Beyonce’s Choreographers Explain How the Historic Coachella Performance Came Together
It's been weeks since Beyonce's awe-inspiring Coachella performances, and we're still picking our jaws up off the floor.
Queen Bey's two main choreographers Chris Grant and JaQuel Knight, who have worked closely with her for the past decade, recently chatted with New York Times about how the historic live show came together.
The planning stages began in December, and rehearsals followed in January after Beyonce decided the direction she wanted to take.
"She said, ‘Let’s do a homecoming,’” Knight recalled. “Boom. A nice, clear concept that we were all able to snap into and execute.”
He added that the choreography team worked Don Roberts, a consultant on the 2002 film Drumline, to create their own "professional level marching band."
"We flew quite a few people in from Atlanta, because it was pretty difficult to cast in L.A. for the specific swag and funk and charisma that we were looking for," he explained.
But the craziest part? They only had one day on-site to perfect the set. "At Coachella, when it gets windy, you can’t rehearse. It was super windy the day of our rehearsal. They had to bring the lights and the speakers down. They shut us down," Knight divulged. "So that was our one day spent in the desert: We ran it once in the hot sun with no lights."
Luckily, the team was a well-oiled machine by the time the final desert rehearsal happened. But even so, the outcome was something no one expected.
"I don’t think any of us were expecting it to be this big of a thing. It’s still blowing my mind," Knight admitted. "We even had a quick conversation with Bey as we were rehearsing for Week Two. She was like: 'Wow. People really loved the show, huh?'"
Read the full interview here.
2018 Coachella Performers: Weekend 1