#MeetTheTribe - Esther Essien, @essien901 is a woman of many parts. She is an actor, drummer, singer, researcher and an entrepreneur. She has also been dancing professionally for five years. She has led in dance workshops, performed at an #AfricanBallet, as part of the Centre's music band, and at a dance festival. She says, . . "Dance helps me a lot with dealing with dealing with all kinds of things. I channel what I'm going through into it. Dance helps with release and healing." . . "Joining @qdancecenter was a bit strange at first but I am someone who learns quickly when I go somewhere new. I have since adapted to the unique styles here and it has been very interesting for me as a dancer." . .

'RainMakers' is about a band of misfits, rebels and truth telling nomads, who collectively build one unique tribe of like-minded individuals who want to be catalysts for change. As droughts encompasses their lands and communities, the tribe seeks to bring back water with their bodies and souls. They go wherever there hasn't been rain and shake things up with their music, songs and dances until the rain pours!!! The QTribe is set to begin a revolution with RainMakers; an unprecedented merger between contemporary/urban dance, with an afrofusion music of various influences, having in its backdrop a youthful creative exuberance and the energy of a city like Lagos. The result you can already imagine. Watch out for the release of our first dance music video. Share // Like our page for more.

#AboutYesterday. The #QTribe was at the McGregor underbridge close to #obalende, shooting for #RainMakers all day yesterday, it was an amazing experience, a really productive day, aside battling with actual constraint like #rain which came to disorganize our plan for the improvised rain, and a #drone that won’t get satellite under the bridge, we also had to deal with about 7 rounds of #hoodlums of all shades and poetic drama, who kept threatening to obstruct our shoot unless we pay them. You see, one of the amazing things about my tribe is that, we all are #young and naturally as #troublesome, even if not more than them, from the #dancers to #musicians, technical #crew and managers, we all got our street cred from the mainland, and we got the numbers to quell them with a more violent disappearing disregards, to make them get it, that that we decide to put our #energies into something #productive and #Beautiful and #inspiring doesn’t mean we can’t match any #agbero who thinks the #public #space belong to them. With the support of #Laspark and @pollyalakija, this is one of our insistent effort of reclaiming the public space, so watch out for our #QTribeTag around #lagos and most importantly watchout for the RainMakers #video, it is nothing like you’ve ever seen come out of #creativelagos. Costume by @kolakuddus #QDanceTribe #Qdancecenter #dancingcities #videoshoot

We're not just a #tribe of dancers. The sounds you hear here to which we move, transform and express are originally composed our #tribe of music maestros. #TRIBE #Ted #ExciTED #PerformanceFilm #PerformanceArt #Lagos #LooksLikeLagos #Rainmakers #QTribe #Documenting #Archive #Rebels #Nomads #Misfits #Community #Change

Currently taking over a slice of interior Lagos to #record #document #archive our story to the world. A huge part of our offering is performance that engages the community. We may start on the stage but the seed is really sown here, close to the people. Our stories are of and about the people. This is QTRIBE!

A few weeks ago we took the @ted GLOBAL stage to perform Rainmakers, a piece about a band of misfits, rebels and nomads, not all from the same creed or nation but who collectively build one unique tribe of like-minded individuals who want to be catalysts for change. As drought encompasses their lands and communities, they go to these places and shake these things up with their music, songs and dances until the rain pours. Today, we are taking that piece from the stage to the screen. We are shooting a performance short! #Throwback #Throwbackthursday #TRIBE #Ted #ExciTED #PerformanceFilm #PerformanceArt #Lagos #LooksLikeLagos #Rainmakers #QTribe #Documenting #Archive

#OurKindOfGuy #StoryTeller #PerformanceArt "Twice Mithkal Alzghair has been lined up to perform in London. And twice his visa application has been refused. This year, after being invited to perform at the Shubbak festival of Arab arts, the Syrian choreographer submitted another application. It should be smoothly processed by the time you read this but Alzghair knows not to take anything for granted. “We will see,” he says. Alzghair is living in exile in France. He moved there to study dance seven years ago but was unable to return to Syria because he would be forced into military service, “to fight with the regime [against] other groups of Syrians”, he explains. As civil war escalated in his homeland, he has watched from a distance while his family still live in the same village where he grew up, in the house his father built for them in the mountainous south of the country. He talks with the unsentimental resignation that comes from accepting a new normality. “People adapt to situations,” he says. “They adapt to the fact that there’s a war, and every day people are dying, so it’s a reality and we accept it.” Does he have any hope that things will change for the better? “Well, no,” he says, frankly. “From where would I see hope? All that’s happening in the world does not make me have hope. All I can say is that it’s the apocalypse.” First solo, then accompanied by two other men, Alzghair performs a rhythmic stepping dance. Woven into it are ambiguously disturbing images, such as the raised hands that at first look as if they’re part of a swaying dance move but then can only symbolise surrender. Or the arms held behind his back in a manner that, again, could be choreographic but soon look like a man shackled. It is Alzghair’s face that makes the performance most affecting: his wide eyes are unblinking, haunted-looking, like a man pursued." - Lyndsey Winship, "Mithkal Alzghair on leaving Syria, performing in London and why we all share a history", Evening Standard. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_VslEq2TFo

Our kind of women. Asha Thomas and Yinka Esi Graves.

Our kind of woman. Katherine Dunham.

Here's what you missed at our #Adrenalin #FitnessTribe Class yesterday! GYM IS BORING. DANCE IS FUN!!!

#ADRENALINE #FitnessTribe #Formation yesterday! GYM IS BORING. DANCE IS FUN! And yesterday proved it! We had the BEST time yesterday and everyone can't wait till the next class! Will you join or nah? 😛😛😛

We're LIVE! #BurnSomething #BeFlexible #BeFit #GymIsBoring #JoinTheFitTribe. If you aren’t here every Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, you are wrong 😆. #QDanceTribe #Qdancecenter #adrenaline #GloverHall #Lagos