When Jessye DeSilva received a letter from the State Department requesting proof of citizenship and her “biological sex at birth,” she felt “as though [she] broke.”
Earlier in this year, the Boston folk artist had filed to change the gender marking on her passport to reflect her identity as a trans woman. But in February, instead of receiving her passport back in the mail, she found a letter stating that the government would hold her (still valid) passport until she provided the aforementioned documentation.
“I couldn’t go to work,” she tells Vanyaland. “I pulled out of a tour I’d planned to join with my good friend and collaborator Aaron Lee Tasjan, both because I felt so emotionally fragile and because I began to wonder what being on the road in the midwest and the South might look like for me in terms of something as simple as using public restrooms. I was crushed to back out of something that meant so much to me, but I needed the space to let myself fall apart.”
This Friday at Passim, when DeSilva and her peers perform for a special “Singing For Trans Rights” showcase, she’ll put some of the pieces back together while surrounded by the Boston music community. The event, which will feature sets from DeSilva, Almost Olive, Darlingside member Don Mitchell, and Hawk In The Nest, is a benefit for the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition (MTPC).
The benefit is the creation of Hawk In The Nest — a.k.a. Boston artist Avi Jacob — and will be held during the same week as Transgender Day of Visibility. Friday’s event also follows five executive orders aimed at disempowering and erasing trans Americans, including an attempt to ban trans women and girls from women’s sports, and a ban on transgender Americans from serving in the United States military under the guise of “military excellence and readiness.”
Another executive order states that the U.S. only recognizes two sexes and that they are “not changeable” — the very issue that’s currently preventing DeSilva from access to her own valid passport. Amidst the grim socio-political landscape, the artist says she craves “the kind of music-making and community building that has been the focus of my career for so long.”
“One thing I’m realizing lately is that being a musical artist who performs live isn’t just about helping listeners and audiences feel seen and held in that space, but it can also be about feeling seen and held by the audience in those moments,” she shares. “Of course I want to be visible, and I want folks to hear my lyrics and perhaps find themselves in between the lines, but to be completely honest, I need that too, and right now, to raise my voice in a warm room full of love and a sense of community and justice feels both impactful to others as well as personally healing.”
As Jacob planned the event, DeSilva weighed on which organizations to consider for the benefit, and flagged the value of locally-based groups like the Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition. All proceeds from Friday’s show will go to MTPC, whose mission is to “ensure the wellbeing, safety, and lived equity of all trans, nonbinary, and gender expansive community members in Massachusetts.”
“Avi and I talked about the importance of supporting grassroots organizations that help trans folks on a more tangible, day-to-day level — many of whom face housing, food, and job insecurity, and may lack the resources and bandwidth to apply for legal name changes or state IDs and other official documents which accurately reflect their gender,” DeSilva says.
Looking beyond the event, DeSilva reflected on additional ways that allies can continue to support the trans community: Namely, taking action loudly and unabashedly.
“I have so many wonderful folks who are allies to the trans community checking in to see how I am doing personally amidst all of this, and that means so very much,” she says. “But I also want people to think beyond me or the one other trans person they may know and take initiative to speak up to each other and to representatives in government, loudly and persistently.”
DeSilva concludes: “I think right now I just want to feel like there are folks who are not just shocked and saddened by trans rights being stripped away and trans identities being erased, but folks who are moved to action. We need all the support we can get right now.”
SINGING FOR TRANS RIGHTS :: Friday, April 4 at Club Passim, 47 Palmer St. in Cambridge, MA :: 8 p.m., all ages, $25 :: Advance tickets
