(Music: "The Space Program" by A Tribe Called Quest)
(Q-Tip) So,  the thing about creating the Hip Hop Council brain trust, when you look at any, any, any kinda like,
you know, for the most part, organization
that you have, you know, you have to, you
can't run it by yourself, you need people;
you need people who you can dialogue
with, and exchange, and build with. Hip Hop is you know, you know, in its DNA, is about
the collaboration, whether it be the
collaboration between the DJ and the emcee or the
five emcees; you know, now we see it's a lot, you know, it's solo artists, but there's still
a mammoth behind that successful solo
artist that makes he or she go. So,
and that's, and that could be said for pretty much anything, any kind of industry, right? So,
when you, when you have a council of people
who are experts, you know, whether it
be a, a Kierna Mayo, or a Questlove, or a
Jason King. You know, these people are
experts at what they do, have done it, worked,
not just got there. You know, paid dues,
some of them arm in arm with me; we
watched each other grow.
You know, we selected people who (um) thrive for excellence, have achieved excellence, and
who desire it not just for themselves,
but for people at large. (um) So, it's, it's,
it's just, it's just a, a must to have
that, especially when we're in, you know,
this creative realm, you know, of trying
to put together great programming in an
esteemed house like the Kennedy Center.
[song volume increases, then fades out completely]
Just to go through
some of the people who are on the
Council. Black Thought is somebody that I'm really excited about being on there
because (um) he's just one of the preeminent emcees and artists of our time, and we
always, you know, know that Questlove is,
you know, appeared in many things in his
concerts like a de facto go-to person
with all things Hip Hop, but (um) Black
Thought really understands the history,
he understands, you know, presentation, and I'm
just really excited about him being on
there. Kierna Mayo is somebody that I've
known, a childhood friend, for a very long
time, and to watch her, you know,
(uh) independently, and on her own, grow herself
in her brand (um), not only for being one of
the original (uh) staff writers on the first
incarnation of The Source, to starting
(uh) Honey magazine, to bein' a figure in,
only, you know, not, not just black
journalism but popular journalism. (um) It's just really (um) exciting (um) to have her there.
Some (uh), Grandmaster Caz (um), one of our (ah) founding fathers, if you would, of Hip Hop. You know,
he was there in the early days watching
Kool Herc DJ in 1973 and, and came up as a DJ
himself and an emcee, you know, of the, you know,
the group The Cold Crush Brothers, and (um)
he's still out here, you know, in
servitude to Hip Hop and to his craft,
and it's just great to have somebody who
really knows, who is es-taunched in the
history (uh), to be a part of it (um), the council (um). And, obviously, LL Cool J, who is the first (um)
Hip Hop artist to have a Kennedy Center
Honor. (um) For him to be a part of the
Council and to, you know, you know, lay
down his experience and, you know, all the
things that he went through, through his,
like, storied career, not only as a, as a
artist, but as an act, as a businessman(uh),
as just somebody whoís kind of one of our
diplomats in Hip Hop. For him to, to be a
part of it is just a complete, complete
honor. So, people like that from, you know,
from different (um) facets of the Hip Hop
culture (um)...
producers, writers, artists, emcees,
activists, men, women, white, black, doesn't
make you know, we're fairly, I think we're
pretty well-represented across the board
for our Council.
(um) To the world and me reading
something that I'm looking forward to,
it's in my birthday month, too, April, so that's reason to
be excited. (um) Also, the one other thing that I'm really excited about, though, is the, is the
35th anniversary of Wild Style. I actually
speak to Fab Five a lot, and I did speak to
him a couple of months ago about that and how excited he is about it. If you don't
know him, Fab Five Freddy (ah) is, you know, (uh) probably the impetus for that film. If
you haven't seen it, it's one of the (uh) first Hip Hop films done, and (um) just to
be able to celebrate that, and then some
of the parties that we're doin' there,
like, gonna have like a big DJ mash-up
with, like, Bobbito, Stretch Armstrong,
Rich Medina, and TJ Spinner all spinnin'
together at the same time, so, that
sounds like that's gonna be a lot of sweaty bodies, so [unintelligible]
[music]
