By now you should be fa­mil­iar with the Caribbean ur­ban pop band Free­town Col­lec­tive. Known and loved for its unique and en­er­gis­ing mu­sic that ex­plores the hu­man con­di­tion and re­al­i­ties of our be­ing that car­ries pro­found mean­ing, Free­town was formed by two friends and spo­ken-word artists, Muham­mad Muwak­il and Lou Lyons, in Au­gust 2010. How­ev­er, the fam­i­ly ex­pand­ed when they added the “Trin­i­ty”, three sup­port­ing vo­cal­ists Shan­na Joseph, Ma­lene Joseph and Tis­han­na Williams. To­day the group’s dis­tinc­tive style is eas­i­ly iden­ti­fied not on­ly by the pow­er­ful duo that is Muham­mad and Lou but now the Trin­i­ty who bring their own mu­si­cal­i­ty, rhythm and flavour that seam­less­ly make the mu­sic whole.

Shan­na start­ed per­form­ing at an ear­ly age. Com­ing from a mu­si­cal fam­i­ly, she was ex­posed to lim­it­less learn­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties. As a re­sult of this, she had the op­por­tu­ni­ty to sing in dif­fer­ent parts of the world and to­day, in­spired by her moth­er, she is a mu­sic ed­u­ca­tor. Ma­lene, like Shan­na, knew mu­sic from a very ten­der age. Af­ter all, they are sis­ters who were mold­ed and guid­ed by a mu­si­cal fam­i­ly. Her first stage mem­o­ries were with the La Pe­tite Mu­si­cal Ju­nior Chorale around the age of five and she has nev­er looked back. She has since per­formed and toured as a soloist and en­sem­ble mem­ber of the Mar­i­onettes Ju­nior Chorale, Bish­op Anstey Se­nior Choir and the Ly­di­an Steel. Tis­han­na, be­fore step­ping in­to the spot­light of act­ing and mu­sic once con­sid­ered a dif­fer­ent di­rec­tion. How­ev­er, her love for the arts mar­ried with her own dri­ve, has brought her to be­ing the force that she is in the lo­cal Arts are­na. To­day, she holds many ti­tles as a lec­tur­er at the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies, a di­rec­tor, a jour­nal­ist and an ac­tress. She is al­so an art ed­u­ca­tion fa­cil­i­ta­tor with Arts in Ac­tion—the lead­ing Art Ed­u­ca­tion com­pa­ny in the Caribbean. The We Mag team is in­spired by the three songstress­es that make up the Free­town Trin­i­ty. We had the op­por­tu­ni­ty to chat with them. This is what they shared with us:

Who is the Free­town ‘Trin­i­ty’ and what does this name sym­bol­ise?

TW: I have no idea where it start­ed but it stuck and I think names giv­en by the peo­ple in love, mean more than any­thing we could have giv­en our­selves. They claimed us. So for me, it sym­bol­is­es val­i­da­tion and lov­ing own­er­ship.

What makes the Trin­i­ty work so well to­geth­er?

MJ: Yuh (You) ever make a car­rot cake? I al­ways say the vo­cal lay­ers we each bring are like in­gre­di­ents in a car­rot cake. Shan­na is the base; sol­id stuff...flour, wa­ter, eggs, brown sug­ar...noth­ing could bake with­out the base. I am like the cream cheese frost­ing...kin­da like whipped and light...added to the top or fill­ing some of the ar­eas be­tween. While Tis­han­na is the se­cret in­gre­di­ent. The spice and tex­ture that makes the thing our unique recipe: cin­na­mon, essence.

What is Free­town Col­lec­tive work­ing on at present that’s keep­ing every­one ex­cit­ed?

MJ: We’re about to take our mu­sic and mes­sage across dif­fer­ent com­mu­ni­ties across the is­land in a very unique and in­ter­ac­tive way. Lots of work to be done.

We have no­ticed that you are all of­ten dressed in lo­cal fash­ion. Why is sup­port­ing our lo­cal de­sign­ers im­por­tant to you?

SJ: To keep the bless­ings flow­ing. Our lo­cal de­sign­ers cre­ate com­fort­able, fun, colour­ful and unique items that mix nice­ly with our vibe. It was a no-brain­er to in­cor­po­rate their taste­ful pieces in­to our per­for­mances to share with our au­di­ences. We are drawn to their pieces nat­u­ral­ly.

What is spe­cial about be­ing a part of this fam­i­ly?

MJ: Be­sides ac­tu­al­ly get­ting to sing and ex­pe­ri­ence dif­fer­ent places and stages with my bi­o­log­i­cal sis­ter Shan­na? (laugh­ter). When we sit with a blank can­vas and all con­tribute to the shape and sound of the songs it is a beau­ti­ful thing. There is a new­ness to the mu­sic that tru­ly hap­pens every time we present or re­work dif­fer­ent parts of the cat­a­logue. Each space brings a new en­er­gy and mag­ic that floats around the lyrics and har­monies that is price­less.

SJ: The good vibes. It is a bless­ing to share pos­i­tive mes­sages with some like-mind­ed peo­ple.

TW: That no mat­ter where you go, what crazy stuff you do or who you are up­set with at a par­tic­u­lar point in time, there is al­ways a fam­i­ly to come back to.

What is your best ad­vice for any up­com­ing fe­male mu­si­cians read­ing this ar­ti­cle?

MJ: Pay con­stant, close at­ten­tion to your craft and cher­ish and val­ue your tal­ent. Spend time in­ti­mate­ly un­der­stand­ing your in­stru­ment(s), your strengths and ar­eas for im­prove­ment. Stand firm in your own brand of mag­ic.

SJ: Get com­fort­able with be­ing un­com­fort­able. Take care of your­self so that you can give your best—au­then­tic­i­ty is a must.

TW: Be hun­gry but hum­ble. This game is cut­throat, guard your spot. Not every male in the in­dus­try who can for­ward your tal­ent is not in­ter­est­ed in your tal­ent. Do not get caught up.