Jazz Poetry 2025: House of Waters ft. Priya Darshini, Safia Elhillo, Haleh Liza Gafori, Rania Mamoun, Nathan Osorio

For this dazzling Jazz Poetry performance, City of Asylum welcomes a celebrated group of poets and a Grammy-nominated band. Each Jazz Poetry program begins with a full set from a live jazz band, followed by a collaboration with local and international poets. In these collaborations, poets share their work alongside the musicians, the two art forms melding to create that signature Jazz Poetry improvisational style that offers something exciting, new, and unique with each individual performance. 

City of Asylum is thrilled to host musical group House of Waters, featuring Priya Darshini. Nominated for Best Contemporary Instrumental album in 2024 and described as “one of the most unique groups you will ever come across” (The Bubble), House of Waters incorporates elements of West African, psychedelic, indie rock, and classical and world musics in their style to be at the forefront of jazz innovation. Sharing the stage with the group are Safia Elhillo, the Sudanese author of The January Children (Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poets, Arab American Book Award); Haleh Liza Gafori, Persian poet and musician whose acclaimed translations of Rumi (Gold and Water) have given new audiences insight into the mind of the 13th-century poet; Rania Mamoun, Sudanese activist and poet (and City of Asylum Writer-in-Residence) who beautifully captured the early days of the pandemic in her collection Something Evergreen Called Life; and Nathan Osorio, poet and scholar whose debut poetry collection, Querida, was selected by Shara McCallum as the winner of the 2024 Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize.

Featured Musicians:

Max ZT: hammered dulcimer

Moto Fukushima: 6-string electric bass

Franco Pinna: drums

Priya Darshini: vocals