[3] Due to spending the summers of her childhood with her mother's family on St. Helena Island, South Carolina Tamar-kali developed a deep appreciation for her Gullah roots, a mixture of Indigenous Southern U.S. and West African customs and languages.
It was a resource and had a lot to do with my development...Being rooted in Gullah culture and having that identity allowed me as a child, a black girl in America, growing up in Brooklyn, I didn't feel like I sprouted out of this concrete.
[1] Her musical inspirations include PJ Harvey, Grace Jones, The Mars Volta, Deftones, Betty Davis, Patti Smith, Archie Bell and the Drells, Ray, Goodman and Brown, Crown Heights Affair, Prince and Quicksand.
[8][9][10][11] After fronting the band Song of Seven with men, Tamar-kali teamed up with three other Black women to organize a series of shows known as Sista Grrrl Riots.
[18] She has also shared the stage with Dub War, Joi, Carl Hancock Rux, Cassandra Wilson, Saul Williams, The Dirtbombs, Jean Grae and Earl Greyhound.
Tamar-kali has performed in such venues as Brooklyn Academy of Music and Lincoln Center, sometimes paying tribute to Nina Simone, Betty Davis and Odetta.
Tamar-kali was the Musical Director for the Black Rock Coalition's Tribute to Nina Simone which held concerts in New York City (2003, 2009 and 2010) as well as Paris and the South of France (2009).
[21] In 2006 Tamar-kali released her first music video for the single "Boot" off her debut EP Geechee Goddess Hardcore Warrior Soul.
Her "masterful guitar playing" combined with various types of self-representation in the video suggested "multiple possibilities of women's gender performance.
[2] In 2018, Tamar-kali created the multi-disciplinary project Demon Fruit Blues for Harlem Stage WaterWorks, during a residency at Mabou Mines in New York City where the work premiered.
[26] In 2021, Shirley received a SCL Award nomination from the Society of Composers & Lyricists for Outstanding Original Score for an Independent Film.