Event is 21+
Jamarhl Crawford comes from a legacy four generations deep in Boston, Massachusetts. Born and raised in an artistic family in the section known as Roxbury, he was exposed at an early age to all forms of music and live talent. His grandmother “Wini” was a renowned tap dancer having performed with the likes of Lena Horne, Diahann Carroll, Jimmy Slyde, Redd Foxx, and a young Gregory and Maurice Hines throughout her travels throughout the US and Canada.
Jamarhl was exposed to a rich history in the area and his was the first Black family on the street when his grandparents purchased their home on “H-Block” in 1948. Young Jamarhl attended the esteemed Elma Lewis School of Fine Arts, which, in the 1970s, was the Black Boston version of Fame, learning dance, drama, singing, music, sewing, history, and more. It was here that he first became inspired and started poetry and rhyming at the early age of ten. In the mid-late 80’s he took the name “UNO The Prophet” and was heavily influenced by Public Enemy, Rakim, X-Clan, and Poor Righteous Teachers, and later by The Last Poets, Bob Marley, Jacob Miller, and Peter Tosh, among others.
Over the past three decades, Jamarhl has featured at hundreds of poetry & hip-hop shows and performed with and opened for The Last Poets, Poor Righteous Teachers, Public Enemy, Dead Prez, Sonia Sanchez, Amiri Baraka, and more. He has toured with Les Nubians, performing at BB King’s, Smithsonian Museum, Atlanta Black Arts Festival, and the 2000 Transmusicales Festival in Rennes, France. In 2002, Jamarhl opened the JAM’N 94.5 Summer Jam in Boston for a crowd of 20,000 people.
