Healed By Music

Kamaria Wilson sells new albums to pay for prestigious college

Lisa Loving of The Skanner

Ethos founder Charles Lewis jams with local folk singer Kamaria Wilson. Ethos is helping Wilson raise $10,000 for college in Boston with sales from her “Live at Ethos” CD.
Photos by Julie Keefe

When Kamaria Wilson was in elementary school, she started failing in class. By the time she reached middle school, the situation was worse.
Diagnosed with Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder, as well as Bipolar Disorder, there were times, she says, when she thought she “wouldn’t make it.”
Now an aspiring singer and songwriter recently admitted to the Berklee College of Music in Boston, Mass. — one of the top music schools in the nation — Wilson says she wants to spend her life helping others heal through music as a music therapist as well as a recording artist.
“I’ve struggled getting to where I am now,” Wilson says. “With the support of my family and my community, as well as my doctors – you know, in and out of hospitals, and at the same time writing songs, healing myself – I think that’s how I realized I need to help others through music.”
Wilson, a Grant High School graduate and music teacher at Ethos in North Portland, is selling copies of her two music CDs, an Ethos Live performance and her original song collection, “Natural Tan,” to raise funds for college costs when she moves to Boston later this summer.
She’s collecting donations through her website, SupportKamaria.com.
“I adore music and I adore singing, but music therapy is something that’s very important,” she says. “The reason I got here is that people believed in me and I believed in myself.”
Wilson says she is blessed by a broad-based community of supporters, but that two people in particular have helped shape and change her life: her mother Shafia Monroe, founder of the International Center for Traditional Childbearing, and Ethos founder Charles Lewis.
“My mom – very inspiring—has taught me pretty much everything I know when it comes to believing in yourself and believing in a dream and working hard for it,” she said.
Lewis was Wilson’s first music teacher, coaching her through her very first guitar chords. “He taught me ‘Louie, Louie,’ which is the same song I teach my students,” she said.
Lewis says Wilson has been a wonderful turning point for the music center as well, which is why Ethos has pitched in to help her raise funds for college.
“With Kamaria in general, music’s been a passion for her, and she has dedicated a lot of time to becoming an even better musician ever since her first lessons at Ethos,” he said. “The Berklee School of Music is one of the best schools for music in the country, and so for us it’s really cool to have had her as one of our first students, really introduce her to music, and then give her a base from which to launch off on this great undertaking, by going off to study music.”
Wilson’s goal is to bring in $10,000, one third the cost of annual tuition at Berklee. Contributions can be made, and CDs can be purchased, through her website, www.SupportKamaria.com.