CCCADI’s 6th annual AFRIBEMBÉ FESTIVAL joins forces with Harlem Week to elevate the African Diaspora's legacy of preserving our traditions across time and place through powerful musical performances anchored in Rhythms of Home, paying tribute to our ancestors and the Motherland, our freedom home of Haiti - the first independent Black nation, and our current home of Harlem.
FREE - Registration not required.
For Harlem Week’s Full Schedule of Activities Visit:
https://harlemweek.com/
AFRIBEMBÉ TAKES THE STAGE AT HARLEM WEEK!
This year our annual Pan-African celebration is presented in partnership with Harlem Week! As Harlem Week celebrates 50 years as a historic cultural movement, we at CCCADI recognize the significance of this moment for our community and as such have decided to bring AFRIBEMBÉ to Harlem Week’s main stage at Grant’s Tomb for “A Great Day in Harlem” on August 11 from 4:30 - 6:30 PM.
COMMUNITY ALIGNMENT
As an East Harlem-based institution dedicated to advancing cultural equity and racial and social justice for African descendant communities, CCCADI celebrates Harlem Week’s milestone and identifies with its original mission established five decades ago: to galvanize community leaders to preserve the spirit of Harlem.
Our visions and communities are aligned. Since 2019, CCCADI’s annual AFRIBEMBÉ festival has served as an opportunity for us to rejoice in our Diasporic creativity, intellectuality, and musicality, remembering our shared roots.
As we join Harlem Week to Celebrate the Journey, we know that our histories are interwoven. The journey of Harlem Week is a continuation of the journey of Black excellence in Harlem 40 years prior, and the resilience, beauty and cultural preservation of our ancestors before that.
CCCADI’s Afribembé is born out of the legacy of El Festival de Santiago Apóstol en El Barrio also known as the Loiza Festival in El Barrio. This Harlem festival celebrated the traditions of the town of Loiza, Puerto Rico, one of the most African influenced towns on the island. While the celebration in Loiza is of the town's patron saint, it is a festival that elevates, preserves, and represents African traditions in Puerto Rico.
The Loiza Festival in El Barrio, created by Aida Perez & Los Hermanos Fraternos de Loiza, brought the same essence to NYC for 50 years. They left our community a beautiful legacy that inspired the creation of our AFRIBEMBÉ FESTIVAL: a celebration of our African Diasporic traditions that bond and bind us as one.
ARTISTS
AFRIBEMBÉ
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Something Positive, Inc. is a not-for-profit, arts and education organization dedicated to the art and culture of the African Diaspora and its cross-cultural influences through performance and education. Utilizing a unique blend of poetry, storytelling, theater, music and dance, Something Positive specializes in multi-media performance art presentations. The company collaborates with several organizations including the Caribbean Cultural Center, and Brooklyn Arts Council (BAC). Something Positive believes that “culture is our finest resource” and we have been continuously praised for “successfully incorporating culture and education with entertainment.”
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Meet K.R.3T's (Keep Rising To The Top), a dance company that has been launching the careers of top-performing dance professionals for more than 30 years in East Harlem. K.R.3T'S has trained more 5000 students in hip-hop, mambo, African, Latin, house, hustle, ballet, bachata, and many other styles of dance. The artistic development students receive through KR3Ts has catapulted many careers as professional choreographers and dancers.
K.R.3T's alumni have performed on world tours with artists such as Beyoncé, Rihanna, Chris Brown, Pitbull, Jennifer Lopez, Usher, Kanye West, Kelly Rowland, Missy Elliot, Lady Gaga, Jason Derulo, Cardi B, 50cents, and Arianna Grande.
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Felipe Luciano is an Emmy Award–winning journalist, news anchor, and former adjunct professor at Fordham University. He is the co-founder and chairman of the Young Lords Party, a member of The Original Last Poets, an advocate for inter-ethnic communication, and the host of “Latin Roots,” a Latino music program in New York City. A talented diversity speaker, Luciano is committed to community empowerment, ethnic pride, and civil rights. He is a regular contributor to many New York–area newspapers and magazines, including The New York Times and Essence. His poetry has appeared in anthologies such as Puerto Rican Poetry: An Anthology from Aboriginal to Contemporary Time.
Luciano is an acclaimed poet and political activist who advocates for the Latino population of New York City, and for kids growing up in the same circumstances he did. Sparing no one—not the revolutionaries, the Revolution, nor the author himself—Flesh and Spirit is written with honesty and humility to help guide young people of color and other Americans through the labyrinths of ideology, organization, missteps, false paths, and phony societal promises. Luciano’s memoir Flesh and Spirit, paints a vivid portrait of his life in New York City; chronicling a Black Puerto Rican man’s transformation from an incarcerated gang member to the Co-Founder of the Young Lords Party and The Last Poets.
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Kongo-Haitian Roots Music, a Brooklyn-based group of Haitian artists, musicians, and activists, operates from the conviction that the artist must represent the community and organize people to bring about positive change. Sanba lead vocalist Öneza Lafontant, a native of Baconois (Bakonwa) in southwest Haiti, founded Kongo in 1995. Like the people of his hometown, Mr. Lafontant aims to keep the Ginen African tradition of Vodou alive.
Kongo collaborates with talented musicians and choreographers, using drumming, percussion, guitar, dance, storytelling, and songs of struggle to engage the community. The group performs with a 6-9 piece a cappella (acoustics) band, featuring traditional African Haitian rhythms, songs, and vocals, sometimes accompanied by dance. KONGO—also the name of an African tribe brought to Haiti—offers a blend of a cappella interspersed with percussion and acoustic accents, staying true to its African roots.
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Sabine Blaizin, DJ, Music Producer, and Event Curator, is a prominent DJ and cultural advocate focused on African diasporic music. Founder of Oyasound Productions which merges traditional rhythms with electronic music, she spins a diverse mix of Global Soul, including House, Afrotech, Afrobeat, and Haitian Roots.
With over 15 years in the music scene, she's had the great opportunity to spin nationally in the US in NYC, Atlanta, St. Louis, Memphis, Chicago, Omaha, Boston, New Orleans, Miami, LA/Oakland, NJ, Washington DC, Dallas, Denver and internationally in Canada, Senegal, Haiti, Cuba, London, Paris, Bordeaux, Amsterdam, & Mexico. Thus, she has made significant contributions that solidified her reputation as a key figure in the music industry. She is renowned for her innovative projects like Brooklyn Mecca, a monthly event celebrated as the home of "Grassroots Dance Culture”; Cumbancha, which features African-inspired rhythms in House, Soul, and Latin music; and Rekòlte: A Night of Haitian Roots & House. She also took part in residencies at notable venues like Le Bain (Standard Hotel), Soho House, and House of Yes NYC and music label Fania Records.
She continues to influence the scene with her creative vision and dedication to cultural advocacy. As an activist, Sabine continuously celebrates and elevates the cultural heritage and artistic evolution of the African Diaspora. In this capacity, she is the Director of Programs at the Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute. Sabine ultimately seeks to create new scholarship through the African and Haitian diasporic lens of music, culture and spirituality.
VENDORS
If you are interested in joining the festivities as a vendor, please visit:
AFRIBEMBÉ
The word Bembé is an African word carried throughout the Diaspora with various meanings. From drumming, to rhythm, to party, we utilize the word Bembé as one of terms that connects our Diaspora together in music, joy and community.
This event is rain or shine. Please note all events are subject to change.
AFRIBEMBÉ is made possible by:
New York City Department of Cultural Affairs - Coalition for Theaters of Color, the New York City Council, Ford Foundation, Gilman Foundation, Mellon Foundation, and the Open Society Foundations.