This 'Leaf Erikson' from Detroit explores his community and the world through music

Pyramid Elementary School, once located at 17151 Wyoming off McNichols Road, was a relatively small private institution. But it had a sizable impact on lifelong Detroiter Vernon Corey Greenleaf. 

While attending Pyramid during the mid-1980s, Greenleaf met two lifelong friends: Emmy Award-winning journalist and former Detroit Free Press sports reporter Jemele Hill; and Richard LaGrant-Roper, who is known in music circles as Dj Wise1. 

A fourth-grade social studies lesson at Pyramid also introduced Greenleaf to the Norse explorer Leif Erikson, which triggered a question from the young man who grew up near the former Cooley High School (Hubbell Avenue and Chalfonte Street) in northwest Detroit. 

“There were five to six sentences about Leif Erikson in our textbook, and what I read said he reached America about 500 years before Columbus,” the now-47-year-old Greenleaf explained as he recalled his early classroom experiences at a school that was Black-owned and staffed by Black educators. “When we had a lesson about Christopher Columbus about five or six weeks later, I’m saying to myself: ‘Why are we being taught that Christopher Columbus discovered America?’ I raised my hand to ask that question, and I was waving my hand back and forth, and then the teacher told me to put my hand down.” 

As Greenleaf tells it, by the fourth grade he already had a reputation for being that kid who regularly posed perplexing questions in class that often took more than the designated lesson period to answer. But while Greenleaf’s question was not answered that day, he says the experience only made him more curious about the world. And Greenleaf’s connection to Leif Erikson never ended, either, as witnessed by the stage name he adopted, “Leaf Erikson,” which appears next to three Detroit Music Awards that have been presented to Greenleaf since 2020 by the Detroit Music Awards Foundation (DMAF). 

“The name Leif Erikson always intrigued me, but I chose Leaf Erikson as a stage name because I wanted to explore the world through music,” said Greenleaf, who was honored in 2020 by DMAF as “Outstanding Rap MC” and again in 2022 as “Outstanding Rap Artist” and for the “Outstanding Rap Recording” garnered by the album “Moonlight Over Mt. Sinai.” 

On four consecutive evenings, beginning July 15, from his northwest Detroit home, Greenleaf — who can be heard as Leaf Erikson with Boog Brown on the single “Boog’s Groove” released July 12 — described the evolution of his musical exploration. Beginning in earnest during his early 20s, Greenleaf’s journey has most often taken place late nights and weekends, after he has had a chance to quickly recharge following demanding day work, including a finance job at a downtown Detroit office where he currently works. A host of Detroit bars and clubs with colorful names — some with and some without stages — and festivals, such as the Detroit Metro Times Blowout in Hamtramck, where Greenleaf has performed for nine consecutive years, allowed a young man from a musical family the opportunity to be a bona fide working performance artist — with a heavy emphasis on the “work” part that Greenleaf defines as "the Detroit way."  

“I would say the number of creatives in Detroit that work for themselves and work one or more additional jobs would be in the very high 90% range,” said Greenleaf, who refers to his mother, Beverli, a longtime New Bethel Baptist Church choir member, as his favorite singer and the member of his family that should have been a recording star. “For us that create music, we’re underdogs as it is. And most of us come into this business not knowing where to record or do shows, so we have to make our own way.

“We also work hard at our other jobs that allow us to do our music, because at the end of that work shift, the prize is being able to go to the studio or to go somewhere to perform live. If you work for Ford Motor Co., you’re expected to be able to do your job. And if you’re an MC, you should be able to put on a good show. And Detroit creatives take special pride in being able to excel in all of those spaces.”  

Greenleaf, who also is the proud son of Augustus Greenleaf, and younger brother to Brian Greenleaf, a music director and educator, says another proud moment occurs any time he uses his recordings to tackle community issues that concern him the most. 

For example, as Leaf Erikson, in the 2019-released album “A Canvas of Hope,” Greenleaf used tracks titled “Foreclosure,” “Gospel from the North End” and “H2o” to call attention to Detroit’s foreclosure crisis, mental health and the Flint water crisis, respectively. Then there is the track titled “Rescue Mission” on the same album that highlights the importance of making resources available to people in need. Greenleaf says he got the inspiration for the piece while he was working a previous job at DTE Energy when a woman who broke down in tears after DTE and COTS provided some basic needs for her in the same day.

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“As a creative community in the city, we have to be a reflection of the times; it has to be more than a photo op and branding,” Greenleaf, who calls himself "the common-man MC" said. “Things that go on in our community should be reflected in our work, especially if you’re screaming every chance you get that you’re from Detroit. Go back to Motown in the '60s: First, there was a lot of pop coming out; and then, later in the '60s and into the 1970s, you had Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder and even The Supremes singing about what was going on in the community and in the world. I can listen to Marvin Gaye’s 'Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler)' today and the hair on the back of my neck will still stand up.” 

The passion that could be heard in Greenleaf’s voice when he spoke about Marvin Gaye is similar to the tone that his friends have become familiar with any time Greenleaf is engaged in a spicy sports conversation. In fact, Greenleaf says his time spent as a member of the prep crew, covering high school sports for the Detroit Free Press’ sports department many years before his Leaf Erikson transformation, is still a part of him with every piece of music he writes or performs.  

“By far, it was the best job I have ever had,” Greenleaf, a 1994 Cass Tech graduate, said about the part-time position he started on October 30, 1992, at the age of 15, which entailed answering calls from local high school coaches who phoned the Free Press with information from their recently completed games that were then compiled into game summaries and sometimes short stories by members of the prep crew. “On the prep crew, we were a bunch of guys mostly — and a couple of girls — and we wanted to be writers. We all hoped to get that call from the winning coach of the lead game for our roundup so that our name could get in the paper.

"That was some serious stuff, but I still literally approach what I do today as a reporter. I want to be able to speak truth with journalistic integrity.” 

The “old-school” journalist that Greenleaf is at his core had no problem identifying his longtime friend, Jemele Hill, as the source behind his relationship with the Free Press. Hill put Greenleaf in contact with former Free Press sports editor Gene Myers. It is the same Jemele Hill that Greenleaf once participated in epic dodgeball games with on the Pyramid Elementary School playground and later regularly bowled with during high school at Schaefer Lanes — decades before Hill was a national sports reporting figure for ESPN. And even as Greenleaf navigates his musical journey, where he has been supported by talented creative people near and far that he profusely praised on July 17 such as Dakim, Hugh Whitaker, the late Titus “Baatin” Glover, Troy Davis, Ilajide, Casey van Reyk, DJ Benny Ben, Dj Wise1, Andrew Potvin, “The Butter Made Records Family” and more — including Greenleaf’s fiancée, Laura Shafer; son Korey Greenleaf; and Chris Campbell, host of WDET’s “The Progressive Underground" — Greenleaf says he still is inspired in a unique way by Hill.

“At Pyramid Elementary, Jemele and I read all of the books written by Beverly Cleary and Judy Blume, and then when Jemele started writing I always liked her style because she was never afraid,” said Greenleaf, who, as Leaf Erikson, has received 15 nominations for Detroit Music Awards, including in 2023 for “Outstanding Gospel/Christian Recording for “The New Testament,” which also featured his son, Korey Greenleaf, who performs as D Apollo. “Jemele is never going to let anyone box her in and she has been a huge inspiration for me. Jemele has also always been all about Detroit, and I’m the same way.

"I love my city. And through music that reflects my city, I want to be a better version of myself. Creating music is like a therapy session for me. And I’m the therapist and the client.”

Scott Talley is a native Detroiter, a proud product of Detroit Public Schools and a lifelong lover of Detroit culture in its diverse forms. In his second tour with the Free Press, which he grew up reading as a child, he is excited and humbled to cover the city’s neighborhoods and the many interesting people who define its various communities. Contact him at stalley@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @STalleyfreep. Read more of Scott's stories at www.freep.com/mosaic/detroit-is/. Please help us grow great community-focused journalism by becoming a subscriber.