THE SUMMER, THE STUDIO, AND SOME LUNCHTIME VIBES
Welcome back. The CREATE Research Lab is back in effect with many activities, many opportunities, but the same passion for exploring how music impacts our lives and helps us and our communities to be at their best!
We had an exciting summer with two incredibly successful projects. 1st was the World Mixtape Tour which literally had us globe-trotting with stops in Latin America, South Africa, the UK, India, Australia, and Hawaii. We saw and heard the best in Hip Hop culture and saw the universal healing power of Hip Hop for individual empowerment but also attention to equity and justice at the community level. These themes were universal across geographies as were themes recognizing the common societal effects of colonialism and resilience in our global history. Our students and CREATE Lab team got to speak to amazing Hip Hop cultural ambassadors real-time from around the globe. We are so fortunate for our visiting ambassadors, artists, researchers, and just all around dope people, including Paul Flores, Emile YX?, Kiz Bangerh, and Dr. Alex Crooke.
Our second amazing project was the 3rd Annual Mixtape Camp, co-facilitated by the one and only Dr. Ian Levy. We continue to look at new creative approaches to student exploration of self and others through music creation. This year we continued our popular collaborative model that guides students through creating beats and lyrics toward a collective musical piece while listen, watch, and discuss music through and empowerment lens. This allows them a powerful process of simultaneous reflecting, analyzing, process, and creating through a lens of empowerment. We also added another type of mixtape creating process where students compiled, sequenced, and added effects to existing songs that were meaningful to them. This more solo exercise was meant to help them curate songs that could be empowering in an even more personal and unique way… plus the functional skill-building and potentially regulating effects of the detail work needed to complete the project within a digital music platform (DAW).
This Fall we are launching Lunch Vibes, a slight update to last years popular Lunch and Chill Series. It will be the same two hour format, but the first hour will have a curated mix with a theme and the second hour will be “just good music.” Both hours will have roughly 10-15 minutes at the end to allow discussion or reactions to the music. Join us!
NEXT LUNCH VIBES: 9/22 @ 12!
We also have a very exciting project in the works but cannot share the details just yet! Stay tuned!