KUUMBA Events and Communications was initially conceived as a parent company for the DJ service then named De Cliff Music.  As our affinity for Afrikan history, culture and activism grew, the decision was made to rename the DJ company KUUMBASound, and then later KUUMBAMusic.  At the same time, we began to diversify into the areas of community organizing, and seeing the need for information that provided perspectives to the community that differed from that of the mainstream press, KUUMBAReport was founded in 1997.

Over the next 14 years and 44 issues, KUUMBAReport explored issues such as Afrikan history, the history of struggle of many Afrikan and South American civilizations, the plight of the Political Prisoners of the United States, the scourge of police brutality and misconduct, issues of global war and resistance, Afrikan-centered business, culture as an organizing tool, grassroots movements that struggle for the people, and related subjects.  Our travels have taken us to Plymouth, Massachusetts for the “National Day of Mourning” Indigenous protest of Thanksgiving, to New Orleans to chronicle the impact of Hurricane Katrina and the ensuing struggle of the people there against efforts to exclude them as the city recovered from the disaster, and to various other locations across the United States as we attended conferences and conventions centered on the people’s struggle.  In 2011, the written version of KUUMBAReport was discontinued, but the work lived on, first through a weekly radio show on the Internet station Harambee Radio, and now with the Web site KUUMBAReport Online (http://kuumbareport.com).

Through all of this, we were consistently struck by the degree to which culture helped soothe the wounds of struggle among a people and how a community’s minds, bodies and souls could be replenished and energized by embracing the culture of their community and ancestors.  This brought us back to music again, only now also with the aim of facilitating and sponsoring events that use culture to provide uplift to the community, in particular to the Afrikan-American and Global Afrikan community of which I am a product.

Thus, our focus here at KUUMBA Events and Communications is to provide means of lifting up our communities through music, event planning and communication through journalistic endeavors.  As we move forward from this point, we will be seeking an increasing number of outlets through which we might contribute to the well-being of our community — through our DJ Service, KUUMBASound, through events that we plan or assist others in promoting, or through information services like KUUMBAReport Online.