By Alanah Nichole Davis
Special to the AFRO
Fifty years ago, in 1976, what began as the Afro-American Exposition at Baltimore’s Charles Center and Hopkins Plaza has grown into the beloved Afro-American Festival, or AFRAM for short. Like many of Baltimore’s festivals, it has moved locations over the years, but its spirit and purpose have not changed: AFRAM is a celebration of Black culture.
This Juneteenth weekend, Baltimoreans from East to West Baltimore and everywhere in between will once again gather for live performances and local Black businesses. But for many, including hosts, organizers and festivalgoers who’ve watched AFRAM evolve over five decades, this golden anniversary is as much about looking back as it is about celebrating. That nostalgia isn’t only the subject of a new documentary, “AFRAM 50: A Celebration of Us,” produced by a women-led team of Baltimore-based creatives that plans to take viewers on a journey through the festival’s rich history. It’s also the subject of this roundup.
Mayor Brandon M. Scott, who gave his blessing to the documentary, told this writer that with so many attacks on and attempts to erase Black history and Black culture, the community must tell its own stories.
“We have the responsibility and the capability of telling our own story, our own history, where we are about our culture and moving it forward in this moment,” Scott said passionately. “It’s critically important that we do that.”
So who better to share their memories of AFRAM’s past than the Baltimoreans who lived it? Take April Watts, a beloved local media personality who remembers hosting the festival alongside Ladawn Black in 2016.
“Baltimore holds many festivals but AFRAM is a citywide family reunion. It feels like home,” Watts said.
Here’s what AFRAM feels like for six other Baltimoreans who’ve watched the festival grow.
Brandon M. Scott
Mayor, City of Baltimore
“My first memory of AFRAM is being there with my older cousin. I guess it was just the feeling that you always get when you go to AFRAM, right? You feel like it’s this big Baltimore family reunion. But I just remember listening to–not just the music–but remember they used to have a ferris wheel. Just remember eating the food, and I remember everyone just having a good time. That’s the number one thing you get from AFRAM–everyone’s there enjoying themselves. Just so many memories over the years like the performances that I’ve gotten to see. I’ve seen LL Cool J, Patti LaBelle twice now, Doug E. Fresh, SWV, which this would be the second time they’re coming up, like you name it. To see the Isleys, The O’Jays, Busta Rhymes. Then seeing some artists that I loved when they were first getting started, right, I remember seeing Little Brother on the B stage down at Camden Yards. Now to see their evolution and to have a personal relationship with Phonte and Pooh, it’s a crazy thing to look back on now.”
Noni Robinson
Founder, Robinson Nutrition Group
“As a Baltimore transplant since around 1997–that’s when I moved to Baltimore–I was searching for community connections and overall sense of belonging. So, what I found in AFRAM was all of that and more. So, for nearly three decades I would say AFRAM has been more than a festival to me, it’s been like a homecoming, you know? I kind of think of my homecoming experience at my dear HBCU. AFRAM is a homecoming. It’s a place where generations gather. Where Black culture is celebrated. Where the richness of our history, music, food, art and entrepreneurship are all on full display.
As a transplant, AFRAM really helped me understand the heartbeat of Baltimore. And being a resident of Baltimore for so long, you begin to see immediately the city’s resilience and creativity and deep sense of pride. You feel that when you attend Afram, and year after year, I’ve watched families create traditions. Like we say, ‘Hey, you going to AFRAM? What day are you going? Where are we going to meet up?’”
“I think of one of my favorite AFRAM experiences, I think it was 2014. One of my most favorite R&B groups is Mint Condition. I can visualize myself swooning, sweating and smiling at Camden Yards. It just felt so great. I think it’s not by mistake that AFRAM is always extremely hot and beautiful at the same time, but that particular experience stands out for me. I felt like a young woman, like just about to pass out in excitement from fangirling.”
I think AFRAM definitely has grown from a festival into a cultural touchstone and a symbol of Black excellence. So celebrating its 50th anniversary is especially meaningful because it continues to mirror Baltimore’s story, a story of culture, legacy and perseverance.”
Fred Watkins
Comedian and Founder, Little Laughs
“My older brother’s girlfriend used to live across the street, whatever that street is right in front of Druid Hill Park …if you keep going, you will hit my Mondawmin and all that. So for Stone Soul Picnic and AFRAM, we would go to her house early, so we could just walk over and catch the bus over there, or catch a hack over there, and then walk across the street. It was always hot. Sometimes we made our own food to bring over, you know, for the picnic. We did all that good stuff too. family centric, all the kids would be out there running around. Never really knew the artist then when we were younger. We just knew it was a vibe. I would only go up there for the AFRAM and Stone Soul picnic, and you know, with my family.
My first time hosting AFRAM in 2017. I hosted the main stage, a part of it. Being from Baltimore and having that opportunity to be a part of it, that was dope. The whole entire experience– riding in the golf cart, getting that nice treatment–you know, being the son of Baltimore, you know that was different. It stuck out as a forever memory.”
Raven Paris 34
Founder, CEOs evolve
“My first AFRAM memory is with my mom and her friend. I had to be about five or six years old, because literally I was too big to be in a stroller, and she was pushing me, because it was hot outside and I didn’t want to walk. Back in the day there used to be people everywhere, and they used to have photo photo booths set up, like all on the sidewalks, and there’s literally like this photo of us being taken. I just remember the live music, good food and a bunch of people out down Druid Hill Park.”
“Now fast forward, I actually ended up hosting AFAM twice. The first year I hosted, that was the year that Carl Thomas performed, Jacquees performed, and I remember I got to interview them under the media tent which was super cool–on behalf of WBAL, because you know I was there to host, but they needed the correspondent. Hosting on the stage alongside Lil’ Black and DJ Quicksilva. It’s like another full circle moment that I feel like I was able to have. From being young and going here with my mom and her daisy dukes, to hosting.”
Maya Gilmore
Executive Director, Mayor’s Office of Cable and Communications (Charm TV)
“I will say my fondest memory was, of course, working the festival and that was when in 2024 Mayor Scott did a proclamation for House Music Day. That was significant to me because I feel like house music, which was always this underground genre of music in Baltimore, had been forgotten because club music kind of took over as Baltimore sound, but we were pioneering in house music. Even if it was born in Chicago, Baltimore kind of took house music, stripped it down, made it gritty and it became our own sound.”
“So it was very important to me as I learned the history of that music to honor those people who really did amazing things–and I mean Grammy Award-winning people who were really just doing their thing, and who are honored and beloved across the world, especially in Europe, but in Baltimore we don’t honor them the same way. We were able to honor Wayne Davis, who is considered the Godfather of Baltimore House. We were able to honor the Basement Boys who produced the infamous Gypsy woman, which is the number one house music song in the world, and we were able to have Crystal Waters come and perform it. giving those people those flowers in terms of preserving Baltimore’s history, Baltimore’s black history. I think that it’s important to really acknowledge and celebrate the people who built, shaped and transformed the city in the face of so many systemic barriers, and so I think that Afram is just a culmination of us coming together and celebrating us, hence the title of the film, “AFRAM 50, A Celebration of Us.”
Tia Goodson
Create Baltimore, Chief Marketing and Programs Officer
“Now it’s crazy, I’m Baltimore, born and raised, I go to every festival, Latino Fest, Greek Fest, right? I’ve gone to every AFRAM that I could possibly go to, but the one, for some reason, that always sticks out in my mind is when it was at the stadium parking lots. I don’t know if it’s because I was in peak young adulthood my independence move around freely in the way that I wanted to, and I wasn’t there with my parents. But I remember that one because I looked around and saw people I knew working on the festival…I just remember being able to, for the first time, see a festival like that from behind the scenes, kind of like where I am now, and being able to look out into what looked like a massive crowd of people, and sit back and soak in like the beauty of that from the stage.”
“Both perspectives are very interesting, but when you have some level of connection to the thing that’s happening, and you look out and you’re like, dag, all these people just came out for this thing that I’m somehow connected to. It’s a very humbling moment, but it’s also beautiful to see the city in that way. Folks gathered together for the sake of having a good time.”
This article has been edited for brevity and clarity.
