Hip-hop artists giving back to community
A team of hip-hop artists with Saskatoon ties is organizing a winter clothes giveaway as a way of giving back to the community they came from.
The Allday Music Family — a group of musicians and performers from Saskatoon and around Saskatchewan — will be giving winter gear bundles out to the first 100 kids at their event at Lions Skate Park on Saturday. The bundles will include scarves, mittens and toques.
Shelby Kelly, also known by stage name Fremo, is the president of the Allday Music Family. He said by getting out in the community and making connections with the youth of Saskatoon, the group’s members can be role models for the next generation.
“I want kids to see that there’s opportunity ... that people from the same place they’re from are able to do stuff like this and bring people together,” Kelly said. “You can do whatever you want if you have the right role models.”
Saturday ’s event isn’t only a giveaway. Group members are planning on performing a few songs out in the park for whoever shows up, as well as featuring hip-hop artist Dakota Bear — stage name Dakk’one — as a motivational speaker.
Bear has been one of the driving forces behind the community-first approach for the music group, having organized a concert and a school supply giveaway for Indigenous youth in Prince Albert.
Bear and the rest of the Allday Music Family are funding the giveaway with help from the #Risingyouth community service grants, a source of what Bear referred to as “micro grants” run through the Takingitglobal initiative to provide community funding for youth projects in Canada.
“For us, I thought it was important that since we are doing a show ... that we add an aspect to give back to the community,” Bear said.
The Allday Music Family is also tying in an album release party to their event on Sunday, but they ’ve made an effort to continue engaging young people in Saskatoon by making it an all-ages concert.
The show is being billed as a Halloween party, which will include a monetary prize for best costume and a “candy buffet.”
Bear said he hopes they’ll be able to fill the banquet room at the Heritage Inn in Saskatoon where they’re having the show.
He said that the group wants to keep reaching out to the community and finding new ways to give back.
After the album release party, Bear said the next step will be figuring out the next best way to provide for the youth in Saskatoon as best they can.
“I’m hoping to empower them,” he said. “When we come together as a group, even the smallest acts can have great impacts ... this experience will be positive for them.”