It has been six years since the GRAMMY-nominated artist Somi Kakoma released a collection of original songs, as she spent that time immersed in theater and multidisciplinary performance. Now returning to her first love, songwriting/singing, she looks inward on the lush What Does It Take to Bloom?, a multitiered effort rooted in jazz, Ghana-based highlife, and theatrical grandeur. These mixes of artistic and poetic are where Somi works best on What Does It Take to Bloom? A late album highlight, “We’re All Falling”, mixes piano and percussion with Somi’s grace-filled vocals as she confronts loss and change in affecting fashion. While editing some of the more wandering efforts would tighten the overall album, that searching sense is also core to Somi’s songs on What Does It Take to Bloom?