“Black women 
invented rock and roll!” – Those were the words of the gorgeous singer with the soulful eyes, born not too long ago in San Fernando, Trinidad.
“Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Bessie Smith, Tina Turner, they started this” she told me in a very looses but calculated fashion during our recent casual conversation at an undisclosed located downtown where she was putting the finishing touches and mixing her latest single, “Desire”.
Her words are actually not at all self-serving or outragous in any sense of the word. Sister Rosetta Tharpe, a gospel singer who played electric guitar born in 1915 in Cotton Plant, Arkansas presented sacred music in the most unorthodox way.
Achieving her greatest popularity in the 30’s and 40’s, She would have a tremendous impact and influence on Little Richard, the self proclaimed “King and Queen of Rock And Roll”.
Richard’s hight-pitched shrieks and blurred sexuality were all influenced by Tharpe, whose own sexuality was ambiguous at best.
Rewind back to Lei’s childhood, it wasn’t without interesting anecdotes as well.
Born Lesha Pretli in the southwestern region of Trinidad, her father would have a major inpact on the non-conformist way that she governed and continues to govern her life until this very day.
Her dad, who for a lack of a better word lived a somewhat “fast” lifestyle previous, decided that he wanted something different for his family.
A deeply religious but open man, he moved his family to the more Central part of the island in Indian Trail Village, Couva where he raised his family in the mountains with no electricity and more than anything, no “worldy music”.
However, music would not go entirely unheard by the young Lei as neighbours and cousins nearby would sometimes blast the sounds of the latest pop tunes.
Lei decribes this somewhat esotheric upbringing by her dad as a “spiritual journey”.
“He kept us from material things and worldly things so we could really find ourselves.”
Lei would live like this until she was 15 never feeling like she was missibng anything. ” I ran around the forrest and picked sugar cane and ate it. It was such an adventure”.
Somehow a cultural contingency organized by the Trinidadian government was where she found herself. She would come to North America, including Montreal speading the history of Trinidad’s African musical roots where she would do the music of a Ella Handell, a Trini songstress that Lei’s describes as a musical god-mother.
“I felt like I was being conditioned for this even though I grew up like that. In school my teachers, everybody knew how I sang and they ecouraged me. My mom specifically was the one who took on the stress of putting me out there”, she laughed.
Lei eventually herself as a singer on the international cruise circuit all over the world, saling to places like Hong Kong and even getting the career advice from Jennifer Lopez who was onboard travelling with then husband Marc Anthony.
“Oh my gosh, they put the fear of this industry in me”
she laughed hysterically. They said, you better be ready for this. They said, your life is not going tio be your own. You belong to the public basically”.
After a period of doing Tina Turner tribute shows, where the energy that she summons of the recently deceased rock legend in uncanny, she’s now preparing her own vision for the music world. Now living is Sainte-Basile-le- Grand on the south shore of Montreal, she’s been through a fe bands with a brand new one who delivered an incredible recent set at Piranha Bar on Sainte-Catherine St, she’s now putting on the finishing touches of her new e.p. “Kepher” , a heavy hard rock album that almost flirts with metal.
“Kepher”, like it’s first single “Desire” is full of salvation and redemption which walks like the line between fear and courage, good and evil and God and the devil.
“Kepher”, Lei descibes as “the highest version of consciousness and your highest self.
“Kepher” comes out at the end of the fall.
