Radical, Resilient Hope: Inside Joe Davis’ Diaspora: On the Rise

This February, Northrop is proud to present an inspiring weekend of music that celebrates Black history and the continued march toward freedom. On Saturday, Feb. 21 at 7 p.m., join us for Joe Davis and The Poetic Diaspora’s Pay What You Wish album celebration, Diaspora: On the Rise, followed by VocalEssence’s WITNESS: Symphony of Spirituals on Sunday, Feb. 22 at 4 p.m.

Thank you to our partners at COMPAS for sharing this recent conversation with Joe Davis. Enjoy!

Top image: Joe Davis. Photo courtesy of the artist.

 

What does it mean to walk into a concert carrying the weight of the world and leave lighter, stronger and ready for what comes next? Joe Davis knows. And with Diaspora: On the Rise, he's designed an experience to do exactly that.

"I want people to walk out of the auditorium feeling a lot better than they did when they came in," he explains.

It's an ambitious promise, but Davis isn't new to the work of transformation.

An Artist Forged in Survival

Joe Davis is an internationally acclaimed artist, activist and educator who works at the intersection of spoken word, music, theater and dance. He's the founder and artistic director of The Poetic Diaspora, a Minneapolis-based collective that brings together poets, musicians and vocalists to create collaborative performance experiences.

But before any of that, he was a sick kid with a pen.

He describes his relationship to art as rooted in survival and healing. As a child dealing with a serious illness, including passing out on the bathroom floor and being rushed to the emergency room and then hospitalized, he turned to writing as a way to cope. That early experience shaped how he understands the role of creativity today. He doesn't see poetry as decorative or distant, but as something active and embodied.

"I use poetry to power possibility," he says.

How a Collective Finds Its Shape

The Poetic Diaspora officially formed in 2015, when Davis decided to pursue art full time. That leap was supported by his first major grant through Intermedia Arts. At the time, Davis and his collaborators were already making music together informally. The shift was a decision to take that collaboration seriously.

"I was like, yo, let's make an album," he says.

From there, the project grew into a collective that changes shape with each new work, a group of friends who love making music. Many of them were also activists and community organizers. 

"It's been cool to see artists come together just for the love of music and the love of bringing community together.”

Why "Diaspora" Is More Than a Name

The name The Poetic Diaspora was chosen deliberately, grounding it in historical meaning. Davis references the Jewish diaspora and the forced displacement of African people due to colonization and slavery.

But he also uses the word in a broader sense.

“As someone who loves language, I used it in both a literal and figurative sense. So many people are dispersed through multiple cultures, races and backgrounds. And their identities have been dispersed through poetry and music.”

The word diaspora also holds pain: scattering, separation, loss. But Davis sees it as a starting point, not an ending. For him, poetry and music are tools for reconnection.

"I feel that poetry and music are two of our most powerful tools to bring humanity together,” he explains. 

The Work Beyond the Stage

While performances like Diaspora: On the Rise showcase Davis’ artistry on a grand scale, much of his time is spent as a COMPAS teaching artist, bringing poetry and music into schools, nonprofits and community spaces across Minnesota.

"I had teaching artists in my life when I was younger, and they impacted me and opened up my eyes and opened up my heart to what was possible," he reflects. "And so I want to do that for other young folks as well."

His teaching-artist work takes him everywhere, from schools to juvenile correctional facilities, where he invites young people to activate their creative power. It's work he's done for years, even before joining the COMPAS roster.

In a time when arts funding faces significant cuts, Davis’ partnership with COMPAS has been vital. "Working with an organization like COMPAS has been really helpful for me," he shares, noting how the organization connects artists to spaces and makes the world more artful.

The through line is clear: Whether on stage at Northrop or in a classroom, Davis creates space for people to tap into the transformative power of art. 

A Concert That Holds Everything

Diaspora: On the Rise is Davis’ most fully realized expression of these ideas. The large-scale concert is designed to lift audiences emotionally and prepare them for what comes next. He describes it as an emotional arc that holds grief, joy and forward movement together.

"There is a brighter future," he offers. "I want to speak to that full spectrum of human emotion and create a path forward for people."

Some of the work is rooted in specific moments of collective grief. He spoke about writing the song "Hold On" following the police killing of Jamar Clark.

"That happened in my own neighborhood," he recalls. "We did that song together, like, as the crowd. We did that song together."

It's memory made into music. Pain transformed into purpose.

The goal is not escape, but readiness.

"I think we need music that's going to lift our spirits. It's going to strengthen and empower us for the work ahead."

Music as Medicine

Davis emphasizes that music must be felt, not just heard.

"You've got to feel it in your body," he insists. "When you hear music, it hits you, and you move, and you groove and you come alive."

This isn't metaphor; it's methodology. This perspective is reinforced by his current training as a poetry therapist and his study of logotherapy (a type of counseling that helps people make sense of their lives, even when they’re suffering).

The body knows what the mind sometimes forgets: that rhythm can regulate, that melody can mend, that shared sound can stitch us back together.

A Stage Filled With Voices

Diaspora: On the Rise features collaborations with three choirs: ComMUSICation (a music youth development organization in St. Paul), VocalEssence and Known MPLS (a Minneapolis-based youth and young-adult choir). The show also includes collaborations with Endia Tierra, reggae artist Brandyn Tulloch and hip hop artist Nur-D. Each artist and collaboration adds texture, depth and dimension. This show is a conversation across lineages and styles.

Leaving Stronger Than You Arrived

When audience members leave Diaspora: On the Rise, Davis hopes they depart with renewed energy and purpose.

“I want their spirits to be lifted. I want them to have radical, resilient hope. And I want them to be mobilized to create change where they are.”

By radical, resilient hope, he does not mean the fragile kind that collapses at the first sign of trouble. He means a hope that has been tested, tempered and strengthened through fire. It is the same hope that once guided a sick kid with a pen toward healing, the same force that transformed personal pain into something collective and sustaining.

“When I realized my words were helping other people,” Davis remembers, “That’s when I committed my life to it.”

That commitment lives in every note of Diaspora: On the Rise. This is not just a concert. It is a ceremony of reconnection, an invitation to feel what becomes possible when we gather, listen and allow the music to move through us and carry us forward.

The question is not whether change is needed, but whether we are ready to rise together and create it.

This piece was originally published on the COMPAS blog and has been published here in collaboration.