Photo provided Grammy-winning and internationally recognized musician Joel Sullivan, otherwise known as the hip-hop family friendly artist Secret Agent 23 Skidoo, is coming home to Columbus to perform at kidscommons’ 20th anniversary block party tonight.
Grammy-winning and internationally recognized musician Joel Sullivan, otherwise known as the hip-hop family friendly artist Secret Agent 23 Skidoo, is coming home to Columbus to perform at kidscommons’ 20th anniversary block party tonight.
He will be performing at the kidscommons’ outdoor stage at 309 Washington St. from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. Be prepared with a word you think he can’t rhyme to challenge him with.
“… trust me, we can,” Sullivan said.
Born in Chicago, Sullivan moved to Columbus when he was 3, where he would spend his childhood until he was a teen and later settling in Asheville. He said he remembers so many days skateboarding around town and trying to ollie off of the Bartholomew County Public Library steps.
“Talk about rites of passage, that was my rite of passage, being able to ollie those steps,” Sullivan said. “So I’m going to go back and sit on those steps and just feel it, man.”
Sullivan now has over 30 years of professionally touring, producing and rhyming under his belt. His career in family hip-hop began when he wanted to share his passion for music with his then 5-year-old daughter, so he took the games and stories he’d tell her and created an album off of that. He found that his daughter got very invested, so he taught her how to rap and she would rap on the songs.
“Anyway, the album caught hold, people loved it,” Sullivan said. “We did a little tour of Asheville, just our relatively small town of Asheville, North Carolina, we did three shows over the course of about 10 days and by the time we got to the third one, it was just selling out packed and I knew I was onto something.”
Secret Agent 23 Skidoo now has released several albums and three books. They have toured across North America and beyond in locations like Australia and India, and in 2017, Secret Agent 23 Skidoo’s album “Infinity Plus One” won a Grammy Award for best children’s album.
Fans of the Skidoo can look forward to some of their hits as well as a few songs they made in collaboration with the Asheville Symphony. Secret Agent 23 Skidoo will be joined on stage by singers Kendall Josey and Makeda Iroquois, in addition to two breakdancers Delma Rahming and William Squires.
“While we deliver the high level lyricism, they’re going to be doing backflips and headspins to compliment it, and the combination is going to connect with everybody there no matter how old they are,” Sullivan said.
Sullivan said he last performed in Columbus around 15 years ago and he cannot wait to come back, saying it will be interesting to see how Columbus has changed. He said it is also great to celebrate kidscommons’ 20th anniversary since he grew up going to The Commons.
“… you always want to be able to deliver the message that you wish you could have heard as a kid,” Sullivan said. “So being able to come back to that place and directly deliver the message to kids who are the perfect age to receive that for the first time and to understand that their differences are their power, their uniqueness is their own flavor which will create their path in life, (I) really look forward to that. And beyond that, probably going to Zaharakos.”
