CHICAGO | January 25, 2016 -- This Thursday, January 28, at 7:00PM, Vol III of the Lyrical Sublime will take place at The Silver Room in Hyde Park. Lyrical Sublime is a ritual and ceremonial performance and conversation that extends meditations on citizenship, spiritual change, and the vicissitudes of identity in the midst of our yet-ambiguous moment.
I started The Lyrical Sublime because I wanted to begin to cultivate a ceremony for young people who need or desire a space of truth-telling that affirms the spiritual realities of our time. Frankly: a lot of people are hurting and the internet isn't a good enough place for us to share with one another the means by which we as human beings have evolved to heal each other and ourselves. We need more face to face time, more spells for flourishing, more belief in the magnitude of our dreams.
I wanted to help cultivate a place where people might feel better through shared expression, radical truth-telling and vulnerability. Each incarnation of the performance is different, and informed by the spaces in which the performance takes place, as well as by the performances before it, and by the people in the room.
I did the first performance in a far-flung corner of the city on a very cold night, to a rapt but tiny audience.
Volume II featured the guest appearance of the incomparable Akenya. Her vocal compositions, masterful and rich, fed us well.
Volume III will be the first incarnation of the performance on the south side of the city, where I reside. I invite anyone who happens to be in the neighborhood to come out. Guest performers will include Christian JaLon, Frankiem Mitchell, and others.
Eric Williams of The Silver Room is donating the space to us, and so there will be no charge at the door. Just bring yourself, and perhaps your own spell for flourishing.
-R