Hip hop is more than a musical genre; it’s a community, a comprehensive way of life and a socio-cultural movement. This is the perspective of historians like Dr. Francesca D’Amico-Cuthbert, who have devoted their careers to researching the origins and ubiquitous influence of hip hop. As a founding member of Roots Rhymes Collective, D’Amico-Cuthbert’s mission is to enshrine 50 years of history from one of the most under-documented regions in hip-hop’s international story – her hometown of Toronto.    

In conjunction with the AGO presentation of The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century, the AGO commissioned photographer Patrick Nichols to shoot a massive group portrait of 103 pioneers of Toronto hip hop. D’Amico-Cuthbert played an instrumental role in gathering the people featured in the portrait. Her post-doctoral research on the history of Toronto hip hop, its nine elements, and the culture industry gave her an encyclopedic knowledge of its key figures.  

In her various published writings, D’Amico-Cuthbert outlines the historical narrative of Toronto hip hop across four crucial decades, beginning in 1976. Breakdancing appears to be one of the culture's first art forms to gain popularity in the city in the mid-to-late 1970s. Following this, the launch of DJ Ron Nelson’s Fantastic Voyage radio show in 1983 and the explosion of Michie Mee, Maestro Fresh Wes and the Dream Warriors in the late 80s and early 90’s gave way to Toronto hip hop’s commercial rise. The golden era of Toronto hip hop in the late 90’s and 2000s produced artists like Kardinal Offishal and Choclair, and resulted in the founding of Canada’s first mainstream urban radio station Flow 93.5 in 2000. In the 2010s, Toronto hip hop became a global export when K’naan’s “Wavin Flag” was named the World Cup theme song, and Drake began his ascension into the Top 40.        

In the spirit of hip hop education, and celebrating The Culture, D’Amico-Cuthbert unpacked these four essential decades of Toronto hip hop with Foyer. 

1976-1986: Foundational Years 

Breakdancing has been identified as one of, if not the earliest known crafts practiced in the city – a history that we can trace back to 1976 through the careers of b-boys like Bobby “Spinner” Martin and Audley “Coley The Kid” Coley and crews such as Wildstyle, Zodiac, The Five Aces and Rebound Breakers. By the early 1980s, Torontonians were also seeing the work of graffiti artists like Parkdale’s Ren, Scarborough’s Graffiti Knights, and Etobicoke’s Sec on walls, in school yards and on the cars of the Scarborough Rapid Transit (RT). 

On the music front, while the earliest single we know of (“Ladies Delight”) was recorded in 1979 by Mr. Q at Monica’s, by the top of the 1980s, partygoers would largely experience hip hop DJing at high school dances, basement parties and blockos via popular sound systems such as Sunshine Sound, Chic Dynasty, TKO and Killowatt Sound. Audiences would also hear many of the city’s earliest emcees at these public events – talents such as Butch Lee, K-4ce, Michie Mee, and Lady P. By 1982, Ivan Berry and Rupert Gayle founded Beat Factory – Toronto’s first independent hip hop music label. 

September 1985, taken by Trax of The Graffiti Knights

A year later, in 1983, DJ Ron Nelson would take to the college airwaves at Toronto Metropolitan University (then Ryerson Polytechnical Institute) with “Fantastic Voyage” – a ground-breaking radio show that aired Saturday afternoons on CKLN-FM. And while the live music scene was blossoming, by 1984, breakdancing was already finding its way to television following the Crunchie competition at the Canadian National Exhibition, where the city’s breakdancers competed for placement in a Cadbury commercial promoting the Crunchie chocolate bar.  

1986-1996: Commercial Rise  

By 1986, Nelson had also become a well-known figure in the concert promotion circle – having staged a series of multi-artist concerts – prime of which were his Monster Jams and the infamous “New York Invades Toronto” series which pit local talents such as Rumble and Strong, Icy Beats and The Box That Rocks against New York City’s Boogie Down Productions and Biz Markie. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Toronto hip hop musicians began setting a number of records: in 1988, Michie Mee became the first Canadian emcee to sign a deal with a US record label; in 1989, Maestro Fresh Wes’ first single ("Let Your Backbone Slide") broke into the national Top 40 and the American Billboard chart, and DJ Jam on Strong won the first Canadian edition of the DMC World DJ Championships; in 1990, Kish became the first emcee signed directly to a major label in Canada (A&M); and in 1991, the Dream Warriors hit the Top 20 in the UK, and DJs K-Cut and Sir Scratch (of the New York City group Main Source) released their debut album Breaking Atoms which introduced the world to Nas. 

Emcees made such an impact that the Junos established the Best Rap Recording category in 1991 (with the first statuette being awarded to Maestro Fresh Wes).  Much of this visibility was due to the continued growth and influence of college radio – which, by the late 1980s and early 1990s, expanded to include shows like DJ X’s The Powermove Show and The Masterplan Show (co-founded by John “Jonbronski” Adams, Motion, DJ Power and DJ DTS at the University of Toronto).  

Image courtesy of Francesca D'Amico-Cuthbert

While radio ensured local visibility, hip hop’s introduction on television series like MuchMusic’s Soul and the City (hosted by Michael Williams), RapCity (created by Michele Geister), X-Tendamix (created and hosted by Master T), and Electric Circus, meant that Toronto artists were garnering both national and international recognition and acclaim. Through television, audiences watched artists use music videos to produce poignant political commentary – whether in the example of the 1990 protest record "Can't Repress the Cause" (a plea for greater inclusion of rap music in the mainstream) or Maestro Fresh Wes’ 1992 single “Nothin’ At All” (one of the earliest rap records to critique Canada’s anti-Blackness and anti-Indigeneity and express Black-Indigenous solidarities). 

It is also in this period that some of the city’s most well-known fashion brands come to prominence – whether that be brands such as Too Black Guys (co-founded in 1990 by Adrian Aitcheson, Robert Osbourne, and Linda Amoroso) or 100 Miles (founded by Garie Adamson). Meanwhile, in the arena of dance, duos and trios like Maurice & Bolton, Frankie & DRK, Split Personality, Jeff & Marvin (and other members of the Money in the Bank crew) began popularizing hip hop dance as back-up dancers for the likes of Michie Mee, Maestro and B Kool. 

And by 1992, breakdancing crews like Intrikit and Bag of Trix garnered the attention of the international breaking community following their creation of a uniquely Toronto technique called ‘threads.’ Finally, in the graffiti world, the form continued to spread through the work of writers like Bomba, Skam, Duro3, and Elicser, while other artists like Crazy Roc applied his style to hair in 1987 as co-founder of the legendary barber shop and hair salon Cut Creator. 

1996-2006: The Golden Era 

Often hailed as Toronto’s “Golden Era”, this decade produced some of Canada’s most noteworthy emcees  – The Circle (consisting of members such as Choclair, Saukrates, Kardinal Offishall, Solitair, and Tara Chase), Ghetto Concept, Citizen Kane, Infinite, Eternia, Monolith, Jelleestone, Red Life, k-os, Brassmunk, Down Ta Erf (and later the solo work of Mathematik), Baby Blue Soundcrew and others. 

Whether on compilation albums like Beat Factory’s Rap Essentials Volume One or their own EPs and LPs, Toronto emcees built a catalogue of classics in recordings such as Dan-e-o’s “Dear Hip Hop,” Ghetto Concept’s “Krazy World,” Kardinal Offishall’s “Bakardi Slang,” or Citizen Kane’s “Black Rain.” It’s in this era that Director X also truly made his mark directing music videos under the mentorship of Hype Williams for the likes of everyone from EPMD to DMX, Aaliyah, Sean Paul and Missy Elliot. 

On the dance side, beginning in 1995, crews like Do Dat – Toronto’s first professional hip hop dance agency – would produce several prominent choreographers in the likes of Luther Brown, Tanisha Scott and Jae Blaze. And yet, despite the heightened visibility of Toronto hip hop across and beyond Canadian borders, documentaries such as Alison Duke’s “Raisin’ Kane: A Rapumentary” (2001) highlighted the struggles that independent artists faced in the Canadian marketplace. This was somewhat rectified when the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) awarded Milestone Radio the 93.5 FM radio frequency in 2000 following a lengthy battle to establish the presence of Black music on mainstream radio.  That same year, Hip Hop would also make its way into scripted television with the drama series Drop the Beat which aired on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). 

2006-2016: International Ascendance  

By the mid-to-late 2000s, Toronto’s impact in the U.S market skyrocketed with the 2008 release of Kardinal Offishall’s “Dangerous” – a collaboration with American R&B star Akon that reached number five on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Shortly thereafter, K'naan's single “Wavin’ Flag” was selected as the official theme song for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. And while Kardinal and K’Naan were making important inroads, Drake – who began his recording career in 2006 – released three mixtapes (Room For Improvement in 2006, Comeback Season in 2007, and So Far Gone in 2009) before signing with Young Money Entertainment and helping to solidify Toronto in the global imagination. He has since released eight solo studio albums, tied Michael Jackson for the most number one singles by a male solo artist, founded OVO’s tastemaker blog (which later expanded to include OVOSOUND record label and his annual OVOFEST), served as the global ambassador for the Toronto Raptors, and lead OVO’s fashion label and Nocta’s collaboration with Nike.  

By the 2010s, Toronto’s international ascendancy became equally evident in the careers of Tory Lanez and producers such as 40, Bo1da, Wondagurl, T-Minus, Rich Kidd, and Frank Dukes who became central figures in the music industry – helping to globalize the “Toronto Sound.” In the city’s underground, artists such as Shad, Raz Fresco, and the members of Freedom Writers continued to expand Toronto’s musical vocabulary, while battle emcee Organik and producer RyanPVP founded the Canadian battle league King of The Dot in 2008 (which featured everything from emceeing, to beatboxing, graffiti, DJing, and breaking). And in 2016, after each building their solo careers, Keysha Freshh, pHoenix Pagliacci, Haviah Mighty and Lex Leosis formed the all-female emcee crew The Sorority after their collaboration on an International Women's Day cypher hosted by Team Backpack went viral. 

Dr. Francesca D’Amico-Cuthbert is an award-winning historian of American and Canadian hip hop culture, and the Chief Research Officer at the Hip Hop Education Centre in New York City. Her postdoctoral research explores Canadian hip hop’s relationship to the state and its national mythmaking, the creative industries, and the music marketplace. As an educator, D’Amico-Cuthbert has taught several courses on the histories of popular culture, including “Hip Hop and the City” – York University’s longest-running course on hip hop and its evolution from a trans-local urban art form to a global commodity. 

The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century is on Level 5 of the AGO. The exhibition is co-curated by Asma Naeem, the Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA)’s Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director; Gamynne Guillotte, the BMA’s Chief Education Officer; Hannah Klemm, Saint Louis Art Museum (SLAM)’s Associate Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art; and Andréa Purnell, SLAM’s Audience Development Manager. The AGO presentation is organized by Julie Crooks, Curator, Arts of Global Africa and the Diaspora, AGO. 

Signature Partner

RBC - tier 1

Supporting Sponsor

Cîroc - Tier 2

Lead Support

The Dorothy Strelsin Foundation

Media Partner

blogTO - tier 3a

Generous Assistance

Greg & Susan Guichon

Contemporary programming at the AGO is supported by

Canada Council - tier 3a

This exhibition tour is generously supported by the Ford Foundation, the Henry Luce Foundation, and The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

Ford Foundation - Tier 3

Henry Luce Foundation - Tier 3

Andy Warhol - Tier 3