Maestro Fresh Wes performed at first ever drive in hip-hop concert in Newmarket

BY SELINA McCALLUM

Forget clapping and cheering at concerts now, the new normal involves sitting in your car and honking to show your appreciation and love for an artist that is performing. On Sunday, July 26^th, a concert called Together at the Drive-In was held in Newmarket in the afternoon.

Together at the Drive-In is a socially distance friendly event series, which safely brings together families and friends this summer, for a cause.

Together Toronto seeks to showcase, support, and cultivate the diversity of Toronto, its people, and its small businesses. They believe that being united is the key to happiness and well-being. Their work is powered by a coalition of socially minded business owners, community organizers, passionate private citizens, and generous donors.

The Stardust Drive-In Theatre was transformed into a two-day socially distance friendly drive-in event. Together Toronto created an immersive experience featuring films, live shows with local DJs and artists. All proceeds from the sales will go-towards helping to support the artists and purchasing meals from partnered restaurants to be donated to shelters, food banks and communities in need.

The lineup included well known artists like Maestro, Kardinal Offishall, and Karl Wolf, and emerging, talented artists like Töme and Ari, from the city of Toronto and GTA area. There were dozens of cars that attended the event. While most people stayed in or near their cars and enjoyed the music, others walked up to the front of the stage wearing their masks and staying slightly away from others.

Maestro, also known as Maestro Fresh-Wes, is a Canadian rapper record producer, actor, and author. One of the earliest Canadian rappers to achieve mainstream success, he is credited as the “Godfather of Canadian hip hop”.

Earlier this year he was inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame.

“I’m the first hip-hop artist to ever get inducted with that. That just goes to show that we got history when it comes to this,” said Maestro.

When asked by Toronto Caribbean Newspaper reporter, Simone Jennifer Smith, how he keeps his momentum and motivation up he mentioned the artists that he looks up to.

“I think of James Brown, I think of the Rolling Stones, I think of the iconic artists that had longevity in their careers,” said Maestro. “We made history right now, this is Toronto’s first drive-in concert.”

Maestro performed his hit song, “Let Your Backbone Slide.”

“Let Your Backbone Slide” is the debut single by Maestro Fresh-Wes, released in 1989 from his first album, Symphony in Effect. In Canada, over 50,000 copies of the single were sold, making Maestro the first Canadian rapper to have a gold single.

In the United States, 25,000 copies were sold in its first few weeks of release. It remained the best-selling Canadian hip hop single of all time until 2008, when it was surpassed by Kardinal Offishall’s song with Akon, “Dangerous”.

Due to the pandemic, Maestro, like many artists, have also performed online.

“I have a show coming up on Thursday. I’ve been doing some IG Lives,” said the Canadian hip-hop artist. “I’m working on another album right now too.”

He says that the pandemic has affected him.

“The pandemic definitely affected me. Nobody is 100% okay, everybody was affected in some way. Thank God I’ve been diversifying,” said Maestro.

Proceeds from the sales of the event went towards supporting community groups, artists and purchasing meals from Toronto Together’s hospitality and food partners and will be donated to shelters, food banks and communities in need.

For Toronto’s first drive-in hip-hop and r&b concert, it brought in a good, diverse crowd that, for the most part, were all following social distancing protocols.