PaviElle French is a two-time Emmy Award-winning, interdisciplinary artist/educator, hailing from Rondo – a historically Black neighborhood in St. Paul, Minnesota. She is known for her powerhouse vocals and performing with an equally powerful 6-piece band. She is a 2023 Mark Award for Social Justice/Impact Track of the Year, “Redemption,” a Macdowell Artist Fellow (2024-25); Jerome Hill Artist Fellow (21-23); a McKnight Artist Fellow(2020); and has received a, Sage Award for Dance and Choreography (2016). 

She was a First Year Global Artists Initiative, Artist in Residence, at MacPhail Center for The Arts (2021); an American Composers Forum Grant recipient for her classical composition, A Requiem for Zula (2018), written in celebration of her Mother’s life. PaviElle’s symphonies have been featured at both the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and New World Symphony in 2021, under the direction of Conductor Edwin Outwater, and Artistic Director, Michael Tilson Thomas. She has performed locally and nationally and has graced such stages as First Avenue; Ordway Center; and The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts (Arts Across America Series). 

PaviElle was voted as Minneapolis City Pages “Best R&B Vocalist of 2015”; her band was named one of First Avenue’s Best New Bands of (2015), and were a featured on both, TPT/PBS “Lowertown Line,” (2017); and MN Original (2018). Growing up in a family steeped in music she says that she ‘wants to make music that honors and represents the Black Arts aesthetic.’ 

PaviElle honed her craft as a young Artist at: Penumbra Theatre (1999-); Steppingstone Theatre (1997-99); and with the collective EduPoetic Enterbrainment (2000-04). She is a Pillsbury House Naked Stages Grant Recipient (2014); and was a part of the Ensemble Cast of Sharon Bridgforth’s dat Black Mermaid Man Lady – the show (2018)  She has been seen in multiple productions of Black Nativity, at Penumbra Theatre, most recently in 2022. She was also featured on Garrett McQueen’s popular podcast, Trilloquy, in 2021.

PaviElle self-produced an album called, SOVEREIGN, in response to the racial upheaval, and pandemic, beginning in 2020. And she has produced a companion documentary called, I AM SOVEREIGN, filmed by Peter Myers, released in August 2022. She has also launched a Twin Cities Community-based Residency through the American Composers Forum, funded by the NEA, entitled: Liberation! Uplifting Our Youth. 

She was commissioned by The Schubert Club to write, The SOVEREIGN Suite, a continuation of her evolving SOVEREIGN Series, performed in May of 2022. And she was commissioned by the Sands Family, to create a symphony in honor of their 50th Anniversary. Sands Of Time, premiered by The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, in June 2022. PaviElle just finished her third year of both her ACF Residency, and Jerome Artist Fellowship, in 2024. And in December 2024-January 2025, completed her residency as a MacDowell Fellow, where her work sits in the illustrious James Baldwin Library. 

PaviElle released The SOVEREIGN Suite Video filmed by Peter Myers, as well as a Soundtrack in 2023. Presently she just finished working with fellow collaborators, Laura Krider, Dr. Shekela Wanyama, and Natalia Romero Arbeláez, to create and write an all-ages set of curricula, and workshops, based on her work through her SOVEREIGN Series, and work on her 2022-24 ACF Residency. The Curriculum was released to the public on August 24th, 2025. 

Awards and Fellowships

• Emmy Award [Making Music History Documentary] (2025)
• Edward R. MacDowell Artist Fellow (2024-25) 
• Mark Award for Songwriting (2023)
• American Composers Forum, Artist in Residence (2021-24) 
• Jerome Hill Artist Fellow (2021-22) 
• MacPhail Centre for Music’s Global Artist Initiative: Artist In Residence (2021-22)
• McKnight Artist Fellow (2020)
• Received first Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra Commission for A Requiem for Zula (2019)
• Sage Cowles Award for Dance and Choreography (2018) 
• Exceptional Ensemble Performance, MN Theater Awards: dat Black Mermaid Man Lady / The Show by Sharon Bridgforth (2018) 
• PaviElle French Presents: Ovarian Fortitude, a One Woman Show at Intermedia Arts (2017)
• City Pages “Best Of”: Best R&B Singer of the Year (2017)
• Penumbra Theatre’s Black Nativity (2016; 2017; 2021) 
• First Avenue’s Best New Bands: PaviElle (2015)
• Pillsbury House Naked Stages Awardee, Playwright, Performer: Runnin’ (2014) 
• Emmy Award [Lowertown Line Documentary] (2014)

Notable Works and Projects

• City Cast Twin Cities (2025-): Podcast Correspondent & Reporter.
• Legendary Path Makers (2025-2026): Current documentary project/filming envisioned, directed and hosted by PaviElle French, in collaboration with MNHS. This piece focuses on PaviElle’s life as a young artist and learning about the artists who were PaviElle’s teachers and mentors, to preserve history and to shine a light on our best and brightest performers in Minnesota. 
• Minnesota Historical Society’s (MNHS) “Making Music History,” Documentary (2025): Host and Narrator.
• The SOVEREIGN Curriculum (2025): A curriculum developed with Dr. Shekela Wanyama, Natalia Romero Arbeláez, and Laura Krider, based on her residency work with the American Composers Forum.
• The SOVEREIGN Suite (2022): A composition commissioned by the Schubert Club.
• Joyful Echoes, Live at Minnesota Orchestra (2021): A Christmas play written by PaviElle French, and writer, Kevin Kling, reminiscing on their childhood memories. PaviElle was commissioned by MNO to write the orchestral piece, The Gift for Voice and Orchestra, to be the theme song for the piece. 
• Sands of time (2021): A chamber orchestra piece, commissioned by The Sands Family and The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. 
• PBS Minnesota Original Series, Season 10, Episode 3(2019): PaviElle French
• SOVEREIGN SERIES (2020-): PaviElle’s self-produced albums, and documentaries including: SOVEREIGN (2020); I AM SOVEREIGN Documentary Film (2021); SOVEREIGN Suite (2022); The SOVEREIGN Suite Film (2023); The SOVEREIGN Curriculum (written 2024, released 2025); SOVEREIGN: Aligned The Mixtape (2025).
• A Requiem for Zula (2018): An orchestral song cycle celebrating her mother, commissioned and world-premiered by The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra.
• Fear Not (2014): PaviElle’s Debut Album. 
• PBS Lowertown Line Series, Episode 3 (2013): PaviElle

Early Artistic Training and Background

PaviElle began her solo career in 2005, releasing her first ever musical offering to the world, Letting Go, in 2004. 

Origin: Hails from the historic Rondo Neighborhood in Saint Paul, MN. 

Age 5: Began her artistry in 1989 with Mary Haffner at Maxfield School & Pilgrim Baptist Church, Saint Paul, MN. 

Artist and activist family: 

Originates from a family with a strong artistic and activist background. 

Grew up at the prestigious Penumbra Theatre, was trained by Broadway Actors, Signers, Dancers, and Musicians. 

Institutions: Studied at Walker West Music Academy, Mississippi Creative Arts, Steppingstone Theater (1997-98), and Penumbra Theater (1998-2018).

Training: Trained in acting, dance, vocals, piano, and saxophone.

Performance: Was trained by members of The Sounds of Blackness (Patty Lacy, and Libby Turner), and was a soloist in famed gospel musician, Robert Robinson’s City Songs (1992-1994).

As a teenager, she was in the band and collective, EduPoetic Enterbrainment (2000-2005), touring all over the country, and Canada.

For bookings and inquiries, contact [email protected].