Up-and-coming soul singer PaviElle French will perform as part of this season's Naked Stages program at Pillsbury House Theatre.

In her one-women performance piece, Runnin’, PaviElle uses song and storytelling to discuss her life growing up in St. Paul's historic Rondo neighborhood. Her playwriting debut, Runnin' is part of a series of plays she is writing to “release her life’s demons and get free," according to a press release from Pillsbury House.

PaviElle's music career has taken off this year. She released her first studio album, Fear Not, with a show at Icehouse in September. "There wasn’t a way in the world that I wasn’t going to become a musician,” she told Andrea Swensson in a January interview. “I was raised very old school. I listened to everything from Ma Rainey to Bessie Smith to Lena Horne, Led Zeppelin, and Pink Floyd.” She said her new album — much like her performance piece — pays tribute to the traditions instilled in her childhood.

Naked Stages is a seven-month mentoring program for performing artists, offering career development and feedback sessions that build to a series of performances. PaviElle, interdisciplinary artist Eric F. Avery and B-Boy and actor B Billy Xiong are the program's three fellows this year.

PaviElle will perform Runnin' Thursdays through Saturdays at 7:30 p.m. from Dec. 11 – 20 at Pillsbury House Theatre. Tickets are $16 or pay-what-you-want.

Hailey Colwell is a journalism major at the University of Minnesota and a co-director of Theatre Corrobora.