Building Community and Breaking Barriers
The Dinah 2017
By Mona Elyafi
Club Skirts Dinah Shore Weekend (aka The Dinah) continues to make its presence felt across our country and around the world by raising the visibility of women in all facets of life, from artists, to comics, to filmmakers, to athletes and beyond.
For over a quarter century Mariah Hanson – founder and producer of the largest lesbian event in the world – has not only been delivering epic good times to lesbians, but has as well continuously been moving the needle with her ongoing commitment to amplifying, championing and celebrating women’s voices and talent via The Dinah.
The growth and longevity of the event – a worldwide cultural phenomenon is all the more astonishing and remarkable at a time when lesbian bars, spaces, festivals and publications are rampantly vanishing all across the country.
This is why, now, more than ever events like The Dinah are necessary to reconnect our community. The Dinah is entirely produced by women, for women, and that is a powerful statement in today’s climate.
Kicking off at the close of Women’s History month on March 29th and wrapping on Sunday, April 2, the Dinah 2017 will celebrate and honor the trailblazing women in the Arts, Sports and Entertainment industry who have achieved historic firsts.
“Now more than ever, it is enormously important to celebrate and raise the visibility of women breaking glass ceilings especially within our own community because we need to be reminded that we are strong, capable, united and powerful in a time when our voices, especially spoken in unity, are needed more than ever before.” says Mariah Hanson.
The 27th installment of the Dinah is already expected to be one of the major highlights of the 2017 Palm Springs festival season with a powerful all-female line-up covering the entire gamut of the entertainment spectrum including sports, music, fashion, comedy, film & TV.
The incredibly inspiring women slated to perform at The Dinah in 2017 include: world surf champion now turned cutting edge DJ Keala Kennelly who not only made a big splash playing herself in the 90s cult movie “Blue Crush” but also made history for female surfing winning the first women’s big wave contest at the Nelscott Big Wave Classic in 2010; Butterscotch, the first female beatbox world champion and a finalist on NBC’s America’s Got Talent; singer, songwriter, rapper Tysh Hyman who penned songs for top-notch artists like Alicia Keys, Diddy, Kelly Rowland and Kanye West; rising pop star and Latin hip hop artist Lady Cultura.
Championing and perpetuating the rise of women DJs behind the decks, The Dinah will also put the spotlight on some of the top female DJ tastemakers including DJ Kittens and the dynamic duo known as Stevie Trickz.
On the comedy front, the always politically incorrect stand-up comedian Julie Goldman, one of the most hilarious, provocative and familiar faces on Bravo’s “The People’s Couch” and the “Vanderpump Rules” will up the volume on your laughter. She’ll be joined by British comic Gina Yashere, who broke onto the American comedy scene with her appearance on NBC’s Last Comic Standing, and the wildly hilarious Erin Foley who has been taking the comedy scene by storm across the nation.
Club Skirts Dinah Shore Weekend is going back to the decade that brought us the ultimate best in dance music with two of the biggest club legends of the 90s: Cece Peniston and Black Box.
Bringing their timeless repertoire of empowering, feel good and very contagiously catchy radio hits & nightclub staples to the largest lesbian event in the world, these two iconic Top Ten Billboard-charting dance/club recording icons are readying to raise Palm Springs’ temperature on Friday, March 31.
CeCe Peniston, who was just crowned one of the 100 Top Dance Club Artists of all Time by Billboard magazine, continues to be a fixture on the club scene with her chart topping international commercial hits “Finally”, “We Got a love Thang” & “Keep On Walking”.
One of the most successful dance club artists in the history of the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play, Peniston scored five number one hits in the chart within three years. Her signature song “Finally” became one of the biggest dance singles, selling 3 million copies worldwide.
Keeping the groove going, Black Box will take us back to the Poetic Justice-style braids and slick fashion of the 90s with their massive international classics “Everybody everybody”, “Ride on Time”, “Strike It Up”, “I don’t know anybody else”, and “Fantasy” (a revamp of the Earth, Wind And Fire hit) all part of their seminal album “Dreamland”, considered one of the strongest and best known dance albums of the 90s.
The Dinah is all about celebrating our diversity and individual uniqueness. Black Box’s high-energy unifying-themed song “Everybody” completely mirrors that philosophy and lifestyle. It is appropriately fitting that the hit single has lived almost as long as The Dinah. It is certainly the theme song for this year’s 27th Anniversary of the event.
CeCe Peniston and Black Box have been keeping millions of fans dancing beneath disco balls and neon lights all over the world for 3 decades now.
Their highly anticipated live performances will most definitely push the Dinah over the edge to skyrocketing explosion for what is already billed to be the party of a lifetime.
“The Dinah has always stood for living out loud in celebration of our unique and incredible lives. This year we are bringing that message up a few notches,” says Hanson.
These are women who have taken a chance, shaken off-stereotypes, fought adversity, and broken the glass ceiling in their respective professional fields paving their own ways.
Because that is what the Dinah has been and continues to be about: living out loud breaking barriers!
For more information about The Dinah go to: www.thedinah.com
