Solange released her brilliant new album A Seat at the Table last week. In a documentary called A Seat at the Table, Beginning Stages, she shares footage of the creation of the album. Watch it below. Solange says the film is “a look at the early days of jam sessions, experimentation, and the exploring of sounds and ideas for the album.” It shows Solange working on early versions of “Don’t Touch My Hair,” “Mad,” “Don’t You Wait,” “Where Do We Go,” and more. Sampha, Kwes, Kindness, Sean Nicholas Savage, Patrick Wimberly, Solange’s son Julez, and more make appearances. Find a statement from Solange about the film.

“A Seat At The Table, Beginning Stages” is a look at the early days of jam sessions, experimentation, and the exploring of sounds and ideas for the album.

While some of the jam sessions featured did not make the album, they helped to create and identify the sonic tone, and the early lyrics and concepts I wrote for the project.

This video is broken up into 3 different parts. The first and second parts happened in Long Island and New Orleans where I first started to jam and collaborate on ideas with the incredible artists and musicians featured (as well as some other incredible artist and musicians who are not shown here). A lot of these days would just start with me singing a melody or someone playing a synth part or bass line, and would transition into an hour long jam.

The third part is me taking all of these jams to New Iberia, LA with just my engineers and creating the actual song structures, building the sounds, and writing the lyrics and melodies.

I later took these songs to Los Angeles to work with Raphael Saadiq to help amplify the production, as well as record the vocals alongside Troy Johnson. When I look back at the beginning stages, I remember the powerful energy that set the tone, and that I’m so grateful followed us everywhere during the creation of this record.