Funk Jazz Kafé is not about ‘celebrity’ as much as it is about ‘celebrating’ Black culture

Written by | Ray Cornelius

After taking a seven-year break, The Funk Jazz Kafé Arts and Music Festival is back!  The event, in conjunction with a screening of Funk Jazz Kafé: Diary of a Decade,  kicks off the National Black Arts Festival’s three-month long celebration beginning this weekend in Atlanta, GA.

Funk Jazz Kafé Arts and Music Festival is an amalgamation of art, culture, health/beauty and dance not to mention the various surprise musical artists that may grace the main stage like India.Arie, Jill Scott, Musiq Soul Child and Omar. However, FJK founder and creator, Jason Orr, is not so focused on satisfying the audience’s hunger for “popular music” or “celebrity” as he is with offering audiences a diverse “color palette” of African-American artistry.

“It’s a celebration of our ancestral culture, the things that we have done to celebrate our spirituality and our artistic capabilities. It’s probably one of the only events in the world that combines all of these things in one night, celebrated by music. A lot of people have a misconception that Funk Jazz Kafé Arts and Music Festival is a concert but I have to start being very clear that this is not  a concert,” says Orr.

“It’s an arts and music festival. But because of the rising cultures of ‘celebrity,’ people tend to gravitate towards that ‘feed me’ mentality of ‘Who’s next?’ and ‘What’s next?’ That’s been a problem and we’re just trying to be a solution to balancing out the cultures.”

In addition to the arts and music festival, there is also a VIP screening of Funk Jazz Kafé: Diary of Decade (The Story of a Movement),  the award-winning indie film which chronicles the beginnings of The Funk Jazz Kafé Arts and Music Festival. It features commentary from a bevy of musical talents that have played FJK including Jill Scott, Janelle Monae, Common, and Erykah Badu. Check out the trailer below:

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Diary of a Decade  plays tonight at 7 p.m. at the Southwest Arts Center and The Funk Jazz Kafé Arts & Music Festival  is Saturday, July 13 at The Tabernacle.

Click here to purchase tickets.