La Vie...L'Amour...Ultime: Pieces of Me...

Hello Everyone!!
I hope you've enjoyed what this blog has to offer thus far! I wanted to take some time to tell you a bit about myself and give you some insight to who I am, what I do and why I decided to start the blog.
Life has been very interesting as of late. I've been traveling a LOT (more on that later) and although I've been very busy, I've had lots of free time. We all love free time, but my free time has multiplied to a point where it's almost too much. Now I'm a person who is constantly thinking. I think about, consider, and analyze almost everything! And there's nothin' like "too much free time" to make my brain work overtime! I've met so many people and had so many experiences and I started to feel like God had put me on the crash course for something; truly, lately I feel like i'm learning a new life lesson every single day. Now any individual who is pressing to move upward and forward would welcome a new lesson every day. But I was learning serious lessons!! From the people i'm interacting with to the books i'm reading, I feel like I've been taught in a few months what many people live well into their adult lives not knowing. And most of these lessons involved love. True love, romantic love, God's love, walking in love, hard love, love, love, love. I got to the point where I was so overwhelmed, not in a bad way, but I had experienced so much insight that I just needed to share! It wasn't enough for me to keep in it or write it in my journal or talk about it to my friends (which was difficult because I often felt like my vocabulary was too limited to really explain myself). I needed to share!!! I had toyed with the idea of blogging for quite a while, but I had no idea what I would talk about. And then it occurred to me that I should just share my life experiences; what I know and have been learning about, you guessed it, love (and life and everything that falls into those categories). And so L'AMOUR ULTIME was born.

So, a little about me. I'm originally from Columbus, Ohio. I have 2 sisters and 1 brother and I work as a professional actor/singer. Currently I'm playing Sarabi the Queen on the North American Tour of the Broadway show "The Lion King" (the reason for all the traveling, lately; we're in a new city about every 4 weeks). To be able to do this show is truly a dream come true and a gift from God. I honestly believe that there were certain lessons that I could only learn while doing this show simply because I needed to be in a place where I had no worries and no real stress. I also believe that we all must go through times where we are separated from the people, places, and things that we have learned to depend on. Regardless of the friendships and relationships we will develop, we all must learn that God is truly all we need. And I'm certainly in a place where I'm separated from the people who I would normally talk to about EVERYTHING.

Throughout my career, I've been very blessed to be able to travel and perform (2 of my favorite things to do!!) across the country and around the globe. I'd love to share with you all a few snapshots of some of my favorite places and videos of my work; just a tiny taste of my life!!!

  **In 2008-2009 I performed in a
  production of the Kander & Ebb revue "And The
  World Goes Round". In the show I played Woman
  #1 and sang the title song and opening number from
  the show. I love this song because of the power and
  truth of the lyrics. Take a listen!!

**In 2010 I helped to create a trio called THYME. The trio consisted of myself, Gia McGlone (also featured on the 'Servants of Love page), and Bahiyah Sayyed Gaines with music direction/arrangements by Melvin Bell III and accompaniment by Matthew London. Below is a clip of a piano accompanied "Unpretty" by TLC. It's amazing how we were really able to get to the meat and message of the song when we stripped away the well known beat and focused on the beautiful and timely lyrics. Hope you enjoy!

** In 2007 I played a Stepp Sister in "Dreamgirls" at The Fabulous Fox Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia. The cast was star-studded and included Ms. Jennifer Holliday reprising her Tony Award Winning role: Effie White.

** The following summer I was blessed to perform in another production of "Dreamgirls" at West Virginia Public Theatre. This time I played Ms. Deena Jones. It was definitely more of a challenge, but certainly a blessing!!

** In 2007-2008 I performed in two Off-Broadway shows, both with The Classical Theatre of Harlem. One was "Black Nativity" with the amazing Andre DeShields...I LOVED singing and cuttin' a rug with Andre every night. If you've ever seen Andre perform, you know it can be hard to keep up with him!!

...the other show with CTH was an adaptation of Euripides' The Trojan Women. This show allowed me to dig in to a piece on an emotional level that had never before been required of me. I got to scream and yell and cry and rant and rave and get beat up and bleed in a 2 page monologue. Then I went off stage and relaxed until curtain call LOL. The role of Cassandra is raw and violent and not pretty...but so amazing and so worth it!!!

My Travels
I have been very blessed in my life to travel to over 10 countries on 4 continents. Here are a few snapshots of some of the amazing places i've been...