YasmineEmani, 23, grew up in Park Hill and graduated in 2020 from Denver School of the Arts. She’s now an independent Western soul singer performing locally while dreaming of a move to New York City. In the meantime, she lives at home with her younger brother and her mom, who drives her from gig to gig.
She performed at the Colorado Black Arts Festival earlier this summer, and she stopped by Colorado Public Radio’s Colorado Matters studio last week. Dressed in a sparkly silver dress and matching glittery make-up and sandals, she performed a Tiny Desk Concert, singing a few songs accompanied by her guitarist, Jake Alvarez, and keyboardist Wes Watkins.
This weekend, she’ll perform at the Underground Music Showcase, which is running July 25-27. There will be three outdoor stages and a dozen inside locations around Denver’s South Broadway. The event expects to attract tens of thousands of fans. It’s the final iteration of UMS in its current form, which has been running 25 years and only skipped its 2020 edition due to the pandemic.
The showcase is ending after a quarter-century because of higher production costs, lower ticket sales and other challenges, the organizers told Denverite. “UMS 2025 is the final showcase in this form. Festivals are hard to sustain,” its website states.
To get more detail, Denverite reached out to Jami Duffy, co-manager of the Underground Music Showcase, who said: “So everything that we’re doing to put on this festival the way it needs to be put on is right. What’s not happening is we’re not getting the amount of sponsorship, philanthropic support, and government support that we need to sustain the festival, and quite frankly, we just don't want to put the burden of sustaining the festival on the ticket holder.”
YasmineEmani is set to perform at HQ Denver, 60 S. Broadway, from 8 p.m. to 8:40 p.m. this Saturday, July 26.
Of the showcase ending, YasmineEmani said: “I feel like it’s just really telling of the times of this world. Everything is very [transitory] right now ... when it comes to the Denver music scene, we’re feeling that in real time.”
Many people “feel very devastated by this loss in the community,” she told Colorado Matters Senior Host Ryan Warner.
While she still has the chance, she’s looking forward to lending her unique fusion sound to the showcase. She came up with the term “Western soul” to describe her style – it’s soul music influenced by Western vibes of Colorado and the Rocky Mountain region, as seen in both nature and films, she said.
“When I think about Western music for myself, I think of the plains, I think of traveling a large ‘scape of land for a long time, that lone ranger vibe,” she said. “And the music often-times reflects that … I feel like Western music has a lot more indigenous Hispanic musical influences, Spanish influences, as well as Black music ... in the essence of that Western atmosphere, tied in with my soulful voice and R & B, soul funk roots. I feel like it’s a perfect hybrid for me.”
She performs at HQ on Saturday night, her second and final time as part of the showcase. She often performs with her eyes shut, her head held back, her arms mid-air. Her sound is stirring and rich, whether experienced in Colorado Matters’ small recording studio, at a public venue or on a streaming platform.
When asked how she envisions people listening to her recordings, she said, “I feel like my music is best experienced on your own first, because I feel like each person who interacts with it always has their own revelation.”
She also hopes people listen while showering, sitting outside in the dark with headphones on, riding in a car playing it out of big speakers, or while in bed with one’s eyes closed. The goal, she said, is for people to think: “I really sat with it by myself and just really felt the truth that I needed to receive.”
Besides YasmineEmani, there will be hundreds of other performers at this weekend’s showcase, including Le Parody, Shermanology, Bison Bone, Future Joy and Shane T. Performers will be performing on the Showcase and Backyard stages, as well as in smaller venues including Bar 404, Baere Brewing, and Hi Dive.
After the showcase, YasmineEmani said she hopes to move to New York City in the near future and live in Harlem – but she’s also open to considering New Jersey – and continue growing as a performer. “I think of me moving,” she said, “and it’s really important just for me to know who I can become outside of the familiarities of my environment.”
