Music with a message should be accessible

"Music is so much more than sound simply traveling through the ear," says sign language interpreter Amber Galloway-Gallego. In a spirited performance, musician and activist Madame Gandhi plays two songs -- "Top Knot Turn Up" and "Bad Habits" -- while Galloway-Gallego provides an animated sign language interpretation.

Amber Galloway-Gallego: OK, hi.

I'm a sign-language interpreter

that specializes in music interpreting.

And you're probably wondering
why Deaf people would attend concerts,

but actually, music
is so much more than sound

simply traveling through the ear.

See, Deaf people experience music,
just in a different way.

For example, my friend Lisa,

she cuts her hair a certain length,

so she feels the vibrations
of sound in the music.

And music has psychological effects on us.

It invokes feelings of nostalgia,
happiness, sadness,

falling in love.

It makes you have a feeling
of connectedness,

and unfortunately,

Deaf and hard-of-hearing people
are excluded from these events,

because obtaining a sign-language
interpreter is so difficult

and so overwhelming

that they simply don't buy
the tickets or they just give up,

and this is not OK.

We have to make everything accessible.

So, myself, I am
a sign-language interpreter,

so what I have to do is I have
to take music and bring it to life.

In doing that, I become a bridge

between the hearing world
and the Deaf world,

making sure that I'm representing music

and the artistry of what music represents.

Now, this is a lot of work, OK?

For a regular set that might be 12 songs,

myself and a team,

we have to study over 30 songs
or more for one set

and hope and pray
we have the right setlist.

But you know what?

You know what the reward is?

Looking down in the audience

and seeing Deaf
and hard-of-hearing members,

all of those people dancing
and jamming out

and feeling included
in that music experience.

For myself, I'm a part of this cultural
and linguistic community,

and we all communicate in different ways.

Some of us sign and voice,

some of us just sign,

but no one way is superior to the other.

But you know what?

Those with hearing loss face
daily battles to communication access,

and those barriers
are put up daily for them.

And music shouldn't be one of them.

So along with Madame Gandhi
and myself today,

let's break down those barriers.

(Applause and cheers)

(Music: "Top Knot Turn Up")

(Percussion)

Madame Gandhi: This is a song
about getting the work done.

Hair up in a bun that's the most fun.

Hearing myself think when I go for a run

or maybe I'm practicing the drums

or maybe I'm writing in the sun,

the takeaway point
is I'm talking to no one.

Protecting my vibes that are wholesome,

trying my best to solve actual problems.

If you want to hang with me

then you have to roll up
your sleeves and work with me.

This ain't no time to come flirt with me;

pipelines and drills
are destroying the earth, you see.

I cannot stand all the constant misogyny.

Tie my hair back so there
ain't nothing stopping me.

Top knot turn up. It's a top knot turn up.

Top knot turn up, turn up, turn up --

about getting the work done.

Top knot turn up, turn up, turn up.

It's a top knot turn up.

Top knot turn up, eh.

(Percussion)

Tie up and tie up your hair

and throw back those curls.

So tie up and tie up and tie up your hair

and throw back those curls, uh ...

Throw back those curls,

throw back and throw back
and throw back those curls, uh ...

(Beatboxing)

(Percussion and beatboxing)

I turned off my phone's notifications,

so I have more time.

No bubbles to trouble
my clear state of mind.

One thing to know, I'm not here to please.

Hair tied back, I do it properly.

My time is not your property

when I'm productive like my ovaries.

Eh, give a grown girl room to breathe,
basic rights and her liberty.

Free from insecurity
that the world's projecting onto me.

Please do not trouble me
when I am focused.

The future is female,
you already know this.

I'm fighting against
the corruption on SCOTUS,

upping my top knot
since when I first wrote this.

Eh ...

It's a top knot turn up.

Top knot turn up, turn up, turn up --

about getting the work done.

Top knot turn up, turn up, turn up.

It's a top knot turn up.

Top knot turn up, ay.

(Percussion)

Tie up and tie up and tie up your hair,

throw back those curls.

Tie up and tie up your hair,

throw back those curls, uh ...

Throw back those curls,

throw back and throw back
and throw back those curls.

(Beatboxing)

Amber G.

(Applause and cheers)

Top knot turn up.

(Music and applause)

Madame Gandhi.

(Music)

(Applause and cheers)

(Music ends)

(Applause and cheers)

Amber, it's such a pleasure
to share this stage with you,

and to make my music accessible

to an audience who might be
hard of hearing or Deaf

and otherwise might not be able
to be included in my music.

And it really wasn't
until this collaboration

that I had thought of the fact
that though I work so much

in diversity and inclusion,

that my music may not be reaching
as many people as it could be.

I grew up in New York City,
playing the drums,

listening to Nas, Lauryn Hill,
Thievery Corporation,

TV on the Radio,

the Spice Girls --

And for me, music was truth.

Music was my perspective
into somebody else's point of view,

into storytelling,

into understanding how the world works.

And yet at the same time,
I felt like there was such a disconnect

between the way that I understood

my own very multidimensional
sense of my gender identity

and the very two-dimensional way
that women and femmes

were often portrayed in the media.

(Sighs)

As I moved through my life,

I went on to study mathematics
and women's studies at Georgetown.

I was the first-ever data analyst
at Interscope Records.

I toured the world
playing the drums for M.I.A.

And I did my MBA at Harvard,

all with the intention of being able
to make a difference in the music industry

and move the needle on gender equality
from the business side.

But it was only until three years ago,

when I ran the London Marathon
bleeding freely on my cycle

to combat the global menstrual stigma
that women face every day

all around the world,

that I realized that I have a message,

and that the most effective way
that I can convey my message

was through my music.

And why music?

Because music caters to the emotions.

Music is joyful.

Music pulls you in with the beat
and the rhythm and the melodies.

The music pulls you in
via the community aspect of it.

And music allows you to access
somebody else's truth.

In the music I listen to today,

sometimes I'm like, wow,
I love the rhythm so much,

but the message is so misogynist,

it's tough to work out to our run to

or do whatever it is
that I'm trying to do.

I oftentimes say, "I'm not here
trying to turn up to the sound

of my own oppression."

You feel me?

(Laughter and cheers)

So I'm here to build
the alternative instead.

In my work, I talk often about
the notion that the future is female.

That we can actually look
to the femme archetype

and derive alternative
styles of leadership

that might encourage,
instead, collaboration,

emotional intelligence

and building a world
that is linked and not ranked.

And so for anyone watching or listening
and experiencing this talk today,

I encourage you to consider
the blind spots in your work

and what partnerships
or collaborations you can do

to be able to make your work
have even greater of an impact.

This next song is called "Bad Habits,"

and it's about being
an even better version of yourself.

(Percussion and beatboxing)

(Singing) I had run out of time,

I had done lost my mind,

I had run out of time,

I had done lost my mind.

I didn't know

why.

I didn't know.

I been so pressed that I don't even know

what's bothering me.

All my bad habits have go to, got to go

entirely.

It's my year to be free

from what's bothering me.

It's this society

that's killing me.

All my bad habits have got to, go to go.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

Yeah.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

Turn with me.

(Beatboxing)

Ready?

Clap with me.

(Audience claps)

Now listen.

(Singing) Fela Kuti in the 1970s

inspires me.

All he wanted was his people to be free

from the colony,

like Mahatma Gandhi in the 1940s.

I've been reading about women's history

in the 1920s,

thinking about how I could be
so much better.

Thinking about all the tears I've cried.

Thinking about how we could
be so much better.

Thinking about all the tears we've cried.

(Percussion)

Yes.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

All my bad habits have got to, got to go.

(Music ends)

(Applause and cheers)

Thank you.

(Applause and cheers)