Music, Movement, and Manifestation: An interview with Valerie June
Written by: Isabel Kay-Anyaji
A sweet southern blend of soul, magic, Americana and blues has a home amongst the discography of Valerie June, Grammy-nominated singer songwriter, author, and poet. I had the chance to sit down with her and chat about music, movement, and manifestation, while uncovering some of the influences and practices that went into her latest album “Owls, Omens, and Oracles” and her EP “Brighter Blue”.
IA: Your album that was released April 11th of 2025, “Owls, Omens, and Oracles” has been described as a “soul recharging exercise in radical positivity” and “a ritual to an innate creative proclamation”, and I'm wondering how making that album was recharging to you and recharging to your soul and your psyche?
Valerie: Well, it was recharging in the way that I got to work with an artist that I really love and respect, and we brought together people that were just great as a combination to bring the songs to life. We put goddesses in the center of the room, like little goddess statues, and, like, made my altar, and everyone respected it. It was just, like, the seed of this record. Last record I did flower mandalas all over the studio, on the floor, with petals, and this record I just did the altar and every day brought in flowers and different things - really, just, the people that you have, the instruments, they all have spirits, and just, like, the whole mood of everything being one that is creative, but also very mindful of, like, our spirit and where our heart is.
IA: What other pieces are part of your musical or your creative process that you will not leave out? Or that you want to be mindful of when you're going to create?
Valerie: Well, simple things, too, like tea, 'cause sometimes, like, in the studio or in creativity, you reach a point where you're like, “whoa, what? I'm frustrated” or “what do I do now?”. What you do is you go make a cup of tea. And you just drink the cup of tea. And as you're drinking the cup of tea and thinking about the day and the flavor and the sky and whatever's happening in the moment, then everything seems to just creatively work itself out so when you go back to what was a problem, it's gone. Yeah, so just the ritual of tea, and then the ritual of starting the day with either my walk or some kind of physical movement, like Granny Jog, 'cause I don't like to do a big jog, 'cause that's hard on your body. Or dance, I do that every day, and I do my yoga cycle every day. Got to set my mind for whatever might come.
The worship of trees - in the Pasadena area where we worked on the record, there were some trees that I just, I had a hard time not making complete love to ‘cause they were so gorgeous. One tree sprawled all across the ground - so I would sometimes just go visit that tree. And it was in someone's yard so I was like, I ain't gonna be crazy enough to go up in the yard, but I'm just gonna go stand and get the energy of it. So many plants that aren't native to where I'm from, so... visiting and getting the plant energy before I go in every day.
IA: Your last EP, “brighter blue”, where does that fit into your universe and where does that fit in relation to “Owls, Omens, and Oracles?
Valerie: It's really returning home in a lot of ways because I was raised on gospel songs like “I'll Fly Away", or “Trouble in Mind", and having parents and grandparents who would teach us about challenges that we'll face in life, but trouble don't last always. You know? And then being from the land where I'm surrounded by fields here, and my people worked these fields picking cotton and things, and knowing that that's where the blues was born, so a song like “Smokestack” really, just, like, in 250 years of American life and existence, remembering my roots, and where my people came from, and those people being Southern people, too, 'cause the song, like, “Trouble in Mind”, that's been covered by so many country folks. It's been covered by so many hillbilly folks, blues, and rock and roll and gospel, so... these songs are American songs and songs that gave birth to other genres, and I wanted to do just a short little photo of my favorites from the American songbook, basically.
IA: When did you start making music?
Valerie: When I was a kid, I used to sing and write songs without instruments. And... the way that I write songs is I hear voices, so voices would just come to me while I was playing, and they still come while I'm doing things. That's how I write songs, but I didn't know what I was doing. I just was, you know, kind of how you have thoughts going through your head and they're... many thoughts are spoken like, “I'm gonna get up and go to the kitchen. I want to turn on the faucet. I'm gonna get out a carrot. I'm gonna chop the carrot. I'm gonna make some soup. Oh, tomorrow will be good to do such a such”, we have this endless stream of consciousness and thoughts going on in our minds, and sometimes what happens with my stream is a song will come through it. So I feel like that's been happening to me since I got here and it still happens, and so I started making music with just singing and with just hearing those voices and singing along to them. And then I started playing instruments later in life in, like, my 20s. So it's never too late to start learning an instrument.
IA: Considering you said that brighter blue is kind of, like, a coming home, and you started kind of making music through your own stream of consciousness - that really, to me, it sets a foundation of you and how your music is just entangled in your life. It feels like it's very integrated to how you live and how you walk through the world. It also makes me think that a lot of influence that you do have comes from the South or the blues. Does that kind of resonate?
Valerie: And the sea, you know, from there, I don't stop, you know? I gravitate toward everything I love. So, if I like a rock and roll song, or if I like a punk song, or whatever, a sculptor, a painter, a dancer, fashion, whatever it is, there's absolutely no limit to where I'm willing to go for creativity and inspiration because it's more fun that way. I love artists that are older than me, like, even Erika Badyu or Lauryn Hill, and they're constantly inspired. Tracy Ellis Ross, they're constantly inspiring and constantly inspired by things. As we get older, it's very easy to close like, no, I do only this one thing, or I'm only gonna wear one thing, or I'm only gonna be interested in one thing. But no, as we get older, we should open the door more.
IA: You practice yoga. How is that practice incorporated into your life?
Valerie: Well, my body really needs it. I've been doing it since I was a kid, and I didn't know I was doing yoga when I was a kid. I was just like, stretching. But I started to study yoga when I became an adult and the breathwork and the practice of it, and as a singer, first off, the breath work really helps with being able to use my voice properly and use my body as an instrument, but spiritually, the practice of yoga, it means the union of all things, you know, whether plants or birds, butterflies, trees, humans, all sentient beings, clouds, I believe, all things. And so when I'm practicing, it is me once a day connecting with all that is, and remembering how large we are, but how small we are. We're part of this huge, ever-going union, and so I need that, and I feel like I make that space in my life, and when I make that space, then the songs feel open to come. The way that you live, kind of being your creativity, we're all creating a life, and so, using our life to make space for those little gifts that'll come to you as you move through, you know? I feel like if l I don't make that space, then I feel blocked, you know? Receiving new ideas, new inspiration, I get more stuck in my ways. That physical practice is important, just as important as the practice of doing the art, having my body move, even that's why I dance every day - even if it's just, like, two songs or 10 minutes, I need to... flow. From head to toe, from limb to limb, just oxygen flow, and the connection with the ground, and the air, and the space, and... wiggle.
IA: So this all helps you stay grounded.
Valerie: Oh yeah, and I hope I'm able to have practices like this until I'm, like, 80 or 90. I don't put pressure on myself. It's like, if I can only do five minutes or ten minutes, and I'll get up in my hotel room, and I'll get it done, you know? If I'm at the airport, I'll go over in a corner and just do some, like, breathwork and stretching, and just try to make wherever I am the space for my practices. It helps you get through the day to have practices, small practices. Mantras, reflective times, times for feeling sad, times for feeling frustrated, you know.
IA: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Well, thank you for sharing that with me. Your song, “Joy Joy”, radiates a radical optimism. Do you find yourself to be optimistic, or is that like something that you strive for? Does it kind of come naturally to you or do not even resonate with optimism?
Valerie: I resonate greatly with optimism and positivity. I think I resonate greatly with it because I'm mean and evil. I wake up so mean, and just, like, so nasty, just so cruel and I'm like, wait a minute. I actually have a choice here. Do I want to continue this day with this attitude? Or do I want to do something about it myself? Before anybody else has to handle it. Or to... face the demon. So, like, just feeling quite responsible in the world for my own place and my own way of being in it, and what my way radiates out to others. Because people are radiating unconsciously all kind of daggers and painful things and we're all trying to navigate through each other's lack of awareness with the things that we're, that we actually have quite a lot of control over if we get conscious about them. Because I see that side of myself and because I've spent decades working with it. That's why I'm not afraid of what good can happen, and what positivity can do, and what positive things are possible. 'Cause just as much as the dark and negative is possible, that positive is so actually possible and real. We just can't even wrap our minds around how good it all could be. We have in our brains that, “oh, it's gotta be something bad”. And I don't think we have to call that forth, that just is a natural thing that occurs in nature and in life, bad things. So why we focus our energy in that direction is something that we choose versus choosing the opposite. So that's just what I've chosen to do and it's not easy, and, you know, I'm a rough person in a lot of ways, so that's where it comes from, the practice. Like, wait a minute, hold up. Whose responsibility is it to take care of this?
IA: What is your relationship with manifestation?
Valerie: I do it all the time. It doesn't stop, and, you know, I've dedicated my life to understanding it. That's why I decided to follow a dream, because I wanted to understand, like, is it true that you can leap, and then it will appear? That sounds crazy to me. Is it true that, like, you can focus on something and direct your energy toward it, and it can be impossible, but you can call it forth? Is that real? I wanted to know, is it real? So I started to do the things in my life that I thought were impossible and to see some of those things come to be a true, truly manifested thing,,, it seems so impossible. But it's actually manifested. The thing about manifestation, though, is that it takes in the physical realm that we're in. Part of our understanding of it is, like, needing it to take time, because the physical realm you plant a seed, and you have to wait for that seat to blossom and grow. There are the phases. I think there are realms where you can manifest something so quickly, and they're all people who can manifest things faster, but that process is really the thing that we're here to learn how to master in the Earth realm. Manifesting even a cup of tea is the practice of it. Or manifesting, like, being a painter is a practice of it or a doctor, or whatever. What you want to wear the next day, that's the practice of it but we need, like, the Earth's life cycle is about learning how to use the gifts and the tools. I think there are other realms, though, where these tools that we learned, we can use them - even now can use them for good or for harm. And so, it's a very delicate thing to manifest and to understand how your manifestations affect all. Manifesting for myself is... It can be a selfish thing if you're only doing it for yourself. So, it's understanding what your manifestation does for the collective and how that can feed off towards something that's hopefully growing and blossoming into a more beautiful space.
IA: Thank you for sharing that. I'm curious what your favorite kind of tea is.
Valerie: Mm, I'm a tea all day person. I start with just plain English breakfast with some cream, or, like, almond milk, or... some kind of milk. It's gotta have milk or it'll make me sick. And then, I'll drink, like, three, two to three to four cups of that, and then, I'll start drinking green tea, and I like green tea with ginkgo and ginseng, so I'll drink, like, two or three of those, and then I'll drink herbal teas like, dandelion, nettles, things like that, and then, at the end of the day, when I'm trying to come down, I'll get on my chamomile. I love to drink flowers. Flowers are just so beautiful and then you think, Oh, my goodness, I can drink this flower! So, really, really special teas that I like, and I like taking baths and teas. I'll make a cauldron of, like, a big pot of tea, and have it in the bath - I live in my bath tub, it's like my office.
IA: Do you have three words to describe your musical career?
Valerie: The word dream, for sure. I will use challenge. And I will use hope. Yeah, those are my words. Because being an artist, it is not always easy so, or following any dream or path that's not already paved. And believe there's a 4th word. But you have to keep hoping and you have to believe that it's possible.
Interview and article by Isabel Kay-Anyaji for STREET GRRRLS / GRRRL MUSIC.
Valerie June's website: https://www.valeriejune.com/
Valerie June on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thevaleriejune/
Valerie June on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCl4FRHq1BAf8mfL9kR1NmcA
Valerie June on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/4QZdOCb3UacKbQ1ybDFAKM?si=llK3A7OnSmqtSAbBddy27Q
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