On Saturday, May 17th 2008 we will be hosting the 3rd Annual Bumrush the Boards Hip Hop Chess Tournament at Lincoln Middle School in Washington, DC. The tournament will include 5 rounds of chess with sections for both youth and adults. There will also be workshops and exhibition taking throughout the day on Rocking, Toasting, Visual Arts, Poetry, Graffiti, Chess, and more. Best of all, the event is free and open to the public.

Bum Rush the Boards, the world’s first hip-hop chess tournament, was created to promote the idea of strategic struggle to the hip-hop generation. There was a logical connection between Chess and Hip-Hop considering the fact that hip-hop as a culture is highly competitive. By connecting hip-hop to chess, we have created a chess tournament that exposes youth to a culture (hip-hop) and a science (chess) that requires them to think ahead, manage talent and size up their adversary. These same skills, when properly applied, are also very useful in business and in life.

Bum Rush the Boards dares to ask the questions; “What happens when a pawn becomes a King or Queen?”, “What happens when a pawn knows that he or she can be more and see’s for the first time that they can ultimately be the most powerful player in the game?”. Bum Rush the Boards harnesses the power of hip-hop culture and the science of chess to open the minds of a generation to a host of new options the world has available to them.

I want to share with you all a fantastic event that I am involved in. Last year I was asked to write a song about chess for Bum Rush the Boards - a hip-hop chess tournament held in Washington DC by the hip-hop journal Words, Beats & Life. The song, ‘War & Pieces: Wise’s Gambit’, is now the official song of the annual event which will be held for the 3rd time in May.Here is a short video featuring the song, you can hear the whole song at myspace.com/thewize and I am currently in Washington DC where we are hoping to do some filming for a full length music video.

For more information feel free to contact me via email at 2tone(at)wblinc.org. Also, see footage from last year’s event at wblinc.org.