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Artist
Toni Blackman
12+ albums
hip hoprap
about
Toni Blackman is an international champion of hip-hop culture, known for her irresistible, contagious performances and alluring female presence. She's all heart, all rhythm, all song, all power - - a one-woman revolution of poetry and microphone. An award-winning artist, her steadfast work and commitment to hip-hop led the U.S. Department of State to select her to work as the first ever hip-hop artist to work as an American Cultural Specialist. After her first residency in Dakar, the folks there started calling her the Hip Hop Ambassador and it all took on a life of itself, already serving in Senegal, Ghana, Botswana, and Swaziland where her residencies include performance, workshops, and lectures on hip hop poetry. Toni, a graduate of Howard University, has shared the stage with the likes of Erykah Badu, Mos Def, The Roots, Wu Tang Clan, GURU, Bahamadia, Boot Camp Clic, Me'Shell NdegeoCello, Sarah McLachlan, Sheryl Crow, and even Rickie Lee Jones. Her first book, Inner-Course was released in 2003 (Villard/Random House). In 2004, she performed in Spain at the Barcelona World Social Forum, at the Cutting Edge Festival in Darmstadt, Germany, and toured South Africa as a headliner on the Urban Voices Festival. Also, the SENERAP Festival featured her in Dakar in 2003. This past summer she spoke at the ESSENCE Music Festival alongside Common, Yo Yo, & Shemar Moore. Highly respected as the Founder and Director of Freestyle Union, a cipher workshop that uses freestyling as a t