Step Afrika! Premieres Work Based On The Migration Of African Americans

Step Afrika! will present Migration: Reflections on Jacob Lawrence on Saturday, Oct. 19th, at The Auditorium. PHOTO BY JATI LINDSAY.
Step Afrika! will present Migration: Reflections on Jacob Lawrence on Saturday, Oct. 19th, at The Auditorium. PHOTO BY JATI LINDSAY.

Step Afrika! Premieres Work Based On The Migration Of African Americans

By Tia Carol Jones

Artist Jacob Lawrence’s “The Migration Series” is the inspiration behind Step Afrika!’s “The Migration: Reflections on Jacob Lawrence.” The series depicts the story of African Americans from the South and their Great Migration to the North. The Migration uses motifs, images and colors from Lawrence’s series to bring it to life on stage, with dance and vocals.

Step Afrika! will present “The Migration: Reflections on Jacob Lawrence” at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 19th, at the Auditorium, located at 50 E. Ida B. Wells Drive.

Step Afrika! was founded in 1994 by C. Brian Williams as an intersectional partnership between the Divine Nine stepping and the South African gumboot dance. Lamar Lovelace, Executive Director of Step Afrika!, has been with the company for seven years. The Chicago native lived in New York City and learned about the organization and was really impressed. Lovelace, who is a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc., talked with Williams, who is a member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., it felt like the right fit for Lovelace.

“The artistic product is phenomenal, and there was a space for me, and I was really happy to be part of the trajectory moving forward,” Lovelace said, adding that as a member of a Divine Nine Fraternity, he loves the tradition of stepping.

Lovelace was also attracted to the compelling storytelling of Step Afrika! Including Drumfolk and Migration. Lovelace described Step Afrika! as high energy, polyrhythmic body percussion. While in most dance performances, there is beautiful movement to a track, Lovelace said Step Afrika! is the track. Through stomping, clapping, body slapping and other types of body percussion, Step Afrika! brings rhythms to life using the dancers’ bodies. Step Afrika! is a professional, full-time company dedicated to the tradition of stepping.

He described this iteration of The Migration as the most beautiful and most recent iteration of the work, which was premiered in 2011. He said one of the most important pieces out of Migration is wave suite, which features spirituals being sung while performers do the South African gumboot dance. Lovelace said that Williams is a fan of Lawrence and Jakari Sherman, the creative director of Migration, really did a lot of research on the migration from the south to the north.

“We always say that everyone in America has a migration story, we certainly know that African Americans have a migration story, especially folks in Chicago. I do think that every American has proximity to a migration story, so the piece is really special,” he said.

Lovelace said that people from all over the world have connected to Migration because of the way people move around for “greater moments in life.” The finale is titled, “Chicago,” and it represents the great coming up North and features a lot of different forms of dance to celebrate their new life out of the Jim Crow south. Lovelace said the piece is bringing the powerful panels to life through dance. As a native Chicagoan, that finale is near and dear to him. He thinks it will also resonate with other people who see it.

“Audiences were literally on their feet last year, marveling at the incredible stepping performed by this important American dance company.  We’re honored to launch our Auditorium 2024-25 season with Step Afrika! back on our stage, offering a historic work that pays tribute to the strength of the Black American migration story, and the role the city of Chicago played as a welcoming place to call home,” Rich Regan, CEO of The Auditorium, said in a release.

For more information about Step Afrika!, visit www.stepafrika.org. Tickets are $29. To purchase, visit www.auditoriumtheatre.org or call 312-341-2300.

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