‘I hope she hears us through the clouds’: a dance tribute to Sinéad O’Connor

Sonya Tayeh remembers watching Saturday Night Live in October 1992, at home in Detroit, when a young, shaven-headed Sinéad O’Connor tore up a picture of Pope John Paul II and declared, “Fight the real enemy.” Tayeh says she felt the world pause. The moment stayed with her; she now has one side of her head shaved and still recalls the defiance and the way O’Connor’s eyes “just seep through your soul and burn.” The backlash that followed that protest derailed O’Connor’s career, and when the singer died in July 2023 Tayeh found herself grieving and revisiting the records.

Listening to Troy one day, Tayeh had a clear image: “women, sweaty women in a line.” From that vision came The Surge — a piece set to O’Connor’s music and created with women over 40. The title refers to a surge of energy, “a hyper-awakening, a rumbling, a thrust.” Tayeh assembled a cast who felt the singer’s force: auditions drew many women inspired by O’Connor, the final company’s combined age reaching 529.

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