Soul Force Podcast

The Soul Force Podcast celebrates the profound impact of radical love, exploring the intersection of art and nonviolence. Hosted by Paul Livingstone and members of the Soul Force Project, each episode delves into historical and contemporary connections between creativity and transformative action. Our diverse guests, comprising scholars, clergy, activists, musicians, artists, and writers, are catalysts for positive change worldwide.

  • Enjoy this Interview with Padmashri Guru Rewben, an extraordinary artist from a mountainous region of Manipur (Northeast India, bordering Myanmar). His music is a compelling blend of the tribal Naga songs and instruments with guitar and raw sound of American folk, blues and rock n roll.

    This lively discussion is peppered with musical examples and focuses around the importance of indigenous knowledge, including stories of his search to discover the traditional music and instruments of his own people, the Tangkhul. His message speaks to a number of issues as he addresses the violence and conflict of the region through his music. His message is universal for all of India and the world, with songs which lift up hope and faith in the human capacity to do good for one another.

  • A Navajo renaissance man, Arnold's knowledge spans botany, geology, myth, spirituality. As a teacher, he is a true culture bearer of the Navajo people and carries a wealth of knowledge within the worldview of his tradition and their connection to all living things. Today we will feature in part one of his talk, a bit of his extraordinary story and his connection to the Holy people and the role that a Navajo botanist plays as a medium between the plant beings and patients in need. One difference of significance is how a Native American botanist like himself takes an approach based on their worldview which is quite different from typical western botanists, among other things.

    Second part of this talk we will release in a few weeks time where Arnold unpacks some of the Navajo spirituality and traditional worldview called the Beauty Way.

  • Reverend James Lawson at age 92 sharp as a tack, breaks down his personal experience,  American history and contemporary outlook on issues ranging from plantation capitalism, the persistence of poverty and the American obsession with guns.  Lawson shows how love in its most courageous expression, creates necessary conflict when addressing injustice.

    Part One is peppered with his authentic practical philosophy and socially informed spirituality as he unpacks his story over the past 80 years. Lawson compels us to consider our history and its meaning today in continuing the struggle for fulfilling our commitment to the truth of the Declaration of Independence. 

    To see the videos of these Rev Lawson Soul Force interviews at Holman Church in Los Angeles, go to the Soul Force website, creative page.

  • Jesse and Fundi unpack this inter-generational legacy, the healing power of the art and the impact it continues to make on younger jazz musicians today.  The interview is interspersed with musical excerpts from Horace Tapscott's 'Freedom's Sweet', an upcoming large ensemble release of immense importance.

    Like Sun Ra’s iconic work in New York and Philadelphia and the Art Ensemble of Chicago which grew out of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians in the windy city, the Pan African People’s Arkestra of Los Angeles is due for equal recognition for their vision and contribution to creative black jazz and the unique sound that emanated from the musicians, poets and composers of this lineage.

    The Gathering is a multicultural music collective founded in 2005 by composer and multi-instrumentalist Jesse Sharps. The mission of the Gathering is to preserve and feature the extensive compositions of Los Angeles composers of the Pan African People’s Arkestra, of which Jesse was an early composer and soloist. Jesse worked extensively (since 1967) alongside Horace Tapscott; founder of the Arkestra and UGMAA (Union of God’s Artists and Musicians Ascension) and helped to shape LA’s own African American creative Jazz scene around Watts and South LA. 

    Contribute your support to the upcoming Gathering release in 2022, a historic recording of Black LA Creative Jazz:  For more info visit: http://thegatheringleimertpark.com/lacpapa/

    2020 will be the 60th anniversary of The Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra, with plans to feature several iconic works. The project includes Lester Robertson's In Times Like These and Horace Tapscott's epic The Ghetto Suite, last performed in early 70s and has never been recorded. We hope to record several additional compositions by some of the most vital and under-recognized local composers such as Jesse Sharps himself as well as Nate Morgan, Linda Hill and legendary Watts poet Kamau Daáood.

  • Father Richard was instrumental in the earliest sanctuary churches in Los Angeles and has been a tireless human rights activist and community organizer working with Cesar Chavez and many others at the historic Church of the Epiphany in Lincoln Heights and La Placita, the oldest church in Los Angeles. Hear a few of his life stories from saving lives in the desert to organizing street theater as creative community resistance to the de-humanizing systems of our culture.

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