Ricardo Arjona, a Guatemalan singer-songwriter, once said, “Songs are born in absolute solitude, but they find accomplices.” The ten tracks of this album have found a perfect accomplice in Kelly Montijo Fink, an Apache storyteller, a teacher, a healer of communities, a singer of songs meant to inspire and encourage, a bringer of peace, an agitator. In this “mixed-greens-salad,” bare-bones, stripped-down, clean, acoustic folk-rock-country compilation with her son Gabe on the acoustic guitar and Craig Erickson on the electric guitar, Kelly Montijo Fink delivers beautiful messages of perseverance, peace, and hope.

Raised in rural southwest California, singing since she first remembers herself, Kelly has never strayed from her Apache heritage. She has been actively involved in the life of Native communities, writing and performing music, speaking at events, working with organizations focusing on the issues of Native American communities. Kelly’s creative contributions were recognized with a Native American Music Award (NAMA or “Nammy”) in 2014 for her album, Don’t Let Me Forget, and in 2011 as a co-producer and featured artist of all-female native artist compilation, The Color of Hope.

I Won’t Stop Contending, Kelly’s fourth album, is a perfect circle structurally. It begins and ends with empowering, get-up-and-do-something! compositions (Rising Up, Agitators), with some sweetness (Peace, Pieces Together), some sadness (Rio, Song to Save Your Life), and some Jesus (but not the in-your-face kind) sprinkled in between (Crazy Amazing, Knee Deep, Righteousness of God, I Won’t Stop Contending). It will take you through a range of emotions and leave you smiling. 

The album opener, “Rising Up,” is a dedication to strong women defying limitations and laughing when someone tells them, “Don’t be a fighter / Don’t rock the boat;” the “inconvenient” and “difficult” ones who refuse to compromise their integrity and are willing to take a stand. The singer joins them and leads them in their rebellion against conformity: “And sing like you mean it / Let these words declare your freedom / Cause you’re rising up / You’re rising up.”

One day in 1997, Kelly’s younger cousin Rio, who was sixteen at the time, came home from school with his friends. The boys were playing around, and at some point, one of them got ahold of the family handgun lying on the table. The gun went off. Rio died in the hospital a few days later. Shortly before the accident, Rio had registered as an organ donor, and his heart was transplanted into a man who turned out to be a custom guitar-maker. To express his gratitude, the man crafted a beautiful guitar for the boy’s father, and named it “Rio’s Heart.” The song “Rio” is about grieving the loss of a loved one who was taken before their time, about turning to faith to cope, and about the hope that still remains as the circle of life continues. “And now your heart beats on / In this guitar I strum.”

“Pieces Together” describes how Kelly sees the purpose of her life: “I was born for this / To play with rhymes and riffs / I’d love to put the pieces together / I look for heaven’s songs / So I can pass them on.” She believes that creative process, organizing the chaos of thoughts and music notes, creating songs from bits and pieces, and putting them together, is similar to what we do in life, piecing it together one step at a time. In the song, she is talking to the higher powers, “Lover of all people, giver of life / Healer of the one who cries in the night,” asking them to show her “things unknown and stories untold / Whisper heaven’s secrets, let them unfold.” The ultimate conclusion is, again, relentless hope, and having an unshakable certainty that everything will work out.

The closing composition, “Agitators,” inspired by the life of the singer’s late friend Mark, is dedicated “To the unsung heroes of this world / To those who do it cause they should… “freedom fighters,” “dragon slayers,” “injustice haters.” They “do what must be done / When others turn away and run.” The song, dynamic, with a rocky flow (just asking for a full-band rendition!), is a warning, “Don’t try to stop these double-trouble troublemakers / Darkness-shakers, destiny-makers / Won’t be daunted these warrior crusaders.” The world needs more people like that and more songs like this: people who won’t stop contending and songs that bring healing, inspiration, and encouragement.

The album was released on October 9, 2019 and can be purchased at:

https://www.kellymontijofink.com/

https://store.cdbaby.com/cd/kellymontijofink5

Kelly Montijo Fink:

https://www.facebook.com/Kelly-Montijo-Fink-224741420939844/

https://www.kellymontijofink.com

Photos by Sofia Chesney; courtesy Kelly Montijo Fink

https://www.instagram.com/sofiachesneymusicphoto/