Interview with Singer X Songwriter @DimitriMcDowell

I have had the pleasure of growing up with many talented and humble individuals in my life. One especially is 20 year old music genius Dimitri McDowell from Queens, New York. We grew up and attended Camp Joharie in upstate New York and Bethel church right in Jamaica, Queens together for years and he was always been an inspiration to me! 

Recently, I've gotten a chance to rekindle our friendship and learn more about his journey in the music business. Below is my interview with Dimitri discussing his life, point of view and road to success.

Enjoy and be INSPIRED!

What's your name and birthday?

- Dimitri McDowell - December 23 1992

What/who inspired your music?

- I was young, singing and rapping was my passion and thats all I knew how to do, then I got into poetry but never was up front about it. I struggled with a terrible speech impediment since I was four, and getting teased and made fun of was second nature to me and always brought me in a depression as well as low self esteem. I began writing my feelings down in a note book when I was in 6th grade, and my principle at the time found my notebook lying around somewhere and she called me in an office and expressed that it was a beautiful feeling and she wanted me to say the poem at a christmas concert as well as dance and lip sing to a old song "Donnie McClurkin - Walking In Authority". My father started taking me to diffrent places to perform such as the Apollo, in which I won several times, McDonalds Gospelfest, Knick Poetry Slam, diffrent churches and venues. From then, I continued to write, sing, and dance and it served as a form of relief and it began to go with the emotions I have at that moment. Growing up, as I began to create more songs and poetry and perform it everywhere, I wanted to take this as a life long dream and become a mainstream artist and a songwriter, I believed I can because my music was good and I knew I can make it. A lot of people wouldnt take me serious and continue to clown my stutter but that didnt stop me. My insipration came directly from God and my close family and friends. I plan to take my parents and my family out of our situations and where we live, and bring them to a bigger and better life.  

Even ice pricked pages turn...

Usually when my friend tells me news it must be NEWS, he usually doesn't tell me useless randomness unless were in that kind of moment.

Not today ugh! He told me he is currently talking to someone...Take back the ugh, so my feelings aren't entirely put out there. Im absolutely happy, that he's happy. While texting my response back to him however, a pit grew in my stomach and I soooo wasn't feeling the text anymore. I hate those love stories (trust me not hinting at anything like that) but when they blow something off as if it doesn't hurt them and the person goes on with their life. Only if they would have told them how much they meant to them and just let them in on a portion of their feelings things would have worked out differently.

Not saying that anyone would change and I'm not currently or at all for that matter become the love of his life but feelings this way.. Is that a true friend to be sort of unrealistically happy yet cautioned and very surpised so that what I really want to say is sort of frosted over? If that made ANY sense I hope you know where I'm coming from now. I'm a REALIST, I stay positive throughout the day but prepare myself for the worst which so far has never happened. This incident hit close to home and I'm wondering.. why is my throat dry? I feel like I have to swallow a tennis ball deep in my chest and my eyes are watering and burning like cutting onions. I'm not going to cry.... oh! There you go.. just had to blink. I forget sometimes.. JOKE! Well since that situation won't resolve itself I can only depend on life's time, practice and effort and realize how many people in the world I haven't met yet that are compatible, will hurt me and ultimately make me stronger. Especially since again in two years I plan on attending Howard and then graduate school (which preferably is not a HBCU) Wait!!! Before you judge. lol I just need diversity I liked that about VOX (the teen newspaper I wrote for), I LOVE that about the world and it is my main reason for begging my mom to let me travel soon in the future (yay!) I would have went to two HBCUs by the time I graduate Howard. geeeez! What a way to climb to the top!


Part II

My Blatant Addiction
I've been reading Twilight.. Lets say since this year BEFORE the movie came out before I knew I was going to see it, but certainly not before they started producing it.... hmmm I wonder when exactly. Well anyways, I'm on the fourth book.
I don't want to force you to read the book but if you do like a book that is page-turning, bonds you to the book, the characters and the world they live in so much so that you wish the book was reality even with all the problems then this is the book for you.

If you want a book that IS better, dear I say than ALL Harry Potter Books then yes Twilight is for you. Trust, I was on team Harry before I actually read the book because The Harry Potter series was good as well and they satisfied me with only seven books (like thats not a lot!!! Hundreds if not thousands of pgs per book). They're like fairy tale bibles in a way. The two books together both authors are females, not trying to empower my sex in anyway but YES! I love it, how we as women can simplify life into pages to be easily understood by any hands it passes through. For me and my sister and whoever else read like us to not put the book down until finished, halfway through or a really good dent in the 800+ pages of the book. To not even know time was passing in human life but only in the book however fast or slow time seems to pass in the pages.

To captivate me to the point where when I finished book three of Twilight which ended on a note I didn't like to be in a mini depressed state until I bought and started reading the fourth and final book. To the point where I read the third book of Harry Potter OVER to understand the fourth one. To the point where I bribed my sister into telling me key points no matter how it fastforwarded the story because my throat was stuck, heart beating right out of my chest and my emotions taking over like a bad wave to a broken boat.

Though I wasn't the type to get read books when I was little in bed, I wouldn't mind reading books to my children (ew way to far) but for real, I am determined to write a book as addictive, heart pounding and tenaciously breath-taking as the ones I have come across in my lifetime. I still remember such books as Bad Monkey by Matt Ruff, Catalyst by Laurie Halse Anderson and even Sex, Murder and a Double Latte by Kyra Davis which my mom undecided about because of the title.

It's rather funny when I could have went in the direction of Jerome Dickey and onlyyyy Black Expression Books, I instead ventured off into the book section that was way too big for me. No pictures here or pages torn out and no more food and other questionable mysterious imprints on these pages! Just all book! I do sort of miss library books though, St. Albans Library, Queens Library the one in Elmont off Merrick Blvd, the smell of used books!!!! Aw Queens!
But back on subject. =) Because I choose the route of abnormal books or just books people wouldn't always pick up, I got the book that a year later became best selling book of the year, the gold retriever that wasn't all the way out the box yet, the treasures in the midst of trash and I was determined to be as intriguing as the minds who developed those books. ___________________ by Nicole Ayilola
With by bio on the slip of my harder cover book adorned by awards and appraisal by the New York Times and everyone else!

I will one day...


live__gold