For 10 days leading up to the watch party, each day I am sharing highlights from the creative process.

The altar, an ode to the Spiritual Baptists of the eastern Caribbean: 2/10

Photo by Galen Higgins

I didn’t know anything about making altars. It’s just what I did before my rehearsals to prepare for the work, to enter the portal. In fact, I didn’t start calling it an “altar” until public showings because there was no other name for it. This prop is not a prop. The altar is a place to meet people, specifically my late maternal grandmother and eventually my living paternal grandmother, as you will see as you watch the performance. I initially sought to connect with Lynda by placing objets she loved on the table, lighting incense, saying prayers, and anointing myself with oil. It is she who gave me the book of Psalms. It was important to her that we memorized the Psalms. (You can hear the voice of my sister and I reciting Psalm 91 during our duet in “Yam, Potatoe an Fish!” (Of course, in 2018 I took license with the language and changed the gender of the pronouns from he to she, as that felt most accurate to whom the prayer was for).

We used to pick up Granny from church, and it seemed like ah whole setta noise to my young self.  In the prelude to “Yam, Potatoe an Fish!” I construct the altar to a medley of traditional hymns. The ringing of the bell..the doption…the swaying of bodies could be heard from the street. The Shouter Baptists, as they are sometimes called, are travelers in my opinion. Through a process known as mourning, a candidate my travel in the mystical planes, to Africa or Asia and return to tell of their experiences. As the singers’ voices rise during the prelude—and I splash a few drops of the Florida Water—I feel most connected to Lynda. The portal is opening…

*The doption is a signature musical style, a type of drum beat made with the voice.