#DayoinChitown

This month, Dayo had an AWESOME opportunity to perform in Chicago. Janine Ingram, founder of The Love Journey held her Annual Sunrise Service. This is a free event held every year at the 39th st. beach in Chicago, Il. It is a great event packed with spiritually uplifting, moving and educational presentations. Everyone wears white and they come with their hearts and minds open to receive. The Love Journey . has many missions, but one of them is to support the community by spending money within it. Dayo among many other businesses and independent artists have benefitted from her efforts.

If you have not guessed yet, Janine is my mother, Dayo's . She booked the company this year to perform two new commissioned pieces and "Identity". The rehearsal process for this was...unique. Dominique was in Chicago with Deeply Rooted while Michael, Asia and I were in DC. We worked hard to learn choreography over choppy video chats and time lags.

Then came the ROAD TRIP!

We drove 12 hours in a hatchback (apparently everyone needed to rent a car this weekend because it was literally all that was available). For some reason, our phones were not charging in the cigarette lighter port so eventually there were no phones and consequently no music (WOMP!). Thats when the real fun began. Imagine, 3 adults in the car (at this point, stuck in traffic) with no music. We could've just had simple conversation, but no. We hosted our own talk-radio segment, created our own ads for that talk radio show, with phone calls and guests! Once that got old, we started a Frankenstein story (Frankenstein anything is a good suggestion for rainy days with kids, email me if you need details ;)). This story was beyond HILARIOUS but as oral Frankenstein goes, their is no documentation so...no evidence of the ridiculousness we created.

We were exhausted when we finally arrived. We hung out around the house. I knocked out before everyone else...so I am a terrible witness to anything that may have followed.

This was the ambitious rehearsal on the lakefront platform on Chicago's hottest day of the year (LOL). It wasn't too bad, it was much needed, especially after working in the studio without Dominique for so long. We rehearsed all day with a major lunch break at Pizza Capri, then...back to rehearsal. We finished the night off at Dominique's with dinner and great conversation.

The Big Day

"Ebony, you know it's 4:00 AM." I knew this, but a sista really did need a few more hours. I could hear my dad moving things down the stairs to pack them in the car. I gave myself..maybe like 15 (or 30) more minutes before I woke Michael and Asia. We were mostly silent except for the occasional grunt as we prepared for the day. I don't know about them but the anxiety of my dance company performing on top of being up this early created a strange calm.

The warm up was pleasant, it really is a pleasure to dance outside. Nature has its own movement and so it naturally became an element in the work.

We moved together, prayed, meditated, and had a blast! You can learn more about the Love Journey here!