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Devine Carama. Photo by Tamara Watson
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The music of Lexington’s Devine Carama can be described as “hip hop with a conscience” – rather than promoting drugs or violence, his lyrics tend to focus on themes of family, love and faith. Photo furnished
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With his extensive community work, the artist combines his love for music and poetry with his passions for youth empowerment and social justice. Photo furnished
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Carama's newest album "Kingtucky" is about inspiring the next generation to take their 'pen game' to the next level. Photo furnished
Hip hop artist Devine Carama has just welcomed a new album, “Kingtucky,” and a new baby into the world, and he claims to be both proud and tired. Both album and baby debuted in October, and while that might seem like a lot in one month, Carama – who additionally serves as Youth Services Coordinator for the Community Action Council, runs a nonprofit organization that he founded and has a wife and three older children at home – is used to having a lot of balls in the air.
While Carama’s talent for poetry emerged when he wrote his first rhyme at age 16, for many years words were a hobby and athletics were Carama’s primary focus – he was drafted by the Cleveland Indians in 2001, playing in their minor league system until a shoulder injury ended his baseball career in 2004. Writing music soon became a more serious focus, with Carama having released more than a dozen albums and EPs in the past decade, and having collaborated with or shared a bill with industry giants who include Nappy Roots, L.L. Cool J., De La Soul and J. Cole. In recent years the artist has increasingly been been shifting his focus to combine his love of music and writing with his passions for social justice and youth empowerment – a tract that came into full fruition with an interactive classroom presentation called “The Power of Words,” which Carama created in 2014 after being asked to speak at Bryan Station Middle School about hip hop and poetry.
“I’d never done anything like it before,” Carama said. “I presented to eight classes that day – by class five I had started to mentally put ‘Power of Words’ together.”
Since that first speaking engagement, Carama has presented “The Power of Words” to more than 5,000 youth at over 100 colleges, juvenile detention centers, alternative schools and middle and high schools. The presentation, which covers topics such as bullying, imagery presented in popular music and leadership development, all filtered through the prism of hip hop and poetry, ultimately served as the genesis of Carama’s nonprofit organization, Believing in Forever. With a mission to inspire and motivate youth through art, education and community service, and to encourage young people to consider both their purpose and their legacy, the non-profit serves as an umbrella organization for a successful group of youth programs. Among those programs include “Poetry in Motion Youth,” an open mic that provides a platform for children to express themselves through poetry, hip hop and spoken word, and “Sons of Single Mothers,” a mentorship program that connects community leaders with boys who lack an adult male in their home.
Believing in Forever doesn’t limit itself strictly to youth empowerment, however – earlier this year, Carama organized two trips to Flint, Michigan, to deliver bottled water during the city’s severe water crisis.
“I have strong connections to the area through the hip hop community, as many hip hop artists are from that region, and I felt compelled to help,” said Carama. After putting out a call to his Lexington networks to solicit donations of water, the first delivery left Lexington in a 26-foot truck filled with bottled water; however, the donations continued to pour in so steadily that a second trip required two 26-foot trucks and a semi. With thousands of gallons of water collected in partnership with local churches, businesses and schools, the project provided an opportunity to involve local youth in an urgent cause.
This winter, Carama has been working diligently on another program, “A Coat to Keep the Cold Away.” The program started in 2014 after Carama and his wife noticed some children without coats at the bus stop that winter.
“I asked one of the girls she wasn’t wearing her coat,” said Carama. “She told me that she needed a new one, but her mom couldn’t afford the coat until the next month.”
In its first year, the coat drive collected about 100 coats; that number increased exponentially in 2015, with over 500 coats distributed that year to children in Lexington and the surrounding areas. This year, the program has expanded in Kentucky to include Harrodsburg, Bonnieville, Salyersville, Whitley City, McKee and Manchester – some of which are among the poorest towns in the nation. Through the program, parents can request coats, hats and gloves specifically in the sizes needed for their children, and each child is given a brand new coat that fits correctly and has never been worn.
“We want to give each child a new coat purchased specifically for her or him – many of these children have never owned anything new, and having a brand new coat that no one has ever worn is special,” explained Carama, whose ultimate dream for the program is to collect enough resources that coats can be purchased and distributed throughout the winter, rather than just during the holiday season. Believing in Forever accepts financial donations for the program, using all funds to purchase coats in the requested sizes and eliminating the problem of leftover coats that don’t match any requested sizes.
COAT DRIVE UPDATE: After receiving an eleventh hour request for 130 coats for an Eastern Kentucky school, Devine Carama has extended the deadline for donations for his 2016 winter coat drive through Friday, Dec. 1. Donations can be sent via PayPal to the phone number 859-303-2637.
Carama credits his parents for inspiring him to contribute to his community in so many ways – he says his father was not only engaged in his life, but also donated time as a youth baseball coach for many years.
“Seeing the impact he made on so many people’s lives inspired me to want to make a similar impact one day,” Carama said. “I watched my parents work together to take us from humble beginnings to a house in a good neighborhood – it was inspiring and showed me what hard work could do.”
Carama’s own experience as a father has fueled his passion for engaging youth in a positive light – a foundation that has become the basis for much of his work, both in the community and in his music. As far as the hip hop genre goes, Carama’s music is decidedly different – he strives to be compelling and relevant without incorporating the lyrical focus on drugs, material possessions and sex that tends to permeate so much of the genre.
“With so much negativity in the mainstream sectors of the rap game, I refuse to acquiesce to those trends,” he said. “Having my first two daughters at an early age, I wanted to create music that uplifted and inspired them.
“My music is a direct reflection of my life and my mission,” Carama added. “It’s very easy for me to just pen my life.”
Sheisty Khrist and Devine Carama present “A Cold Winter in Kingtucky”
Dec. 16, 9 p.m.
Al’s Bar, 601 North Limestone St.
Devine Carama will perform songs off his new album, “Kingtucky,” alongside fellow local hip hop artists Sheisty Khrist, who will perform songs off his album “A Cold Winter.” DJ JK-47 will spin classic ‘90s hip hop throughout the evening.
For more information on Believing in Forever, visit www.believinginforever.com. To listen to Devine Carama’s music or purchase his albums, visit www.devinecarama.bandcamp.com.