We recently connected with Alpha Fisher and have shared our conversation below.

Alpha, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you tell us about a time that your work has been misunderstood? Why do you think it happened and did any interesting insights emerge from the experience?

Without a doubt, if someone has not heard me before, the assumption is that I do r&b, neo soul, or that I rap. True story, I brought my guitar to a gig once and the person who booked it said “Oh. You rap over guitar music? I’ve not seen a black person do that.” Oh man, and when the pandemic started, I remember being told by the person hosting the virtual open mic “With the increase in Black Lives Matter protests, we really wanted to make sure we spotlighted some black artists and you’re the best one in Colorado.” I remember thinking “Man, it feels great to be the best black person in ALL of Colorado” haha. The part that makes it hard is that I’ve been booked for gigs and don’t fit the set list.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I am a singer/songwriter living in Colorado Springs and I have been singing since I was a little kiddo. My dad said “When you were three years old, we were at a barber shop called Colors that my friend owned. There were a bunch of people getting their hair done and Whitney Houston’s version of I Will Always Love You came on the radio. Right at the end, where she hits the big note, you just belted it out like it was nothing. Your little eyes were closed and you sang your heart out. What I remember most is looking around at everyone and they had all stopped what they were doing and were just staring at you. I’ll never forget that.” I have a lot of musical influence in my life. My mother has a gorgeous voice and sang to me and my brother a lot. My dad played a lot of soul, r&b, and blues. Around the age of seventeen, I found out that Sly and the Family Stone was a family band. Sly and Freddy Stone are my great uncles; Little Sister was made up of my Grandmother and my Great Aunt.
Finding all of this out actually made me work harder to find my own voice. There’s an interview with Michael Buble on Jool’s Holland Live (I think that’s where I saw it). He makes a statement about how he learned vocal techniques from his favorite singers and made them his own. I loved that idea. Every artist/song/lyric became a teacher. Every time I heard something new, I wanted to know WHY I liked it and why other people liked it. When I started playing music around the city, I went to open mics. I did a lot of covers and I hated it. I wanted to sing my own music and I didn’t understand why no one wanted to hear what I had to say. Through years of feeling completely on the outside looking in, I realized that as odd and out of place as I felt singing my own music, there was always someone who was REALLY happy that I did. I describe acquiring my fan base like running down the street and eventually, some folks started to follow. I’ve spent some time going down different streets too. I opened for Burlesque shows for a while. I have songs that are based on paintings fellow artists have created. We’re all talking, and I love that. We’ve all found a way to speak to each other with our own languages so we come from a place of knowledge, always thrilled to share. This opened everyone up. Conversation about other topics became easier. We all spoke to each other respectfully from a place we were comfortable so, doing the same in an uncomfortable space wasn’t as cumbersome a terrain to traverse.

That’s what I want my music to do. That’s what I want to put out there. I think everyone is talking but no one is listening and art creates a space for you to sit down and grow the roses.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

I was finding difficulty performing in 2019 because I wasn’t getting the response I wanted. I was STILL getting low paying gigs and even when I promoted myself (which I’m not great at doing) I didn’t get much response or support. I was performing all over Colorado Springs and then the pandemic hit. Black Lives Matter protests were also at their height and for the first time, I experienced two things: Remote gigs and tokenism. I was ACTUALLY told “Because of all the Black Lives Matter stuff, I wanted to really open up our mic to a black artist and you’re the best black one we have here!” The worst part was, I had to take the gig. I needed the money. I didn’t know what I needed to do to get out of this rut or how I was going to keep music interesting to me (yes, I was losing steam fast), then Bo Burnham’s inside happened. I watched it obsessively. He did something I always wanted to do but didn’t know how: He opened up conversation on real topics through dark comedy. I thought “That’s my life.” First thing I realized was I needed to change how I performed. I always sat down and I would share a little story (timidly) and then start singing. I had to stop being so concerned with people’s perception of a black girl doing folk music and realize that I was going to be put into a box no matter what, but those who really wanted to hear me and what I have to say, would support me.

The first show I had in 2021, I decided I would stand and I wrote some jokes for the topics I wanted to discuss. When I got on stage, I told myself “This is your space and your time. Be honest” and went into my set. It was the best I had done up to that point. People were incredibly responsive. I promoted my album and people actually asked me where they could purchase it.

Stagnancy as an artist is death but it happens to us all. The most important thing to do is to be truthful with yourself and to yourself. Work out new ideas and when you start to feel stagnant, you absolutely have to move, even if it’s a small step that starts with watching Bo Burnham’s Inside twice a day for three months.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

As an autistic person, I spent most of my life studying people and I LOVE humankind. There are so many things we do as humans that don’t make sense but we do them because that’s how we were raised or, we do them because that’s how we were taught to perform those tasks. Our country’s main goal is to create a society of people who will follow the rules and do as they’re told. That has just NEVER been me.

I became obsessed with finding people who were combative. I enjoyed women who were labeled “rude” or “bossy” and I would try to align myself with them. See, the thing that drives my creative journey is finding people who aren’t going to hear “well, we did all we could” and walk away. I wanted to be surrounded by creatives that would hit a wall and create a plan to tear it down simply because it was in our way and didn’t explain itself. I’ve met so many people who are considered “annoying” or “frustrating” and let me tell you something, they aren’t either of those things. You know what they are? exceptions to the rule. We aren’t doing things the ways people think someone our ages should be doing things but if these lovely folks aren’t incredibly successful and changing lives.

That’s what I want. I want to change lives through true connection. In order to connect with people, you have to be uncomfortable and sometimes, that means I get called “bitch” and I respond with “Right but, I wanna get this done and so do you. How do we do that?”

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alpha_the_musical/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AlphaTheMusical
• Other: TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@alpha_the_musical

Image Credits
Broken Glass Photography, Ariel Crawford Photography, Gillian Marie Photography