Cheryl Byron
Cheryl Byron | |
|---|---|
| Born | Cheryl Byron |
Cheryl Byron (died June 17, 2003) was a visual artist. She started her studies in her native land, Trinidad & Tobago. There she also studied dance with Neville Shepard and acted with the Caribbean Theater Guild.
While on tour in New York, her artwork won her a scholarship to the New School University, where she studied fine art. Byron then obtained a Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degrees in English from City College (CUNY) while maintaining her professional life, including becoming in 1976 the first woman to perform her own original brand of poetry in a calypso tent in Trinidad, for which she is recognised as "the mother of Rapso".[1]
Byron was a pioneering performer of rapso and dub poetry. She studied dance with Pearl Primus, and became a member of the Primus Board "Earth Theater". She then became Primus' special assistant, accompanying her on her numerous teaching and choreography assignments, including with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater.
Byron performed on national and international stages. Her talent took her to such places as Canada, Guyana, Barbados, Jamaica, London, Kenya and Nigeria. Byron was an ordained Reverend Mother in the Spiritual Baptist faith and a professor at Medgar Evers College and the College of New Rochelle in Brooklyn, New York. Byron also taught at City College, and New York City Technical College. Byron played one of the lead roles in the PBS film Homecoming, became a published poet in an anthology of poetry, Woman Rise, and is featured on an album of dub poetry, Womantalk, on Heartbeat Records.
In addition, Byron founded Something Positive, a not-for-profit dance organization based in New York City.[2] Something Positive is under the Artistic Direction of Michael Manswell.[3]
Byron died in New York at the age of 56.[2]