Local composer Della Orrey scores Black History Untold project

Feature photo of Afaq, a still from Revolution.

Vancouver indie film buffs may already know the name Della Orrey. She was the composer behind award-winning short documentary Who Am I by Kenyan-born, Burnaby-raised filmmaker Adhel Arop–and if you were around for the film festival circuit early this year (pre-COVID lockdown), you’d have definitely found it in the program. What you might not know about the multi-talented Orrey (she’s not only a film composer, but a singer-songwriter, poet and audio-engineer–to name a few) is that her work reaches far beyond this Western Canadian city. In fact, her latest collaboration, Black History Untold, has gone on to international renown, and even landed in the Museum of American Revolution.

Black History Untold, created by award-winning journalist Sofiya Ballin, is an identity series that explores the importance of a comprehensive Black history education through personal essays and on-camera interviews. For 2020, the annual project’s theme was Revolution, which is a series of video vignettes directed by Emmanuel Afolabi that asked participants to share an untold Black revolutionary story and how it’s impacted them.

Revolution–released in early June–quickly became a Vimeo Staff Pick, and, in Orrey’s words, the piece is “turning the volume up” on self-defined narratives, and the truths we weren’t taught in grade school.

I caught up with Orrey to find out more about the project, and why she’s so passionate about the intersection of sound, film and storytelling.

First thing’s first: this is an amazing, amazing project. It must have been such an honour to get the inside track on these telling interviews, and hear them.

Yes! I learned so much while being able to work in the background, and all these interviews have made a profound impact in accelerating my exploration of the past told outside of mainstream historical text.

How’d you get involved with Black History Untold, as a composer from Vancouver?

I’m not originally from Vancouver but moved here in 2010. I lived in New York City from 2017 to 2019, and I kind of cut my teeth out there and found myself in an amazing community of visual artists–filmmakers, photographers-turned-filmmakers.

Emmanuel Afolabi, who is the director for this project, is one of my main collaborators.

He introduced me to Sofiya, who graciously allowed me to contribute music.

This year’s installment came out in February, so why is this important to highlight now?

Since 2016, [Black History Untold] has centered on a theme.

This year’s was “revolution” and the full body of work was premiered at the American Museum Of Revolution in February for Black History Month.

Fast forward to now, we never would have foreseen the world would take a turn how it did. It took some time to process and respond. Emmanuel’s BLM protest footage in Brooklyn [along with] compiled pieces from the interviews really spoke to the now that we find ourselves in.

For me, personally, it’s been the way I’ve been able to heal, and feel challenged and feel encouraged and feel that I even have the capacity for hope.

I was familiar with a lot of this footage and these interviews but I hadn’t heard it pieced together in this way, resonating in this time, so that’s kind of why it’s coming out now instead of in February.

It was then released [around early June], and Emmanuel premiered it and released it with [Vimeo], and it was selected for Vimeo Staff Pick!

And you’re releasing the score separately? Pardon my ignorance – how does that work as a composer?

The score along with other compositions is available to listen to on my Soundcloud.

I think I should tell you more about me: I’m not just a composer, I think “composer” is the agency in which I’m growing as a music producer, audio creative, singer-songwriter, and performer. I do a lot of things, but film is the biggest period of growth that’s happened since 2017. Coming back to Vancouver, I scored Who Am I for Adhel [Arop] and I just realized, ‘Wow, Vancouver is a film town and this is such a great indie community.’ I love supporting visual narratives and I think that’s what I’m going to focus on before I try to figure out who I am as a solo recording artist.

So that’s how you landed in film and storytelling through music?

Yes!

You say that working on this has helped you find healing–can you tell me a little more about that? You also said this provided you inspiration: can you tell me what you’re taking from this project onto the next–or perhaps your own self discovery?

My ancestors are escaped slaves who came into Canada from the underground railroad, so I have always been raised with a strong awareness and acknowledgement of that family history, and identify with that strongly. Education and self-narrative is so important to me, as I have that strong oral history that’s been passed down to me through the generations.

When you are a minority, a hyper-visible black minority in BC, the only time you’re reminded of your blackness [is when it’s usually] something negative. So that’s how I grew up, but seeing the reality of that within that much different space with my friends [later in life when moving to NYC], I’m like, “this [blackness] is different and beautiful and so diverse and so expansive.” It got me questioning, “What is going on with the media? Why have I never seen this before?”

That’s why I think my involvement in this project is important, because I think representation within a space offers others to share an experience somehow with me, of growing up being hyper-visible in their space, and they might not have these role models and have access to these voices.

I love what you said about that self-narrative. In that interview with Marc Lamont Hill, I was so hit hard by the line “The stuff that tempts you away from challenging power… you might lose some friends, you might lose a job,” and that’s where we stay if we don’t challenge power. If we don’t challenge power then we lose these stories.

It’s challenging, right? There are so many different emotions covered by that piece, and I think it’s really incredible.

It’s the anger, the hope, then what the cost is. And what ground are you standing on right now? And then the question is: what do we want? We want justice. We want equality. We want peace.

Tell me, in your words, why everyone needs to watch this right now.

Black History Untold is actively undoing erasure of our resistance by educating on how black revolution manifests in our past, present and future.

Black History Untold: Revolution credits

Director, Editor, Director of Photography: Emmanuel Afolabi
Executive Producer, Director: Sofiya Ballin
Associate Producer: Perry “Vision” DiVirgilio, Marc Lamont Hill, Mike Africa Jr.
Set Designer: Keturah Benson
2nd cam: @hqlou
Production Assistant: Akilah Grant – Sullivan, Keturah Benson, Nazir Alston
Composer, Sound Editor: Della Orrey