Nelson Street Girls' student gets break in Nadia Batson video: 'Dancing is my dream'

Dillyann Irving always knew she wanted to be a dancer.

She would watch dance tutorials, music videos, and other dance groups on YouTube and try to copy the dancers. She also made up her own dances when she listened to music, which she still does most of the time.

At age five she joined Dance Dynamix Trinidad and Tobago and now, at ten, she has several performances under her belt, including dancing with soca star Nadia Batson.

She loves soca and performing with Batson made her Dillyann’s favourite artiste.

“I danced with her when I was small. The dance group went to perform in a kids show and danced together and then she invited us to dance in her video.”

That was in 2017 when the dance company’s Kids Core performed at Aunty Nadia Batson's children Carnival concert. There, they were invited to appear in Batson's music video for the song Clear A Way.

Dillyann, one of the lead dancers in Dance Dynamix TT, performed at the International Caribbean Dance Festival in 2017 and 2018. She also danced and acted in a Dance Dynamix theatre production called The Curious Cat at the Little Carib Theatre in 2019.

From 2015 to 2020, she performed at the annual international dance showcase – Heart of Culture – and in 2019, she and other members of the company made a guest performance at the Little Miss Africa TT pageant.

“Dancing has always been my dream since I was small. My granny used to watch me and she got me into the dance school when I was five. She told me to always believe in myself and follow my dreams.”

In the company she learns folk, Afro contemporary, Afro Caribbean, tap, and ballet dancing. But the company has extra workshops where she has learned Indian, African, and hip hop dancing.

She still goes to YouTube and now the social media platform TicTok to watch people dance and follow along.

“I want to be a dancer and a police officer but mostly I want to be a dancer because it was my dream. I want to go around the whole country and perform and do music videos and stuff.”

Dillyann, who will turn 11 in August, intends to do solo performances but still stay in the dance group. She said her dance teacher and director of Dance Dynamix, Delton Frank, encourages them to practise, and if they do it wrong, he would still believe in them.

“He treats us nice, and it have lovely people in the group. I always used to meet my friends but now I can’t. I have to do online because of covid. It’s not the same.”

Dillyann lives in Laventille and attends Nelson Street Girls’ RC School where she will be going to standard five in September.

She said she is nervous about the move because the work in standard four was harder than she expected, and she knows standard five will be harder. She is also worried about doing the Secondary Entrance Assessment exam even though she is a good student who often gets “excellent” for attendance and attitude.

She likes mathematics, grammar, and creative writing, and her four sisters and one brother sometimes help her study. She also loves reading and learning new words. She usually reads her reading books, the Bible and the newspapers now that she can no longer go to the public library to borrow books.