Category: ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

It’s been 20 years since the world was first introduced to the cast of “In Living Color,” but many of the show’s alums have gone on to dominate Hollywood in film, TV and comedy. The series, created and written by Keenan and Damon Wayans, launched the careers of Jaime Foxx, Jim Carey, David Alan Grier, […]

On Aug. 28, the Benning Neighborhood Library will be transformed into a musical epicenter, where chamber music and jazz converge in selections crafted by famed Weather Report bassist Andrew Nathaniel White III. The Georgetown Quintet will perform White’s “Three Jazz Parodies” for woodwind quintet and alto saxophone and “Sinfonia/Adagio/Badinerie” along with other selections. Heard on […]

In today’s hip hop landscape, women are usually the bodies before the camera rather than the emcees behind the mic—but it wasn’t always that way. In the fledgling days of hip hop pioneering female artists such as MC Lyte, Missy Elliott, and Queen Latifah helped define and reshape the music. Some three decades after the […]

LisaRaye McCoy and film and television star Mehki Phifer will co-host the NAACP’s 20th celebration of thespians of color, 7 p.m. Aug. 30 at the Director’s Guild of America in Los Angeles. Under the auspices of the NAACP Beverly Hills/ Hollywood Branch, the Annual NAACP Theatre Awards will, this year, honor director and producer Kenny […]

Two renowned music artists have joined Dudley’s B Sharp Music Academy, adding to the company’s roster of professional musical instrument instructors. Eugene Chapman, a Sykesville, Md., native and Morgan State University graduate, comes to Dudley’s as a saxophone instructor. He has performed with R&B artists Erykah Badu and Robin Thicke and was a member of […]

Jada Pinkett Smith, star of the television drama “HawthoRNe,” did not continue using the show’s original medical advisory team at the close of the series’ first season in 2009 following her mother’s detailed criticism of the team’s medical techniques. Pinkett Smith’s mother, Adrienne Banfield-Jones is the head nurse of an inner city Baltimore clinic. A […]

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Hearing Brittney Wright declare “I Win” in her recent single release is inspiring and convincing that everyone can be an “overcomer” through the power of the gospel. It is merely a foretaste of her first album, The Beginning, to be released Aug. 24. Wright is a hard-working preacher’s kid who believes the message she sings […]

It’s been five years, and many sections of New Orleans are still reeling from Hurricane Katrina’s wrath. Famed director Spike Lee returned to the Crescent City for a four-hour documentary, If God is Willing and Da Creek Don’t Rise,which examines the aftermath of Katrina and two distinct events – the 2010 Super Bowl victory and […]

Gospel music is ingrained in the fabric of American culture and is particularly precious to African Americans, whose ancestors sang songs of heartache and jubilee during slavery. This music became a gift to future generations of Americans and proliferated into jazz, the blues and modern day soul music. At times, the essence of gospel music […]

At a makeshift recording studio inside a Fort Washington dwelling known as “Da House” to local emcees, a rapper is positioning himself for his nine-to-five. He takes two pulls on his cigarette, motions a quick cue to his producer, and now he’s ready for work. He lines up the microphone, clears his throat and lays […]

In a night that celebrated excellence in dance, Washington, D.C.’s Manzari Brothers, a fêted tap dancing duo, showed off their smooth moves before a national audience, Aug. 12. John and Leo Manzari earned a coveted spot to perform on the season finale of the popular Fox television show, “So You Think You Can Dance,” during […]