call to action from Democrats to “Flip Florida Blue.” As an artist/activist, Cotterell found that bringing blues artists from Tallahassee and beyond would highlight the music’s message of Black liberation from social and cultural restrictions.

Uplifting musical legends and local artists like George Clinton, aka “Dr. Funkenstein,” has become a quest for Cotterell, one that she believes will make Tallahassee known and respected for its past and ongoing musical contributions.

“We are a capital city; we should be encouraging more touring artists to be on large stages in our city,” Cotterell said. “When I think of other capital cities, I think about the arts and entertainment that define them.”

She hopes to encourage more events like The Far Out Funk & Blues Festival, which celebrates artistic ancestors and invites new music and conversation to Tallahassee.

Cotterell gathers acts like Loose Ends featuring Jane Eugene, Zac Harmon, and Klymaxx featuring Cheryl Cooley, Nellie Tiger Travis, Scottie Clinton, DieDra, and Keith Rodgers at the Tucker Civic Center for a summer of fabulous funk she hopes fills those who stand in witness with peace and a call to liberation.

If you go

What: The Far Out Funk & Blues Festival

When: 6 p.m. Friday, July 26

Where: Tucker Civic Center, 505 W Pensacola St.

Cost: $35-$75 per ticket

Contact: 800-654-0747 | [email protected]

Tickets: tuckerciviccenter.com; tallahasseefaroutfunkandbluesfest.com

Dr. Christy Rodriguez de Conte is the feature writer for the Council on Culture & Arts (COCA). COCA is the capital area’s umbrella agency for arts and culture (www.tallahasseearts.org).

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Tallahassee artist Donna Cotterell hears freedom in Far Out Funk Fest