- [Announcer] Production of "Applause" on Ideastream Public Media is made possible by the John P. Murphy Foundation, the Kulas Foundation and by Cuyahoga County residents, through Cuyahoga Arts & Culture.

(upbeat jazz music) - [Kabir] Coming up, singer songwriter Ngina Fayola steps into the "Applause Performances" spotlight with her musical fusion of folk and soul.

Plus, a son of Appalachian Ohio is making monuments inside his Zanesville sculpture studio, and Dayton artists decorate a new health center in the Gem City's Edgemont neighborhood.

Hello and welcome once again to the artistic nook known as "Applause".

I'm Ideastream Public Media's Kabir Bhatia.

"Applause Performances" and The Shuffle Podcast shared a studio session with Cleveland singer-songwriter Ngina Fayola.

Born in Guyana, South America, Fayola moved to Cleveland with her family when she was five years old.

While she's called Northeast Ohio home since the '80s and has performed here since 2004, she plans to return to Guyana to record her next album.

Fayola shared her music and stories of her influential father, Jojo Kofi Badu, with Shuffle Podcast host Amanda Rabinowitz.

- Ready?

(mid-tempo music) - Can you talk a little bit about your homeland and the music that you have kind of adapted?

- Well, I was exposed to every style of music actually in Guyana before coming here.

I think I was exposed to country music in Guyana before experiencing it here.

And then a lot of '70s, '80s music, really pretty melodies.

But the traditional music of Guyana is Soca Music and Calypso music.

So it's a, I'd say almost like Reggae, Afro-beat all merged in one.

That's the main music that I was, you know, around.

But the R&B and the country music and the rock and roll, those just kind of filtered through my house.

My father was a musician, and I was exposed to everything because of his musicianship.

- Yeah, can you talk a little bit more about that?

I know your dad introduced you to rhythm at a very young age.

- Yeah, he did, he did.

At about three or four years old.

My dad was a percussionist, but his main instrument was the flute.

As I was coming up, he wanted to teach me how to just stay focused while making music.

So he taught me to just maintain rhythm.

So he had me doing.

(rhythmic drumbeat) Right?

So I had to maintain that while he did a lot of intricate stuff around me.

He was such a strict man and he was so serious about music that I guess I had, not so much a fear, but I was just really focused on not falling off of the beat, just so I wouldn't mess him up.

So that was my first experience with learning how to listen and play at the same time.

♪ Baby's gotta eat, daddy's gotta work ♪ ♪ Mama's gonna fix us a big ole meal ♪ ♪ I made up my mind ♪ ♪ I'm gonna go to church ♪ ♪ Leads to Sunday down the mound ♪ ♪ 'Cause I got myself two little ones that do ♪ ♪ Exactly what they want to all the time ♪ ♪ I'm gonna raise them right ♪ ♪ One day at a time ♪ ♪ I'm gonna be all right, gonna be all right ♪ ♪ Because time's wastin' ♪ ♪ And I ain't got the time for chasin' ♪ ♪ I'm facing tomorrow with determination ♪ - I know as a teenager you got a chance to go back to Guyana.

- Yes.

- Can you talk a little bit about that?

I know you said it tickled your senses.

- Yeah, man, it was great to go back home.

It'd been since I was five years old, so I hadn't been in the weather.

I hadn't been in just in the environment, hadn't been around many of my cousins, my grandparents.

So we went there and just got a chance to just get reacclimated with the scenery, with the family, with the food, with the music, just with the sounds, just the breeze, you know, the water.

- What was it like to kind of immerse yourself in the music when you went back there?

- Oh, I didn't, that's the thing, I didn't.

When I went back, I wasn't even interested in, I think I was too shy to, you know, share music.

I think I was just trying to navigate teenagehood when I got back.

You know, I don't think I was really interested in publicly doing music.

I didn't mind doing it privately.

But I wasn't interested in being public with my art until maybe my late 20s.

- Right, so do you think when you came back to Cleveland, how much did Guyana influence your music?

- Well, that's my main influence.

You know, I can't get away from my Caribbean background, you know, I can't get away from the rhythms of Guyana.

And that's what really influences every style of music that I create.

♪ Does anybody know how the story ends?

♪ ♪ When does the plot begin?

♪ ♪ When does the show begin?

♪ ♪ Because I've been chasing dreams and nightmares ♪ ♪ The same, this necessary game ♪ ♪ Necessary game, yeah ♪ ♪ Since I can't get enough, I want more and more ♪ ♪ So insatiable ♪ ♪ Since I can't get enough I play the driven whore ♪ ♪ But I don't want to work for this pimp no more ♪ ♪ But today ♪ ♪ I guess I'm gonna work for this pimp once more ♪ ♪ The light ♪ ♪ The love ♪ ♪ The pain ♪ ♪ The rush ♪ ♪ The light ♪ ♪ The love ♪ ♪ The pain ♪ ♪ The rush, yeah ♪ - Ngina, I know growing up in Cleveland's Collinwood neighborhood, you started singing in a church choir.

Can you talk a little bit about and share some of those memories?

- I did not like singing in church choir.

- No, you didn't like it?

- No, I didn't want to.

You know, my mom forced me.

I didn't wanna go to church at all, honestly.

- Wow.

- I loved music.

I wanted to go to listen to music, but I didn't wanna go participate in music, you know, because I didn't want anybody to hear my voice.

So I was forced to sing and I would sing very quietly, and the song director, the choir director, the pianist, they would call me out, and they'd be like, "If you don't sing louder, we're gonna make you solo."

So.

(laughing) - Wow.

- So I would, you know, I would try to sing a little louder, and eventually I guess I didn't satisfy them with my volume.

So they made me solo.

They made me solo a song, and the very first song I had to solo was the song called "Jesus Is the Answer for the World Today."

And man, my heart pounded out of my chest.

It was just the worst.

It was the worst.

I sweated, you know, I forgot lyrics, but it definitely ushered me into having courage to do that.

But even then, I still wasn't ready until my late 20s, to share.

- Is that when you started writing poetry, in your 20s?

- Yeah, I started writing poetry mid 20s.

Yeah, I don't even know if I was trying to find my musical voice.

I think I was just trying to stretch myself, you know, beyond my comfort.

And I had a cousin, she would hear me sing around the house, and I would let her hear my poems, and she guilted me into sharing it.

She told me that I owed it to God because she felt that I was that good.

She was like, "You owe it to God, you know, to go out there and share your music."

So I felt guilty and decided, let me go pay God what I owe Him.

♪ Crazy I must be because I'm in love with you ♪ ♪ In my visions hazy ♪ ♪ Tears are overflowing brown eyes blue ♪ - Your love for melody kind of came from your parents' extensive record collection.

Can you talk a little bit about that?

- Yeah, my parents, well, my mom, she strictly listens to gospel, but my dad, he was a worldly man, so we had everything in the house, and I just gravitated to the prettier melodies, like the softer.

I guess I fell in love with like yacht-rock type melodies, and I was ashamed to tell people that I was listening to yacht rock.

You know, at 14.

But yeah, I just fell in love with the prettier melodies.

They made me feel a certain kind of way.

Like even before I knew what in love was, it made me feel like I was in love, you know?

And that's what I wanted.

I wanted to be able to create music and make people feel that same feeling from my music.

♪ Whoa, whoa ♪ ♪ I feels like I'm crazy ♪ ♪ I must be because I'm in love with you ♪ - [Kabir] Watch the entire session of "Applause Performances" featuring Ngina Fayola anytime on the PBS app.

It's time to meet another member of artcoz, the artist colony of Zanesville.

The first time he touched clay, Alan Cottrill found what he'd traveled the world searching for.

An international businessman turned award-winning sculptor, Cottrill captures human emotions in his enduring statues.

(cello music) - [Cottrill] A lot of artists, they do it mechanically, try to look just like the person.

No, I wanted to feel like the person.

When I touched clay, it was so tactile, and it gave me a means to express human emotion.

I always cared a lot about and tried to intuit people's feelings and what they had been through and to instill a piece with those emotions.

(cello music) I sculpt because of human emotion, and that's what I try to convey.

(cello music) Growing up, I didn't know anything about sculpture.

You know, my dad went to the 10th grade.

His dad, my grandpa, went to the second grade.

So intellectual curiosity, I never heard of it.

I became a milkman like my dad.

In my first life I started that pizza chain and put joint ventures together in China, Japan.

I went to India.

For a poor country boy, that pizza business was a way to elevate my social station.

But it didn't feed my soul.

California University of Pennsylvania.

My buddies were all professors there.

I built a corporate headquarters, and I bought all original art.

Some of it's on the walls here.

I met the artists and started hanging out with them, and I realized we were simpatico, we were alike.

And I'd been characterized in the press often as a "creative entrepreneur."

I don't know, I just was what I was.

But I didn't realize that I had that creative energy and gene and a passion for creating.

The first time I touched clay, I had discovered the mistress I had traveled the world in search of.

(energetic music) I left Zanesville the week I turned 18, never thinking I'd be back here.

Well, I found this building for $50,000, and when I walked in, I felt like I was in Soho.

It was perfect.

So I thought, I'm moving to Zanesville.

I'd started my bronze foundry here.

I was driving back and forth every month or two.

All of my family had moved back to Zanesville.

I'm glad I came back.

The pace of living's slower.

People are friendlier, cheaper, and I have a perfect workspace.

(peaceful music) I have a theory that, in reading biographies of great artists, a person can only ever put as much passion into a piece as they have themselves.

It's rare to be able to achieve that, but that's the most you can put in.

Having worked through a lot of pain in childhood and young adulthood, I love to put some of that in.

I will do that instinctively, so sometimes I have to ratchet that back.

But it helps a lot with my coal miner statues, with my military statues, and anybody that's been to war and seen the things that they've seen, if you see photographs of 'em, you can just see that pain etched in their face, the stuff they've seen.

My painting buddies would ask, "Okay, you can save one painting if there's a fire.

What one do you save?"

Well, mine would have to be my wife and my tombstones behind me, because it's a tribute to her.

She's a daggone angel, and it's a tribute, in the broader sense, to long-lasting love.

I study a lot the science of human pair bonding.

You have to be incredibly fortunate to have the kind of pair bonding that she and I have.

(uplifting music) A whole bunch of big bronze statues around the country.

People will look at it two or 300 years from now and really connect with one, and then look down and see my name in bronze, "A Cottrill," whatever date, say, wow, that guy did that two, 300 years ago.

It's still here.

I'm dust.

It's still there.

So that's what I hope.

I can't wait to get into work.

I work seven days a week, not as many hours as I used to, but I don't wanna leave here, man.

It's like coming in and making love all day long.

That's pretty good stuff.

- [Kabir] You can appreciate the work of Zanesville artist Alan Cottrill when you visit downtown Akron.

He sculpted the Rubber Worker statue installed in 2021.

Cleveland's Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards celebrate diversity while exposing racism in fiction, nonfiction, and poetry.

On the next "Applause", the literary spotlight shines on the 2023 winners.

Plus meet the artist who creates the awards for Anisfield-Wolf from his glass studio in Cleveland.

And Les Delices delights audiences with a Brazilian bossa nova anthem from the film "Black Orpheus."

All that and more on the next round of "Applause."

(somber music) Let's move now to Dayton's Edgemont neighborhood, where a new health center recently opened.

Inside, there's a surprise waiting for them created by a who's who of Dayton-area artists.

(upbeat music) - [Bramlage] Five Rivers Health Centers is a non-profit community health center, and we are here to serve patients with primary care, and we turn no one away.

We see patients regardless of their ability to pay.

- This site is the largest federally qualified health center site in Ohio.

When we initially started, we served 12,000 patients, 45,000 visits.

We're now up to 27,000 patients, over 90,000 visits a year.

So it's all about access.

- When we decided several years ago to consolidate some of our smaller clinics, we looked around the community and tried to find a place that made sense for us and was close to our patients.

And the Edgemont property that used to be Whittier School many, many years ago was ideal.

And we decided to build this facility.

It is 84,000 square feet.

It is very large, but we provide so many services and resources here that our patients can really come here and know that they're coming to a one-stop shop.

When we first started working with our architect, consultants proposed to us, "Why don't you purchase 20 pieces of framed art this size, and you know, 20 stock photographs this size, and that's how you will decorate your space?"

We started talking to Terry Welker, who is the amazing sculptor artist that did the piece in our main lobby.

And he said, "You know, there's a very wonderful group "of local artists here in the Dayton area, and you ought to talk to them."

That was the starting point, and we started realizing, let's do it local.

Let's make sure to support the local artists, and let's make sure that we are bringing the community into the space and into the building.

And that's what we did.

- Five Rivers has the best art collection in town.

The commitment they made to the local arts is phenomenal.

Kim and Gina came to visit my studio, and we talked about what they were looking for, and they looked through my art, and I had some pieces that were perfect for the pediatric center.

I had a few pieces that were great for the women's center.

And then at that point they asked, "Well, we don't know how to put this all together.

Could you help us?"

And I said, sure, I'd love to.

After I saw Five Rivers Health Center and I saw they still had some blank walls, they have 88 exam rooms.

I felt they needed art, and I just started to think, you know, pediatrics, it would be really great to get some kids art.

And so I went into Dayton Leadership Academy and Louise Troy Elementary, which is right down the street, and these kids see the health center.

And so it was really special working with the local kids.

It's very abstract, but what they really worked with was color and movement, and we really talked about emotions and feelings, and I would ask them, "If you're going to the dentist, what kind of color do you wanna see on the walls?"

"Oh, we want something calm.

We would like some blues and some teals."

And these kids learned how to mix all those colors on their own.

They learned about tints, tones, shades, and by the end of the project, if I would ask, "Oh, could you just stir me up a teal?"

They could do it.

They really understood it.

- [Bramlage] Currently the collection is about 150 pieces total, and we have supported 70 local artists.

And that includes not just individuals, but also student groups from the two schools that Amy Deal worked with, and We Care Arts.

So, there's a wide array of works and looks.

The collection is very diverse.

- [McFarlane-El] We wanted to make sure that, since we're in the heart of an African-American community, that we involve the African-American Visual Artists Guild to be a part of it.

And then we had fun shopping at Front Street Galleries with all of those wonderful artists.

- [Bramlage] In addition to supporting artists that are known in the community, we also have art from individuals who have never sold their works before.

They may never have been included in any kind of public or community space or exhibited their works.

And that was really exciting to talk to our staff and have someone say, "Well, my dad's a painter.

"He's retired from GM, but he paints in his garage and he has this amazing artwork."

And we would go take a look, and then we would purchase a couple of pieces.

So that's been awesome, to share works with the community from artists that are not well known yet, but hopefully they will be.

- Many of our patients don't get the chance to see art every day.

And so to have it as a part of their healthcare, I feel this is part of our healing touch that we're doing from a visual perspective.

And because we put a little bit of information about each artist through the QR codes that we have, they can get to learn a little bit more about the artist as well.

My favorite piece is called Yes, We Can by Andrea Cummings.

And it displays a black ballerina doing ballet pointed toe.

And so when I was growing up, my instructor told the class that African-Americans don't do point.

And it was a little offensive when I went home to tell my mother, and she's like, "You are going to do toe."

Now there's so many African-American ballet dancers who do point, but I was the only one in my dance troupe who did ballet on point.

- I find myself having a different favorite every week.

I tend to really find myself enjoying the second floor, the Dayton Gallery Wall, because it's got a lot of different photographs, paintings, prints of places and spaces around Dayton.

So there are some shots from Carillon Park and the VA Cemetery.

And so that wall of multiple pieces is one of my favorites.

We are open to the public, and so, even if you're not a patient of Five Rivers, we would love to have you come in and experience the local art that we have in the building.

- They could probably see almost about 50% of the art.

The other 50% are behind locked doors.

It's in an exam room, it's in a conference room.

You need a badge to get through, but it would be our pleasure.

Stop by.

We'd love to show it off.

This building is a showplace.

If you haven't had a chance to see it yet, and the fact that it's right here within the West Dayton neighborhood of Edgemont is just the cherry on top.

(bright music) - [Kabir] Ah, nothing like a healthy dose of the arts, my friend.

And with that, it's time for this "Applause" to come to an end.

I'm Ideastream Public Media's Kabir Bhatia, signing off with more folk-soul fusion from Ngina Fayola.

♪ Maybe I'm not as fine as some of your other lady friends ♪ ♪ But I got something ♪ ♪ I know how to love a man ♪ ♪ I'm not so fancy ♪ ♪ I don't know the latest dances you know ♪ ♪ But I'm a classic ♪ ♪ And I know how to love a man ♪ ♪ More and more ♪ ♪ More and more and more and more ♪ ♪ We can give him more and more ♪ ♪ More and more ♪ (vocalizing) ♪ I never finished college ♪ ♪ I only got my G.E.D.

♪ ♪ Extensive knowledge ♪ - [Announcer] Production of "Applause" on Ideastream Public Media is made possible by the John P. Murphy Foundation, the Kulas Foundation, and by Cuyahoga County residents through Cuyahoga Arts & Culture.