Day Two of Essence Festival: Keeps on Rolling

This seems like the performances this year have been awesome. The lineups look to have hit all of the right chords. I can't wait to see how the Gospel Sunday closes out the weekend.

The second night of the 2011 ESSENCE Music Festival was one attendees won’t soon forget. The evening was jam-packed with one thrill after another as El Debarge, Chaka Khan, Jill Scott, and headliner Kanye West all took to the stage.

El Debarge kicked the evening off with his big comeback performance. He opened with a tribute to all his classics. Guests swayed and cheered as Debarge delivered greats like “Rhythm of the Night” and “There’ll Never Be” and when he got to “I Like It’ the crowd went wild. His fans proudly cheered him on to express their gratitude for his pitch-perfect performance (even when he was sitting on the stage Indian style while singing) and they immediately took to Twitter to tell the world he was back to his old self again. He also performed his latest hit “Second Chances” much to the joy of fans.

The one and only Chaka Khan was up next and as usual just her presence alone had the audience mesmerized. She shook that sassy red hair, belted out her famous notes and really brought the stage alive as she went through an awesome lineup that included favorites like “Through The Fire” and “Ain’t Nobody”. As Chaka moved effortlessly between favorites she shared love and laughs with the audience to be sure they were feeling good too and they ate it up, screaming “Chaka Khan” every chance they got. Chaka brought out New Orleans’ own Ledisi to join her in a sure to be classic performance of “I’m Every Woman” and even gave everyone a little “Sweet Thing”.

Read more at source