Jamila Woods

Jamila Woods is an American singer, songwriter, and poet from Chicago whose work blends soul, R&B, and spoken-word poetry into a sound rooted in Black identity, community, and healing. Before releasing music under her own name, she was known for her collaborations with fellow Chicago artists, lending her voice to Chance the Rapper and The Social Experiment tracks such as «Sunday Candy» and «Blessings», and appearing on Macklemore and Ryan Lewis’s «White Privilege II».

Her 2016 debut album HEAVN established her as a distinctive voice in socially conscious soul music, pairing warm, minimalist production with lyrics that address police violence, self-love, and Black womanhood, featuring guests like Chance the Rapper and Noname. She followed it with LEGACY! LEGACY! (2019), an album structured around tributes to Black and Brown artists and thinkers, and Water Made Us (2023).

Woods is also known for her poetry and her work as an educator through Young Chicago Authors, and her music consistently threads together personal narrative with broader themes of race, place, and community, positioning her at the intersection of alternative R&B and literary songwriting.