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This episode features our conversation with Johnisha Matthews Levi, which was live-streamed on September 27, 2026.

Born and raised in Washington, DC, Johnisha Matthews Levi brings a critical eye to her writing based on her experiences as a development professional for social impact nonprofits, a former litigation attorney, and a culinarian. She graduated from Harvard University, New York University School of Law, and Johnson & Wales University. Her writing has appeared in Yes! Media, Wildsam, the kitchn, and Northern Virginia Magazine. Her first book, Number's Up: Cracking the Code of an American Family (University Press of Kentucky, 2025), is a finalist for the 2026 Tennessee Book Award for Nonfiction. She lives in Nashville.

During this episode, we chatted about her debut book, Numbers Up.

Levi's stirring memoir centers on her brilliant but troubled father, a Black World War II radioman who, facing economic barriers after his naval service, reinvents himself as a "numbers man" for an underground gambling operation. The job enables John Matthews to provide for his loved ones and to achieve a level of success far beyond his childhood dreams in the impoverished Jim Crow South. In the process, he becomes an indirect target of law enforcement.

By examining the circumstances of her father's incarceration, Levi explores how multiple generations of the Matthews family have been haunted by the specter of violence against Black people. Number's Up offers a unique but quintessentially American story of survival through ingenuity as it asks: Is forgiveness the sole means of moving forward?

To learn more about Johnisha and her work, please visit johnishamatthewslevi.com.

Purchase your copy of Numbers Up from our Bookshop.

Find Johnisha on Instagram: @johnishamatthewslevi

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A companion podcast to our award-winning series, Black Writers Read, Recasting the Culture highlights the work of BIPOC innovators and other co-conspirators, offering an inside look into the practice and process of writers, musicians, visual artists, curators, community leaders, and educators whose work challenges conventions, re/defines culture, and promotes social transformation.

This episode features my conversation with Latin Grammy-nominated Brazilian jazz musician, saxophonist, and composer, Felipe Salles.

A native of São Paulo, Brazil, Felipe Salles has been an active musician in the US since 1995. He is a recipient of a 2018 Guggenheim Foundation Composition Fellowship, a 2021 South Arts Jazz Road Creative Residency Grant Fellowship recipient, a 2015 and 2023 NALAC Fund for the Arts Grant winner, a 2009-2010 winner of the French American Jazz Exchange Grant, and a 2005-2006 winner of the Chamber Music America New Works: Creation and Presentation Grant Program, grants sponsored by The Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. He was awarded First Place in the 2001 Concurso SGAE de Jazz "TETE MONTOLIU", 2001, with his composition The Return of The Chromo Sapiens.

Salles has released twelve critically acclaimed recordings as a leader.

His newest recording, Camera Obscura, featuring his quartet, a string quartet and a woodwind sextet, was released on the Tapestry label on June 6, 2025 to critical acclaim. A Deriva (Adrift translated in English), which is featured on A Deriva, is nominated for a 2026 Latin Grammy for Best Arranging.

Felipe Salles has a Master’s and a Graduate Diploma in Jazz Performance from New England Conservatory, and a Doctorate in Jazz Arts Advancement from Manhattan School of Music. He is a Professor of Jazz and African American Music Studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where he has taught since 2010.

To learn more about Dr. Salles’ expansive body of work, please visit sallesjazz.com.

Watch The New Immigrant Experience on YouTube

Hear the Latin Grammy-nominated song for Best Arranging, A Deriva (Adrift)

Watch "Using Poetry to Inspire Composition" - hear Felipe talk about writing music for A Deriva

Find Felipe Salles on Instagram: @sallesjazz

Find Black Writers Read on Instagram: @blackwritersread

Find Black Writers Read online: https://blackwritersread.com/

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This episode features our conversation with Desiree Cooper, which was live-streamed on September 8, 2026.

Desiree Cooper is a 2015 Kresge Artist Fellow, Pulitzer Prize-nominated journalist, former attorney, and editor of the groundbreaking 2026 anthology, Black Summers: Growing up in the Urban Outdoors. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, Oprah Daily, MSNBC Daily, Flash Fiction America 2023, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Rumpus, River Teeth, and noted in The Best American Essays 2019. Cooper is the author of the award-winning flash fiction collection, Know the Mother. Her children’s picture book, Nothing Special, is a 2023 Paterson Prizewinner and one of the New York Public Library’s “10 Best Children’s Books of 2022.”

During this episode, we talked about Black Summers: Growing Up in the Urban Outdoors (Wayne State University Press, 2026), an anthology edited by Desiree Cooper.

Remember frolicking outside during the long, jubilant days of summer? This vibrant collection invites readers to breathe deeply and return to that "carefree" season. From riding bikes with friends through the neighborhood, to hopping the ferry to Boblo Island, catching catfish along the river, dancing on warm nights to Afrobeats and jazz music, and cooling off in the Swimmobile, those sun-drenched memories were often clouded by racism for the Detroiters in this evocative anthology. These emerging and award-winning creators of all ages recount the struggles and triumphs of staking their claim to public spaces. Ranging from poetry to essay, creative nonfiction to comics, this collection blends nostalgia with struggle and resilience. Arising from the iconic city of the African American experience comes this exploration of Black joy in the urban outdoors.

To learn more about Desiree, her work and this anthology, please visit descooper.com.

Check out Desiree's last visit with us to chat about her children's book, Nothing Special.

Find Desiree on IG: @descooper

Find Black Summers on IG: @blacksummersbook

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Find Black Writers Read online: https://blackwritersread.com/

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