Rap Music Camp Teaches Teens How to Overcome

Article from The Spokesman-Review:

EVERETT – A 16-year-old boy with a red-and-black-checked bandanna knotted around his neck leaned over a notebook and penned rap lyrics.

“I went to over 10 funerals in 1 year people had O.D.,” Kyle Moses wrote. “Running around getting keyed/Are they thinking it’s going to be better for them/80 bucks for 1 pill …”

Around him, other American Indian teens sat on a porch overlooking Port Susan Bay and wrote their own lyrics about prescription drug abuse and gambling.

“It’s really easy to rap about because I’ve seen a lot of it,” said Moses, a member of the Muckleshoot Tribe. “I usually rap about the truth. I think it helps me because I like putting it out there and having other people see how it is.”

He spent a recent week at Warm Beach Camp attending a music academy for Indian teens focused on ending prescription drug abuse and problem gambling. About 50 teens recorded their own CDs in a bunk-room-turned-recording-studio, helped create music videos about gambling and drugs, and bounced lyrics and poems off one another.

The camp, called the Tribal Youth Music Academy, was organized by the Evergreen Council on Problem Gambling with grants from the state attorney general’s office and the state Division of Alcohol and Substance Abuse, along with support from several Northwest tribes.

Several teens said they have parents, siblings or friends who abuse over-the-counter drugs.

Carrie Rincon, an adult mentor with the Muckleshoot tribe, said she lost a niece to OxyContin and has other family members currently battling addiction.

Prescription drug abuse is no more prevalent among Tulalip’s tribal population than in other nearby communities, said Angel Cortez, a Tulalip cultural specialist who works with youth. Still, he sees value in teaching teens more about addiction and helping them learn to express themselves through music.

“I record music, but I don’t really consider myself a musician,” said Cortez. “But it is a tool that can bring the kids in and grab their attention.”

In the studio at Warm Beach, Cherisse Sulkanum nervously recorded her first single. The shy 13-year-old Nooksack girl has sung in her school choir, but rapping into a microphone about being an American Indian is something else altogether.

“We’ll be marching as one in this faceless movement,” she sang.

Singing with other tribal kids has encouraged her to try to connect more with her ancestors, she said.

Her aunt, Candace Kelly, said Cherisse usually won’t talk to people unless they start the conversation. The camp has given her confidence.

“Most of the youth, they’re trying to be American more than Native American,” Kelly said. “This helps them to realize they can be Native American.”