November was an eventful month in vocalist Isis Damil’s burgeoning career. She performed the music of jazz vocalist Betty Carter at the Detroit Preservation Jazz Concert Series at Wayne State University. Fitted in a tight red dress with her natural hair pinned up, Damil belted beautifully classic tunes from Carter’s discography like “Tight,” “Make Him Believe,” and “Naima’s Love Song." On November 22, she gathered with local songwriters at the Detroit Institute of Arts’ Friday Night Live! series, performing original music and doubling as a pianist. She ended the month at the Thanksgiving Day Parade, where she debuted her version of the “Go 4 It” theme song from WDIV-TV (Channel 4).
Last year, she won the WDIV local competition, beating out other vocalists from Michigan. The promo song from WDIV has been performed since the 1980s by iconic Detroiters such as gospel singers Karen Clark Sheard and Marvin Winans. Now, Damil’s voice will be heard in the new version of the promo commercial.
Over the last few years, Damil has built a name for herself in Detroit’s jazz and R&B scene. Echoing heartfelt lyricism with her mezzo-soprano vocals, you’d think being a vocalist was her lifelong dream. But it wasn’t until she was in her 20s that she stopped running from her true passion.
“What’s so funny is I felt like my parents forced me into music when I was younger,” Damil says. “So I rebelled. I was like, ‘I’ll do anything but music.’ I even went to school to be a dentist, so that’s how much I didn’t want to be a musician. But I’m a strong believer in when you’re called to do things, it just keeps coming back around, and musical opportunities just kept presenting themselves to me, and I couldn’t ignore it."
Damil’s parents are accomplished musicians. Her father, Zion Yisrael, is a jazz fusion pianist who has performed with the Enchantment, Billy Paul, Kenny Burrell, Marcus Belgrave, and Donald Walden. Her mother, Mecca Damil Lathan, is a retired music educator, multi-instrumentalist, and vocalist.
Over the years, her parents have collaborated on many performances, notably a popular jazz series at Metropolitan United Methodist Church on Woodward.
Damil recalls tagging along with her parents and performing with them often at Bert’s Marketplace and Baker’s Keyboard Lounge. Working occasionally with her folks, Damil confesses she fought the idea of pursuing music, tricking her dad into giving her piano lessons so she wouldn’t have to take private lessons with a teacher and could avoid daily practice.
But the music wouldn’t go away. She was classically trained at Renaissance High School and played flute in the University of Detroit Mercy band. She studied dental hygiene but switched to communications, earning her bachelor’s degree in 2014. After graduating, she worked at the Aloft Hotel at the David Whitney.
In 2015, the music called her again. This time, she didn’t let go. At the Dirty Dog Jazz Cafe, her mom and guitarist Perry Hughes begged her to join her dad for one song. She wowed the crowd with the jazz standard “All the Things You Are.”
Shortly after that experience at the Dirty Dog, Damil quit her job at the Whitney to pursue music full-time. She secured a weekly residency at Baker’s Keyboard Lounge for six years, opened for R&B heartthrob Brian McKnight at Motor City Sound Board, performed with saxophonist Dave McMurray and bassist Don Was during the Concert of Colors, and sang at national music festivals.
While Damil doesn’t typecast herself as just a jazz vocalist, the genre is a part of her identity as an artist. But she’s working toward being regarded as a vocalist who can navigate any music genre with equal aplomb.
“I love God, but I also love singing at the clubs.”
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“I thought I needed to get away from jazz,” Damil says. “But then again, when you’re called to do certain things, it keeps returning. And jazz is very near and dear to my heart. It allows a lot of space for creativity and is very reactive because I can throw things at the musicians I’m on stage with, and they can throw something back.”
Gospel is also an important part of Damil’s musical DNA. She grew up in the church as a preacher’s kid, singing in the choir. Her father is also a gospel pianist and minister at his church. She admits it was hard navigating both the spiritual and secular worlds.
“I felt like I was always tiptoeing around both,” she says. “I couldn’t let the church people know where I was, and the people at the club may or may not come to church. It was a conflict of interest, so I grew up having difficulty defining who I was. I love God, but I also love singing at the clubs.”
She also felt judgment from her father, although he was part of the religious and jazz worlds himself.
“I would get a double standard from my dad because he would say, ‘You can’t wear things like this because if the church people come here to see you, what will they think?’ But then also it’s like, you had me performing in these clubs with you.”
This spiritual conflict led Damil to focus her music on empowering women to live out their true selves and not let them feel restricted on what they can do personally and professionally.
Damil is currently taking her career beyond her hometown onto a national level. For starters, she organized the Manifest Tour this year, which took her to places like Chicago and Columbus, performing her original music. She ends the tour this weekend with back-to-back performances at the new Miss Eva’s Detroit club in North Rosedale Park.
Next year, Damil plans to release her second project in the hopes of putting out new music consistently.
“That’s something that I was struggling with before,” she says. “But now, figuring out how to define myself and what kind of music I want to make, I’m like, I don’t care. You’re going to get the music — and at the end of the day, people have been asking for the music.”
Isis Damil will be performing at Miss Eva’s Detroit at 7 p.m. on Friday, Dec. 6 and Saturday, Dec. 7; 19566 Grand River Ave., Detroit. Tickets are $40-$70 and available from isisdamil.com.
