Life is not black and white and yet I am. Not black enough, not white enough but still both. The identity of multi-racial people such as myself is complicated to arrive at and I feel lucky that music has been there to guide me and allow me to create a sonic reflection of myself in order that I might feel whole. As much as alluding to the keys of the piano, the instrument that set me on the path to being the artist I am today, this is what the title ‘Black and White, Vol.1’ is about.
Nothing about life is simple and neither is talking about matters of race, yet as a species we have evolved this binary concept of ‘black’ and ‘white’ and so from that have come these vague ideas about what it means to be ‘black’ and what it means to be ‘white’. And so we have racial stereotyping. Like as if these supposedly two colours of human are somehow intrinsically different from each other.
The beauty of music is that it is above all of this mundanity. Music connects those of us that want to be connected regardless - it exists in a higher place. If we let it, music can pass through any and all filters and speak to the soul. It’s a magical place and I wish I could be there always. But I do not kid myself, I put this album out into this world knowing that its title and for many just the mere sound of my voice on these gentle songs will present a challenge to primitive, un-inclusive world views that are held hidden in the confines of musical genres. In reality they are often little more than subtle ways of racial stereotyping. My blackness co-exists with my whiteness in my skin, in my voice, in my influences, how could it not? I am both ‘black’ and ‘white’ in a world that seems to want me to pick a side. I was once told that racially-speaking, I shouldn’t exist, yet here I am.
In a racially binary world, I am the rainbow.
The new album from Julia Biel, ‘Black and White, Vol.1’ is released via Ankhtone Records/PIAS on 28th February 2020.
Photo by John Seymour