DoMo, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Are you able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen?

The evolution of my creative career has been a journey that I’m very proud of. I began teaching dance part-time in 2007 and then dance and steel pan full time in 2013 with a company that contracted with many New York City Department of Education schools. It felt amazing to spread knowledge on these crafts that I enjoyed so much myself as a youth. It brought me so much joy seeing their priceless reactions to their first performances and how proud they become of their own self-expression. In addition to teaching, I formed a band in 2015 and we performed the music I wrote every chance we got at colleges, restaurants, and other venues.

In 2018, I embarked on self-employment, as I no longer felt aligned with the company I was teaching with. I walked away grateful for the experience to affect so many young lives, but also unsure of how I was going to make ends meet. This is when I began to allow my love for performing music to lead my life. I began performing covers on my steel pan in the subway stations of NYC. Each day, I was surprised at the amount of connections I made, whether it was friendly smiles, dances, money, and best of all – bookings for events.

In addition to busking in the NYC subways, I was able to land gigs through the various websites that connect event creators with entertainers, and also through word of mouth. Today I have an official business for my performing arts, and I am able to sustain a living in NYC and provide for myself, my wife, and my two sons through performing on my steel pan. I truly love transforming the rooms I perform in and uplifting the people that hear the sweet sounds of my steel pan.

DoMo, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

My life as a performer began at the age of 5. I started out dancing with my aunt’s dance school, where we did annual recitals, and a select few of us traveled across the country doing lindy hop competitions and performances, We even landed an opportunity to be in a documentary that aired on Netflix called Alive and Kicking.

I began learning the steel pan in the middle school I attended, and began performing with a local band where I learned so much about different instruments within the steel orchestra and the culture of steel pan music.

In high school I joined a dancehall group, and we were so talented that we performed with various reggae stars. I was so inspired by the reggae culture, that it became my entry into songwriting. Soon afterward, I began turning my poetry into rap songs, and then I fused everything together when I began writing pop songs and including steel pan solos throughout.

During my college years, I joined forces with my talented musician friends, and we formed a band called “And Effect.” We performed at many college events, restaurants, and other venues. In addition to live performances, my good friend Matthew created beats for me, as he was in school for audio engineering and he really understood me and the sound I created. This is how my first album EarthStrong was born.

I took a break from recording music to grow my business as a steel pan musician and the business I have with my wife centered around holistic health, but have recently returned to this as I have a love for spreading positive messages through my music. My recent single Remedy and the other songs I’ve been recording and will soon release, were inspired through my new brand called Hip Health, which focuses on helping people see it is cool to be healthy. I’m very proud that I am able to streamline my talents and knowledge together, while inspiring listeners to pay attention to how we treat our bodies. You can find my single Remedy in all of my recent social media posts that share important wisdom on health.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

The name of the brand for my music is Hip Health. One of the Six Pillars of Hip Hop is knowledge/consciousness, and I truly believe knowledge is power. Hip health’s initiative is to bring knowledge on health through hip hop, whether its financial, physical, mental or social health.

I believe that Health is the most important factor in the world (since you can’t do everything you want to do if your health is poor). The brand Hip Health combines these two powerful concepts.

In addition, there’s a stigma that when you start doing things to become more healthy, you become less cool. My goal is to debunk that myth and prove that we can be and are both Hip & Healthy.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I adopted the name DoMo the Jack of All Trades as a teenager because I am multifaceted, and enjoy using all of my talents and creating music in multiple genres. People told me for years that I needed to choose a lane and stick to it, and I stubbornly refused because I didn’t want to limit myself. I learned through much research about niching and having a target audience (and some good friends having an intervention session with me), that it is easier and more powerful to choose a focus that I can put my energy into, and watch that grow. This is why my focus is now creating music that is aligned with my brand Hip Health. I let go of creating pop and reggae music (for now) and solely create Hip Hop music that touches on some aspect of mental, physical, social, or financial health.

Contact Info:

• Website: domojoat.com
• Instagram: instragram.com/DoMoJOAT
• Facebook: facebook.com/domojackofalltrades
• Twitter: twitter.com/Frazzzdomo
• Youtube: youtube.com/domojoat
• Other: https://linktr.ee/domojoat https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/domojoat/remedy

Image Credits
UKAY HIP