Profile 017: Charm La’Donna, Artist and Choreographer
For so many musicians, especially in R&B, star power always involves some level of distinct choreography that creates compelling stage moments. Enter Charm La’Donna. The force behind Rosalia who has also been the solo dancer on stage beside Kendrick Lamar with credits that include Madonna and Meghan Trainor, Charm is a young prodigy staking her claim on the industry. And, she is also an artist. Having released her first project, “La’Donna” this year, Charm sat with us before her release to discuss her journey, why releasing music is an extension of her artistry, and her journey towards the center of the industry. It’s storytelling that, luckily for us, is evergreen. Learn more about this incredible multifaceted creative below.
You have had a few roles in this lifetime already. What would you say is the fullest extent of your professional titles?
I think my professional title should just maybe be a creative artist.
And how did you get here? How has this role evolved over the course of your career? You've gone from doing choreography to now being an artist.
Well, I'll say this: I believe that I was always an artist. What led my career for a very long time and what people know me for is being a creative director and a choreographer. But I've always been in music. And I always say, I developed and am [continuously] developing myself.
I've always been creative. And I'm just now using a different form of expression as my front. But I'm simultaneously still choreographing and directing for myself and for other artists. I don't plan on stopping any of it just because I'm now releasing music, which I've been doing for a very long time.
So when did you start making music?
I started making music when I was a kid; I was a teen. But the music that I've been releasing I've been working on for a couple years. And even [this past] April, I was still recording to get the project finished.
Do you have a moment that you can remember in your life where you thought, vividly, “This is who I am. This is who I'm going to be?”
I don't have a specific moment where I was like, “Okay, I'm gonna be this, I'm going to do that.” I just know that my life shaped and formed itself organically. I knew I loved music, I knew I loved to dance and I knew that I loved to perform. I knew I loved to create, I have always been this artistic kid. I just can't pinpoint when I was like, “all these things are going to come together and I'm going to be here now.”
So let's take some steps back. You started dancing when you were…?
Three.
What was that process like? Did you ask to go to dance school?
I did. My mom tells a story that when I was three I came to her and said, “Mom, I want to dance, I want to perform.” But my mom wasn't a dancer, so she didn’t know [what exactly to do]. So she ended up putting me in this recreational place close to our house. And there, a woman was volunteering to teach dance and after meeting me she told my mom, “Oh, she needs to go to a proper school. She's actually gifted.” She saw something in me and gave my mom this address of the actual dance school in Hollywood. And then that's when it started.
I was taking ballet, jazz, hip hop and African modern -- you know, the basic dance classes for a kid. And I believe that it started off once a week. As I got older and I got better, and it became two times a week, three times a week, four times. It just progressively grew as I got older. But I love, love, love, love, love to perform.
I knew that learning the technique and being in class was also a passion of mine, because I enjoyed movement and dance that much. As a kid, you don't know that you're getting ready for performance. And then when you have a show, you see it. It’s like, oh — you work for this because then it goes [to the stage]. And as I grew and continuously took classes, I knew that I love both.
Do you remember one performance as a child where you were like - “This is it”?
You know, I actually do - and my mom actually has it on film. I think that I was five, and it was a tap sailor number. We had a sailor outfit on, and I don't know why I remember this, I think it’s because at that moment, I remember having fun and feeling really good. I even remember the steps! The memory came to me when my mom found the tape. I watched it and I was like, “I remember this day.” I remember being nervous. I remember being excited because it was the showcase. I remember getting moved up to a higher level -- the advanced group. And I know that that moment is special for me.
Artwork by Sed Miles
Five years old. That's amazing. So you're growing through dance and you're learning, and you meet Fatimah - how did you meet Fatimah [Robinson]?
So I met Fatimah [Robinson] at an audition being held at my dance school. I was never the kid to audition - I never auditioned. I was just training and going to school. But the owner of my studio was like, “Hey, she should go audition for this.” So I just went into the audition - kind of crashed it, in a way. I didn't have an agent, I didn't have anything. And I went in and I just danced. It was hip hop, and Fatimah picked me out of so many kids. She only picked five, and I was one of them. I was 10 years old.
How did that relationship continue to build? I always find it fascinating that so many times, we just stumble into how expansive the thing that we're interested in can become.
Yes. I completely understand. When I was dancing, growing up and performing, I didn't think of myself as a choreographer, right? Like, I didn't think of myself [as that] when I was with my friends, and we’d do little stuff, little showcases, and I’d choreograph the showcase; I didn't call myself the choreographer. To me, it was just friends putting stuff together.
I met Fatimah when I was 10 and then I took some of her master classes. And then when I was 14, there was an audition for people who could choreograph. But they wanted someone who could dance, who could rap, who could sing, who could choreograph - it was like the Mickey Mouse Club. They went to artists - kids who were just artists. I heard about it through a friend, because again, I was never an audition kid, and I was like, I'm gonna go.
And I choreographed a routine with my friends. That’s whenFatimah realized that I had choreography skills. But again, I don't think I'm a choreographer. It's just my friends being like, “Hey, you put the steps together, because you want to put the steps together.” Fatimah tells this as the moment when she saw that I had this ability to choreograph and realized how well put together my piece was. I was rapping, and then she was just like, “Oh, this girl, she can kind of do it all.” And that's when our relationship expanded.
Was that the first time that you felt seen in your industry?
To be honest, the first time I really, really felt seen in the industry was when I went on tour with Madonna.
That experience was different for me because I've always been training - whether it be dance, musical theater, doing plays, I've always trained. But my friends were actually kids in the industry. Sometimes people get confused and think that because I've been dancing since I was three, I've been a kid in the industry. And I really haven't. I went on two auditions: one when I was 10 and one when I was 14. All that time I was just training. They thought I should be this elite kid. That's what they were training me for, to go to an art school.
And this is to say, as a kid looking around I was always surrounded by all my friends who were industry kids and were booking. My friend was one of Missy’s dancers on that “Work It” video. So all of them were working and I wasn't, and I didn't understand why it wasn't working out. Or I would ask, “Mom, why don't I have an agent?” And my mom would always say, “Keep working, keep working, keep working. Keep grinding, keep grinding. Your time will come.” My mom would say, “When it’s your time, it’s your time, so don’t look back.”
So when I booked Madonna it was then that I became part of the industry, of that world, that I had been training for for 15 years nonstop. My life was dancing and [with that booking] it made sense. Because without that training, I wouldn't have been able to book that tour. I was a multifaceted person who could do all genres and be myself and that's what Madonna saw. She saw maybe the same things Fatimah saw at a very young age. I still am probably the youngest person she's ever hired to go on tour. I was 17.
Wow, you were 17 on a Madonna tour.
Yeah, I just turned 18 - and that story in itself was crazy. Because I had to leave my art school and home school. My credits didn't transfer and LAUSD.
Because all my credits didn't transfer. You need to transfer in this system to graduate. I didn't have to take certain classes at arts high school, you know. So I had to take so many classes - history, math - so many classes that I had to finish in order to graduate. So I pretty much had a year of school to do in three months. Because Madonna made it clear that if I didn’t get that diploma, I wasn't going. So I said, okay, cool. I just grinded.
That's when I felt almost like, “Wow, all this is beginning to make sense for me.”
Would that also be the same time that you first saw yourself? Or did you see yourself earlier?
I think I saw myself earlier. I've always had a goal, and that goal was to dance. That goal was to perform. That goal was to live in the arts. I knew I loved to do what I loved to do. If you asked me as a kid, “Hey, do you know you're gonna create a career out of this?” No, I just knew that's what I loved.
I thought I was gonna be a lawyer, if you asked me. So I kept my grades and GPA high, took AP classes, and thought, okay, dance is amazing, but I'm probably going to be a lawyer after this.
But it wasn't till Madonna that I was like, oh, I can make a career out of this. I can go beyond. And I literally turned down every college. I got accepted to so many places, but I wanted to stay in LA. And I picked the UCLA program because they allowed me to explore, they allowed me to focus also on choreography, and the study of the arts. And then it worked out perfectly, because I ran back into Fatimah and then that's when it really lifted.
So Madonna was a big one, but was there another moment that was the biggest turning point of your career? Another time where it shifted?
It’s so crazy, because you can't talk to me about music without talking to me about all my creative aspects, because I'm not one entity in one box. While I'm doing all of this with dance and devoting my craft, I've been simultaneously writing and working on music just in the background. I didn't want to be on set with whoever and I'm like, “does she know I do music as well”? That wasn't the job I was there to do.
A big moment that shifted my career was when I really turned from being an assistant - and mind you, Fatimah knew this whole time I did music. She was always like, “When you can put this music out? You’re an artist” for years.
But another transition point for me was probably when I kind of started working on my own, and not necessarily under my mentor.That project was Meghan Trainor, for whom I choreographed “All About That Bass.” And that was something I did. Fatimah was the director and I was the choreographer. And that's when it shifted for me, in the sense of like, okay, I've learned so much and I can do this. I can also do this under my own name, under Charm.
And I think all these shifts propelled me to where I am now in my life in which I’m releasing my music, because that's a big step for me. I'm not gonna sit here and say that I wasn't nervous, taken back or worried about what my music would do. But what I had to do was just go back into myself and realize that when I create, I’m not worried about how others perceive it - I create it from my heart. I create from how I feel, I put it out, and those who receive it, they receive it. And that also helps me propel my music. I gotta be that little girl who saw the journey and was like, “I'm not afraid to go on it.”
I realized and I've accepted that I've been doing the work the whole time.
Isn't it wild to think that your mom had you training that whole time, all to find out that even when you’re out of training, you're still training?
It's so cliche to say, but I say I'm always a student. I'm always learning. Someone asked me recently, “If you get really big as an artist and your music takes off, are you still going to choreograph? Are you still going to work with other artists?” And I said, “Yeah, why wouldn't I?” When you love to do something, you love to do it.
I'm releasing music right now, and I'm still choreographing and still helping create for some of the same artists. As long as our friendship and everything is still there, why not? And I will go there, and I'll push their music, and I'll help them out. There's no ego with me. I think that’s also what allows me to continue.
What role does vulnerability play in your work?
I think vulnerability plays a huge role, an important role, especially with releasing music, because it is my story, it is releasing a part of me that I can't really get back - once you put it out, you can't get back.
And I have to be vulnerable with the artist and who I create with because that's where I feel like my art comes from. My collaborations come from a space in a room. People always ask me, “How do you choreograph things? How does your art come out in a way where people can feel it?” All the time I'm getting comments like : “I feel your work just differently and you pour so much in,” and that’s because I am vulnerable in it.
The artists I work with, we are all collaborating and creating what we feel. And my art and my work reflects the time we're in because I'm always inspired by what we're in. So again, I say a lot of my stuff comes from my growth and where I come from. I hear a lot that my art always reflects the time we’re in. And I hear, “Are you a political artist?” I just take in what I see and I just put it out with no real intent of trying to change anybody’s mind. I’m absorbing.
So I mean, I think you have to be vulnerable and open to be able to absorb. And let go.
You put work out for the world to see and critique, and on top of that, I can see it. It's not like I'm in the corner, and I don't see anything. It's everywhere. So I think being vulnerable is an ingredient that’s naturally a part of how I create.
How do you stay inspired?
That's a great question. I often say I can be inspired by almost anything. I’ll start by saying being grateful. Let me start there. I think being grateful for where I am allows me to see and take in life a little differently sometimes. So my inspirations come from the smallest things. It could be a conversation with my little cousin, it could be seeing somebody on the internet living their life, it could be a leaf on the tree. I find inspiration in the craziest ways.
And sometimes I don't like talking about it because I don’t want people to think I’m a crazy art psycho. [laughs]. You know, like, “Everything is art!” [laughs].
I draw inspiration from my mom, I draw inspiration from my history, my past and my childhood. I draw inspiration from all of that. And if you want to be even more particular, when we're talking about a choreography or a piece I’m making, I draw inspiration from that artist. I draw inspiration from the music. I draw inspiration from the people that are in the room when I create. I draw inspiration from all of that. My music comes from how I see things, how my friends see things, how my mom - it comes from so many different places, I think that's the continuous thing. And there's times where I haven't felt inspired to do anything. I'm not gonna sit here and say every day I'm like, “I'm an artist and I want to create,” you know? There are times where I'm just like, “I don't feel it.” I just don't feel it. And I can't even explain why I don't feel it. I'm just not moved. So those days come you know, they're far in between but they come.
And sometimes just have to allow for those.
Yes, that's what I've learned. That I have to allow for rest days because it's like you take off one hat and you put on another one.
Right. As opposed to sometimes you gotta let your roots breathe.
That's what I'm saying. Gotta take these braids out and let the wind wind through it. [laughs].
And to be honest, that's what I've been learning this past year. Even dealing with COVID and things shutting down, it's allowed me to breathe. Even though I've been working, recording, choreographing and creative directing, I've kind of learned to breathe.
When did you learn how to trust yourself?
I'm still learning how to trust myself. I think that's a journey in itself. And I remind myself to do so. I tell myself to never say, I should have listened to my second mind.I never say that. So when I'm feeling a little doubtful, I go, hey, what did that first mind say? And I feel like that came when I started putting myself in the role of being a choreographer, and solely as myself. Not being someone's assistant, not being a prodigy. Not being “Charm the prodigy,” just “Charm,” and trusting my decisions.
I'm not saying I'm perfect - far from it - but I feel like I've been making the right decisions my entire life. Very intuitive, very aware. So it's the moment of going, hey, you know what you're doing. And even if you do make a mistake, you can keep on going.
So I'll probably say in my early 20s. But then I’d go back to say, I'm still learning today. The human and me is like, is this the right time? Is this right? Does this all make sense? And then I have to go, okay, what does your first mind say? Let it go. Then I let it go.
Just let it breathe.
Take the braids out and let it breathe. That should be my new thing. I gotta let it breathe.
Artwork by Sed Miles
My last question to you is, what legacy are you trying to leave behind?
That’s such a good question. I don't even think about it. If a kid picked up a book about my life, I think I would want them to know that they can do anything. That there's no limits, there's no boundaries, follow your heart, follow your passion. Because she did it, she knocked down doors and she did it with her morale. She did it to keep who she is, she never compromised herself. And she created some dope ass shit [laughs].
She's an artist. She created some fire. She created movements for people. And she comes from Compton. What? That's crazy. Statistically, she wasn't supposed to make it. So I think that's it.
I love that. That's all I'm trying to do too. You just wanna inspire the kids.
That's really where it is for me. And then if it changes, I’ll let you know Jas, but for right now, when I get calls like “My little cousin, or these girls like music” - there’s this dance group in Compton that apparently loved me, and my friend called me saying like, “These girls look up to you.” And I’m like, “What!?” I don’t even understand.
Right. Because you're so in it.
Yeah, those are the moments and those are the things that mean the most to me.
Any last words?
I'm just an artist, and I'm just here to create. And that literally is it.