July 31 2005
I'm taking a quick break from the Brighton Hiphop Festival
showcase to update you on recent developments and say hello. Most recently I just performed half an
hour ago on a sunny outdoor stage in front of hundreds of hiphop fans on
Brighton Beach, the only international artist in an otherwise home-grown
line-up. I guess this scene has
kind of adopted me, since over the past couple days I have been working on
songs with half a dozen local artists - I also put on the first ever Rap is
Poetry Brighton event to showcase local lyrical talent, which was a big hit.
The most
significant recent development has really been more of a chain reaction. Last week I performed the last of my
Cambridge school shows in front of four hundred primary students. This was the culmination of a tour that
had me in twenty two schools over six weeks, during which I performed for over
sixteen hundred students.
Afterwards I returned to London for a bit of a rest and catch-up and to
work on some music with Emunah.
Then this week I was caught in an unexpected storm. I had sent out a press release to alert
UK and Vancouver media about my Cambridge tour about three weeks ago, but got
no interest or response whatsoever except from CBC's North by Northwest radio
show in Vancouver.
http://www.cbc.ca/story/arts/national/2005/07/22/Arts/RapTales_050722.html
Then on Tuesday
The Cambridge Evening News decided to run the story, which was then picked up
by The Daily Mirror, The Independent, The Times, BBC Radio Five Live, BBC
Online, The Ottawa Citizen, etc.
In the past five days I have given about seven radio interviews and been
featured in six major papers. The
real kicker was being on the main page of BBC's website, which is the homepage
for hundreds of thousands of people, which meant the story was then picked up
and broadcast globally on the BBC World News Service. The sudden spike in traffic crashed my website which meant I
couldn't check email for two days, so I just hooked up with some artists and
made some new hiphop songs in London and Brighton and ignored it. Then yesterday I finally got back
online to find a hundred and fifty emails from random people around the world,
including enquiries and requests for performances and interviews from South
Africa, Japan, New Zealand, Sweden, New York, etc.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/4721073.stm
Needless to say this couldn't have come at a better time, since I am heading up to Edinburgh tomorrow to begin performing in the Festival there and need all the help I can get to fill up my shows. I will be doing my show every afternoon at 5 pm from the 3rd until the 29th of August in central Edinburgh. Thankfully Erik will be up there with me again this year on the technical and promotional support. There have been some other fascinating new developments that I will save for a future email, since they aren't finalized yet and I want to avoid more fishy stories like the one about the Queen back in May. I am also not trying to discourage any of you from writing me by trumpeting my sudden email load. It has calmed down considerably now and I still appreciate the support and encouragement I get from my friends, more than ever in fact. I know media attention is a fickle thing by nature so I'm not going to take the fad for granted; I'm just glad for the timing.
baba
http://www.cantabphotos.com/view.php?album=claude/050619180518