Donavan’s Yard, the DJ and dance culture collective leveling up Los Angeles’ nightlife and dancehall scene, is celebrating its third anniversary on Saturday (June 1) with a block party in LA’s Art District.
Originally created by Sean G and Drewbyrd as Shabbaaaaa, Donavan’s Yard rebranded in 2021 with a focus on reggae and Jamaican music, growing its profile from LA underground dancehall act to a far reaching global dance movement connecting Jamaica, New York and London with LA street culture. The musical duo have booked an incredible line up that honors Donavan Yard’s dancehall roots with acts like Wayne Wonder, Sarz and DJ Tunez, along with headliner and LA heavy hitter 03 Greedo and Latin trap artist El Cherry Scom.
“For us, when we’ve done these big events, we’ve always ran into roadblocks trying to bring the vision to fruition,” Sean G tells Billboard. “At the end of the day you end up at the mercy of whatever concert venue that often doesn’t really understand the movement that our brand is trying to build. So the real goal with building the Donavan’s Yard festival is to just create an experience that we’d want to attend, an experience that is 100% authentic Donavan’s Yard. It’s power in numbers and we are not only excited for June 1, but also to see where this goes in the future.”
Drewbyrd added, “This has been a vision of ours for awhile now,” adding, “we feel we’re growing at a pace that has now exceeded the regular club space and we plan to grow not only our peculiar taste in music but also artists we love.”
Donavan’s Yard will resemble a classic summer block party, with inflatable games and a food line up that features big names like Uncle Paulie’s Deli, Love Hour, Happy Ice, Rocky’s Matcha and Da Jerk Yard plus sponsorships from Nike and popular new energy drink brand Joggy. Donavan’s Yard has brought on event and festival veteran Miles Canares (founder of Family Style Festival and others) to lead production and operations.
For more information and to purchase tickets to the Donavan’s Yard Festival, visit donavansyard.com or follow on social @donavansyard .
