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i believe
in hope.

They say we're fools.

Our dreams are unreal.

We hope for too much.

But still we go on and up.

Stay Foolish.

Rapper | Activist | Educator

jason chu speaks hope and healing in a hurting world, blending high energy performances with thoughtfully crafted lyricism. As an Asian American kid in suburban Delaware, he found a vocabulary for racial identity and liberation in rap music and hip-hop culture. Starting out freestyling with friends at school, he began recording and performing music in college.

Touring extensively, jason brings a social and historical consciousness to stages and classrooms around the country and globally.

jason was a 2022 Artists at Work Fellow at the Japanese American National Museum. He has been presented on the National Mall in Washington DC (In America: Remember) and curated in the Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs virtual exhibition Reimagine Public Art: House and Home (2021) and the LA County Department of Arts and Culture's 2023 public installation Illuminate LA: Collective Memory.

His music has been heard on Kung Fu (The CW), Warrior (HBO Max), Tetris Beat (Apple Arcade), Snowpiercer (TNT), and Wu Assassins (Netflix).

jason has been featured in the Chinese American Museum of Los Angeles and presented at the Getty Center, Flushing Town Hall, and the Nate Holden Performing Arts Center.

As an expert on Asian American identity and hip-hop culture, jason has spoken and led workshops at colleges, conferences, community centers and beyond. He is a contributor to the St. James Encyclopedia of Hip Hop Culture.

Follow jason at @jasonchumusic everywhere.

jason's work has been graciously supported by The Mellon Foundation, The Slants Foundation, Culture Surge, Equal Sound, and the California Relief Fund for Artists & Cultural Practitioners.

Press

jason's work as a rapper and Asian American cultural expert has been covered by

  • Nextshark, ‘We here and we rappin’: Bay Area seniors welcome Year of the Rabbit with rap music video (Instagram)
  • NPR, San Francisco Chinatown seniors welcome in the Lunar New Year with rap
  • NBC Bay Area, “OGs stands for the Original Grandmas!” (YouTube)
  • Bomb Magazine, Influences: Performing Arts
  • LA Downtown News, Museum Combats Hate With An American Vocabulary
  • Instagram, Reels We Loved This Week (Asian Pacific American Heritage Month Edition)
  • Jubilee Media, Rappers Rank Themselves by Talent (Artists vs Audience)
  • Scripps / ABC 10, Artists and musicians surviving pandemic with fellowships that focus on education
  • LAist / KPCC, A Mob Killed A Tenth of LA’s Chinese Population. 150 Years Later, There's A Push To Remember.
  • Jubilee Media, Spectrum: Is Hip-Hop Misogynistic?
  • Twitter, #TwitterIgnite
  • BBC (2), What attacks on Asians reveal about American identity
  • VPRO, The World of the Chinese: United States
  • Mic, "The Mahjong Line debacle is the latest in a long history of Asian erasure" (Jan. 8, 2021)
  • NBC 2 (Boise, ID)

His music has been covered by

He has been a guest on podcasts including:

Press photographs can be downloaded here.