A wise duo once said “Alright stop, collaborate and listen”, and while I may be pushing it a little by quoting Vanilla Ice in an article about a hip hop festival, I can’t think of a more applicable lyric for this city’s barrier breaking venture coming up this weekend.

The Hip Hop Festival, which is set to boom-shake-shake-shake the room this coming Saturday, is another example of a fusion between the local community and music – and this time with the added accompaniment of break dancing, graffiti art and DJing.

Show director and host Adrian Blackstock is pumped to get it started. “A big part of my job was organising the cultural direction of the show. It was important for us to incorporate all elements of hip hop – the graffiti, dance and products are equally as important as the rapping.”

This type of festival is a first for Shenzhen, and follows the successful Blues and Folk event, which is set to make a highly anticipated comeback this year. Despite the “tricky, tricky, tricky” task of pulling this all together (that’s the last one I promise) it seems the team are now focused on the performance ahead.

Adrian added, “We made the decision to do this in December and it’s been a real team effort, with everyone spit balling ideas from the start. I’m anxious but excited about making this happen. It will just be good to put on a show and see people enjoy themselves.”

And enjoy themselves they shall! Set in the beautiful F518 area of Bao Bao, the festival boasts superb musical talent from all over the world in addition to the involvement of local artists and businesses.

The event is being put on by Shenzhen Local Music, and is supported by The Nanfang. We’ll see you there!

Event details here.