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Q-Tip Named JFK Center’s Artistic Director For Hip Hop Series

blame it on Meka March 8, 2016
q-tip-keyboard

As hip hop culture steadily continues to accumulate the planet-wide respect that is long overdue, it continues to make leaps and strides in areas previous thought to be unreachable. In honor of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts’ forthcoming Hip Hop Culture series, they have tapped the talents of a hip hop legend to curate its upcoming season.

Alongside visual arts organization Hi-ARTS, A Tribe Called Quest’s Q-Tip has been named the program’s first artistic director. According to a press release, Kamaal will be a curator at the Washington, DC center which explore hp hop’s culture via its five pillars: emceeing, deejaying, breaking, graffiti, and knowledge of self.

Via a press release, Q-Tip says “With Hip Hop constantly changing and evolving, it is easy to forget the history and legacy that precede it. I want to begin at the beginning of the Culture to help people see its roots, better understand its present, and responsibly create its future.”

The 2016-2017 Hip Hop Culture Series is as followed:

July 12-16, 2016 — Brave New Voices Youth Summit
October 12-16, 2016 —All the Way Live!
November 3-5, 2016 — Words, Beats & Life Teach-In
November 5, 2016 — Top Notch
May 23, 2017 — DJ Spooky: Rebirth of a Nation
June 5-11, 2017 — /peh-LO-tah/

Rap fans may remember that last year’s Culture series was the location of one Kendrick Lamar, as he held the DC leg of his Kunta’s Groove Sessions there.