TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Hip hop DJ pioneer Grandmaster Flash wins Polar Music Prize
Grandmaster Flash on Wednesday shared Sweden's Polar Music Prize with German violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter and US charity Playing for Change Foundation.
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
American hip hop recording artist and DJ, Grandmaster Flash arrives for the traditional Clive Davis party on the eve of the 60th Annual Grammy Awards on January 28, 2018, in New York. (AFP/Jewel Samad)
G
randmaster Flash, one of the pioneers of hip hop and DJ music, on Wednesday shared Sweden's Polar Music Prize with German violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter and US charity Playing for Change Foundation.
Third Laureate announced: congratulations Grandmaster Flash, Laureate of the Polar Music Prize 2019!#polarmusicprize #thepowerofmusic #award #2019 #GrandmasterFlash
— Polar Music Prize (@Polarmusicprize) February 13, 2019The winners will each receive one million Swedish kronor (95,700 euros, $108,000) at a gala in Stockholm on June 11 in the presence of King Carl XVI Gustaf.
Grandmaster Flash, whose real name is Joseph Saddler, is best known for his 1982 hit "The Message" about inner city violence, drugs, and poverty, and for developing DJ techniques such as scratching, backspinning and punch phrasing.
The 60-year-old is the first hip hop artist to win the award.
"Grandmaster Flash is a scientist and a virtuoso who has demonstrated that turntables and mixing consoles can be musical instruments," the jury said.
"His adventures at the turntables – 'the Adventures of the Wheels of Steel' – changed the course of popular music."
Grandmaster Flash, who with his Furious Five group were the first hip hop act inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2007, said in a statement that winning the Polar Music Prize was "such an honor, because a lot of times in our culture, what we do as DJs gets overlooked".
The Playing for Change Foundation was honored for providing music and arts education to underprivileged children around the world.
The jury hailed the global project with 15 music schools and programs around the world for having "impacted the lives of over 15,000 children and their surrounding communities".
Read also: Hip-hop turns 40 -- and its parents are beaming with pride
"The Playing For Change Foundation shows how music can be used to inspire, build bridges between people, create positive change, and conditions for peace."
The jury also honored four-time Grammy Award winning violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter.
"For more than 40 years the German violinist has thrilled audiences around the world with her virtuosity and astonishing clarity," it said.
"With her Stradivarius under her chin, Anne-Sophie Mutter is not just one passionate and risk-taking musician -– she is also a storyteller."
She also runs two charities helping young musicians.
The Polar Music Prize was established in 1989 by the late Stig Anderson, best known as the manager of Swedish pop superstars ABBA, and selects two or three laureates each year.
The prize's stated goal is to "break down musical boundaries by bringing together people from all the different worlds of music".
Past laureates have included Metallica, the Afghan National Institute of Music, Sting, Bob Dylan, Bjork, Sonny Rollins and Ravi Shankar and Dizzy Gillespie.
