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About

Imani Rousselle is a Texas-born vocalist with a love for interpreting and delivering the message of lyric. Whether covering jazz standards or contemporary compositions, her voice invites you to follow along as she fills the spaces between the silence with carefully crafted sound. Imani’s musical journey started at Concord Missionary Baptist Church in Dallas, Tx in the lambs ministry choir. As soon as children were able to speak, they were able to join the choir and this is where Imani’s love for music began. As she moved through the different church choirs, church leaders heard something powerful in her voice and she was eventually invited to join the praise team that led the choir and congregation in worship. During this time, Imani also sang in school choirs as well as the Children’s Chorus of Greater Dallas where she developed an affinity for European classical vocal music. She soon began attending the prestigious Booker T Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts and became a leader in the choir while there. It was at Booker T. that jazz educator Kent Ellingson invited Imani to sing with the school’s award winning vocal jazz ensemble and thus began her exploration of jazz as a means of personal expression. 


After graduating, Imani left Texas to attend Columbia College Chicago where she obtained her Bachelor's Degree in Voice as well as a double minor in environmental science and management. While in Chicago she was named a Luminarts Cultural Foundation Fellow. It was in Chicago where Imani met Jackson Shepard, a fellow CCC student, and soon after joined his band, Human Bloom. Human Bloom has since performed extensively and released singles and an album that have gained lots of traction in the experimental/pop-fusion listening spheres, and are set to be releasing more music later in 2025. In Chicago Imani performed at the legendary Jazz Showcase, The Green Mill, Buddy Guy's, Sleeping Village, Subterranean and others, becoming a deeply rooted part of the Chicago music scene.


Imani is currently based in New York City, having graduated the Manhattan School of Music with a master’s degree in Jazz Voice in the spring of 2021. At MSM she was under the amazing tutelage of Stefon Harris, Jean Baylor, Buster Williams, Marc Cary, Jo Lawry, Theo Bleckman, Ingrid Jenson, and Damien Sneed. Since moving to New York just a few months before the global shutdown, Imani has been able to sing on stages such as the world famous Dizzy's Jazz Club, Smalls Jazz Club, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Clements Place, The Schomburg Center in Harlem, The Joyce Theater, The Jazz Club and more. Rousselle’s talents have taken her across the globe, most recently as the feature vocalist in the tour of SW!NG OUT spearheaded by tap dance phenom Caleb Teicher, and in LaTasha Barnes’ Bessie winning production of The Jazz Continuum. She has also performed alongside great musicians including Stefon Harris, Casey Benjamin, Marc Carey, Jaleel Shaw, Cory Henry, Ben Williams, Roger Boykin, Jon Thomas, Jillian Grace, Gabby Garo, and Domo Branch. Imani is now working toward the completion of several music and interdisciplinary projects, and is excited to continue performing and sharing in a world with renewed fervor for connection and creation.

 

© 2022 Imani Rousselle Music

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