Episodes

  • Season 3, Episode 7: Last Dream Home
    May 19 2026

    In this final episode of Season 3, I reflect on endings, beginnings, and the mystery of what it means to let go.

    Through story, song, and remembrance, I share the journey behind Last Dream Home — a song born from love, fear, grief, and the quiet unfolding of acceptance. Together, we sit with the unknown, with the tenderness of goodbye, and with the hope that peace may meet us on the other side of sorrow.

    Thank you for walking with me through this season of Great Grief. It has truly been a joy to be in community with you.

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    10 mins
  • Season 3, Episode 6: Love and Kindness Tea
    Apr 14 2026

    In this episode, I share a reflection from my book Beneath the Skin of Sorrow—a poetic “recipe” for caring for ourselves in the midst of grief. Loving Kindness Tea invites us to slow down, breathe deeply, and return to gratitude, silence, and love.

    Through story, meditation, and a touch of ritual, we explore how healing can live in small, intentional moments—and how we can begin to live greatly through grief.

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    7 mins
  • Season 3, Episode 5: Window Woman
    Mar 31 2026

    After my husband’s passing, I found myself searching for language that could hold both my grief and my continued capacity to love. Then, a stranger offered me a new way of seeing.

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    10 mins
  • Season 3, Episode 4: Encore
    Mar 17 2026

    In this episode, I reflect on the idea of an encore—that unexpected moment when you are called back to the stage.

    As a young jazz singer on my first European tour, I experienced my first encore and discovered something powerful: the space between what we plan and what we are asked to give in the moment is where the real magic lives. Through story, music, and reflection, I explore how that lesson returned to me years later through grief. Sometimes grief calls us back to the stage of our lives when we feel unprepared, uncertain, and afraid. Yet in those moments, we are invited to trust, to improvise, and to find healing in the unexpected.


    If this episode resonates with you, I invite you to subscribe to Great Grief Podcast, and to join my community as the season unfolds. New episodes are released bi-weekly!

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    7 mins
  • Season 3, Episode 3: What's Love Got to Do With It?
    Mar 3 2026

    Valentine’s Day can stir many things — joy, memory, longing, even sorrow. Not everyone greets it with candy and flowers. So instead of wishing you a happy Valentine’s Day, I offer you something else: a love bouquet from my heart to yours.

    Recorded live at Moorhead Manor on Valentine’s Day, this episode reflects on love through the lens of loss. What is this thing called love? What happens when grief reshapes it? When marriage, partnership, and shared life change form? When the question stops being theoretical and becomes deeply personal?

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    56 mins
  • Season 3, Episode 2: A Meditation on Loss
    Feb 17 2026

    Welcome to Season 3 of Great Grief.

    In this episode, I sit with the word “loss.” What does it mean to lose something? A bag. A job. A sense of direction. A beloved. What does it mean to feel lost yourself?

    Through meditation, storytelling, and song, I explore the difference between something being gone and something being changed. I reflect on grief as a landscape—where the map no longer matches the terrain, where you show up but feel estranged from your own life.

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    10 mins
  • Season 3, Episode 1: My Grandmother Perry
    Feb 3 2026

    Welcome to Season 3 of Great Grief!

    This season I’m listening closely—to stories, songs, and the quiet places where grief lives beneath the surface. In this opening episode, I share ancestral stories of my grandmother and great-grandmother, reflecting on grief, memory, and lineage. Through music, storytelling, and poetry, I explore grief not as something to fix, but as a journey—one that can be honored, felt, breathed with, and sometimes sung through. This season holds a culturally wide lens and a feminine gaze, creating space where sorrow and joy can coexist. If this episode resonates with you, I invite you to subscribe and join my community as the season unfolds. New episodes are released bi-weekly. What has grief taught you about listening? Share in the comments.

    Website - http://nnenna.com/ Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/nnennafreelon/ Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/pages/Nnenna-Freelon/32336396896 Twitter - https://twitter.com/OfficialNnenna Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/artist/4WkgNR9kn136k50T4pc7RS

    #GreatGrief #NnennaFreelon #LiveGreatlyThroughGrief #GriefJourney #GriefAndHealing #MusicAndGrief #StorytellingAsHealing #AncestralMemory #GreatGrief #GreatGriefPodcast #GriefAndHealing

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    13 mins
  • Holiday: Home is Where our Spirits Reside
    Dec 16 2025

    December has been calling all year long. This holiday offering from Great Grief is an invitation to pause, to listen, and to remember what the heart craves — belonging, rest, and communion with spirit. Featuring a summer moment of joy and reverence with Paperhand Puppet Intervention, this piece honors our oldest ancestors and calls to our beloveds on both sides of the veil.

    Every goodbye ain’t gone.

    🎧 Season 3 of Great Grief returns weekly beginning January 13, 2026.

    Great Grief is a podcast about living greatly through grief and is available everywhere you get your podcasts.

    Special thanks to Naima Harrell, Andrew Berinson, Donovan Zimmerman, and Larkin Consulting.

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    10 mins