PSU’s Grammy nominee: ‘With representation comes pressure’

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — Coty Raven Morris has only been in Portland for 3 years as an assistant professor at Portland State University. But her innovative teaching methods caught the eyes of the recording industry, earning her a Grammy nomination for the Music Educator Award.

Morris, the Hinckley Assistant Professor of choir, music education and social justice at PSU, is only in her mid-30s. But she’s already conducting choirs across the US.

“I walk in the room and the first thing I say when I take my hair and put it in my poof, my little ‘fro is, ‘I am the following names, or you can call me Queen Morris.'”

She said the students always choose ‘Queen,’ adding it’s an excellent fit because she only teaches royalty.

“I established that not only are we all royalty in the space, but true royalty knows that my kingdom is not diminished by your success.”

She said she’s proud of her work but initially struggled with the recognition.

“It had to do with imposter syndrome,” she told KOIN 6 News. She said she had to “sit with the reality that you are a Black woman, in education, in her mid 30s nominated for a Grammy. And I just shuddered, honestly, underneath the pressure. The other thing about representation is the pressure that it comes with.”

Though she didn’t win the Grammy, Morris helped secure a grant for PSU.

“All of this, and this honor to share, is not only a representation of excellence, and what young Black women, what young people of color, what people can be, but it’s reminder that we are fostered in the chiseling,” she said. “And that it’s our duty to help chisel and sharpen and not to stab at harm.”

Coty Raven Morris was born in Louisiana and raised in Texas. She didn’t really know where Portland was when she took the job in 2021 — and her family sent videos of the night Black Lives Matter protests in 2020.

“When I got to Portland for the interview, let alone to move, I felt the pain in the city,” she said. “I had to get really uncomfortable. I had to wake up to some different things that I was seeing in academia, that I was seeing in our world. And I could be still and complain about it or I could be the thing that moves.”

Move she did.

Beyond teaching, she founded Being Human Together (BHT), which aims to use music to help connect communities and further conversations about mental health, systemic oppression and other challenging topics.

“Here at Portland State, Being Human Together has three branches; community, neighbors, and youth. It’s with our neighbors’ initiative that we are working on a houseless choir, in collaboration with Street Roots.”

She’s experienced homelessness. Morris said she earned the first half of her undergraduate degree while sleeping in her car and she knows the potential power music has to help heal vulnerable communities.

“We don’t celebrate to block out darkness. We celebrate so that we will remember what joy feels like, especially in darkness. Because the weeds of the garden want to choke all the roses, and this is the Rose City, so we must be gardeners of our emotions, gardeners of this community together.”

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