A hip-hop music and dance performance will be held today at the National Auditorium of Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy (BSA) at 6:30pm. The performance is the outcome of the two-week hip-hop dance and music workshop.
Organised by the American Centre of the US Embassy in Dhaka, four artists are visiting Dhaka as part of a cultural exchange programme called Next Level. Their visit is sponsored by the US Department of State, Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs.
Four American hip-hop musicians will be performing with 50 hip- hop rappers and Bangladeshi youths.
The four-member group is comprised of Asheru, born Gabriel Benn, an African American hip-hop artist, educator, and youth activist, Amirah Sackett, dancer and choreographer, JocElyn Ellis, vocalist, songwriter and music producer, and André “DJ A-Minor” Barden, an educator, DJ, and producer.
Cultural Affairs Officer of the US Embassy in Dhaka Calvin Hayes, who helped to coordinate Next Level’s cultural connections and facilitated workshops at EMK Center, told the Dhaka Tribune: “Today, four American artists along with Bangladeshi choreographers, dancers and rappers will be performing hip-hop break dance, hip-hop rapping, beatboxing, beat making and so on.”
Next Level, an initiative of the US Department of State and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has selected the hip-hop artists and educators to participate in the programme.
It will take teams of artists to six countries in Africa, Eastern Europe, and South Asia to use hip-hop as a tool for cultural diplomacy and conflict resolution.
