WORD, WATER, AND FIRE: THE CALLING

Sitting with a group of students in my small office in the College of Fine Arts at Howard University in the middle of hip-hop’s Golden Era, we began with a question, what could hip-hop theater do for us as African American artists? As we sat, held in the breath and embrace of Larry Neal, Jr, who smiled and whispered, “and for your community, and for your ancestors…” Kamillah Forbes, Chadwick Boseman, and Nsangou Njikam (then Glenn Gordon) and many others knew were being called to something much larger than I could teach in Playwriting, Theater History, or Aesthetics. I could not see him, but I could certainly feel him, elder/ancestor Larry bopping his head to “Jazz (We’ve Got)” leading us to the questions that would shape our quest:

1. How do we speak to the spiritual and cultural needs of Black people?

2. Whose vision of the world and the art we create to speak that vision is more meaningful, ours or those who simply consume it?

3. How do we walk our talk? How do we create an aesthetic that not only guides our work, but our lives?

  The questions were forged in flame in 1968, thirty years later they still burned. In what we came to call the Playwright’s Lab exploration of these questions lead to works like Kamillah Forbes RHYME DEFERRED which tells the story of two brothers Gabe and Kain who struggle to find success and maintain integrity in the hip-hop world. Both are committed to the art, but Gabe is also committed to his community and his ethics as much as Kain is committed to becoming a commercial success. The play uses rap, deejaying, breakdancing, and even graffiti as audiences watch these brothers pitched against each other in a mythic battle (rap) of good against evil. The moral code of the hip-hop underground elevated rhyme to the level of prayer, and anyone who violated the sanctity of the rhyme…the freestyle would be subject to cosmic correction. The play, first produced in 1998, laid bare the truth of Black Arts most bold declaration, that there is a well-defined Black audience. Black people, young Black people WILL AND DO support theater. The success of this play led to the creation of HIP HOP THEATER JUNCTION, a production company which would play a defining role in creating some of the earliest Hip Hop Theater Festivals.

  HIEROGLYPHIC GRAFFITI continued to probe the spirituality of hip-hop by situating its aesthetics squarely in the context of Egyptian/Kemetic mythology. The play is a retelling of the Egyptian Osiris myth using hip-hop, African ritual from a number of traditions Chad’s work celebrated the presence of divine symbolism all around us. GRAFFITI is set in DC, ironically juxtaposing the power of ancient Egyptian symbolism and architecture on which many DC monuments are modeled with gentrification, poverty, and revolution that have come to characterize the city. GRAFFITI is many things; at its core it is a love story celebrating the sacrifice and commitment that has marked our history since our arrival on these shores. Osiris and Isis give birth to a Blackness that could never be broken even in the bastion of whiteness.

SYNCING INK continues spiritual revolution that is hip-hop theater. Gordon must fulfill his destiny, should he fail, the cypher fails. The cypher is a metaphor for the sacred creativity/artistry that has sustained African people throughout the diaspora. In this play, hip-hop takes on the power of the nommo, the responsibility of ase l’enu, and the balance of coolness as Gordon is aided, challenged, and finally stands revealed by the orisha. The rituals action of the play is rooted in Isese with a nod to various “new world” traditions including Lucumi, Santeria, and Candomblé, but the language is hip-hop. From its inception, the goal of Syncing Ink has been to lay bare the power of hip-hop to heal by restoring Africa in its intended audience. This does not mean that Syncing Ink, or even hip-hop is solely for an African descended audience, it means that it both emerge from an understanding of art and art-making that is at once communal and functional. In short, if art was not uplifting, even when censuring or leveling brutal critiques, it was not made. SYNCING INK asks whose vision of the world and the art we create to speak that vision is more meaningful, ours or those who simply consume it? As Gordon, his father, and possibly his father before him and so on are threatened with silence, so are we. Not only are we asked to bear witness to Gordon and Lightning Lynn’s healing, but we are also asked to participate in the healing of hip-hop to save ourselves. To restore Africa in ourselves. What SYNCING INK wants to accomplish is no small feat.

Sitting in my office twenty-five years ago we were simply following the music. We could hear the power, prayer, and resilience of our ancestors as we sang along to “Astronomy,” “If I Ruled the World,” “People Everyday” and “Ex Factor.” We wanted that same ritual of communion with theater. Today we are still on the journey armed with power of knowing that words give birth, that transcendence is always possible, and faith is evidence not only in the unseen, but also in that which is always seen…and heard. We thank our ancestors for making an altar of our hearts and our hands. We thank you, our beloved ancestor Larry Neal, Jr. We thank all the hip-hop heads who wear the prayer of Africa on your tongue and in your swagger, may you be forever cool.

Sybil R. Williams