Update for Feb 09- Playback NYC, NY Times, Arts education, and more

It's the second month of 09 and life in NY is feeling good.

I spent most of last year on the road traveling the world. It was Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Singapore, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, philippines, Berlin, Holland, UK, Czech Republic, Australia. Anyway you get the idea..

It was a great and dizzying experience. I met many inspiring artists and new communities. At the same I realized I was running from my life in NY.

New York has changed, we are talking major gentrification, a sort of hipster/young professional invasion, a continued closing of important artistic venues, and the continued displacement of communities of color and poor folks.

Maybe its the uneasy feelings about the economy that are bringing that nervous comfort of my eighties experience. It has been a process to face my feelings about New York and renew my love and commitment to this unique metropolis.

I have to shout out Danny Hoch's Taking Over
His show was a cathartic release for me, it tackled the many angles and contradictions of a changing New York. I also want to shout out the folks who keep New York raw and creative.



This is all said after a two week family retreat in LA, a very intimate conference held by KRS ONE in the LBC( where a vision for a Hip Hop city was laid out), and a show in LAS VEGAS where Yako and I opened for a major computer companies keynote, I am back in New York and staying put.




I am back in the teaching trenches and working on some great education projects with Organizations Urban Arts Partnership, Urban Word, BAM, John Jay College, and Arts Horizons. I am about to start working with an ESL and finished a project called Intersession at New Design High School with fellow UAP teaching artist Bami. We created a multi-media animated comic with Poetic narration and beats. The student explored individuality, self expression, challenging society, and the challenges to the self esteem of young women.

Yako and I were in Australia and were posted up in the bunker studios with Sloth of Meta Bass and did some mad Hip Hop Dub tracks. We are starting to get in the lab and edit that record and an all beat box record. We are planning for a mess of new music to start making a web presence. It has been too long!!!!!!

Playback NYC, the improv theater company I co-founded got together with members of Hudson River Playback, and Big Apple Play to do an important show in Long Island. Big Shout out to Paul McIsaac who spearheaded this effort! “After Grief and Anger — Healing and Change,” the performance was an effort to promote better understanding between Latinos and non-Latinos in the area following the killing last November in Patchogue of Marcelo Lucero in a bias murder. click here for the story in the NY TImes.



That's my first update for 09 and look forward to adding more news, music, and videos. Peace and see you in the cypher.

baba