The artistry and culture of Hip Hop has significant real world applications, yet its power to engage, unify, heal, and give voice has often been overlooked, particularly in educational settings.
Today’s Future Sound (TFS) directly addresses a lack of culturally responsive educational, therapeutic, and social interventions for people of all ages by bringing our mobile music production studio to their door.
WHAT WE DO
Through hands-on beat making and music production instruction, our program creates an outlet for creativity, personal expression, and critical thinking in a variety of settings:
Elementary, Middle & High Schools
Juvenile Centers
Mental Health Facilities
Veteran's Groups
Everything we teach, including the physics of records, how to operate turntables and DJ controllers, and the underlying math and science of beat making, is grounded in the history of Hip Hop music and culture.
OUR PARTNERS
Today’s Future Sound (TFS) currently serves over 100 schools across the country, and collaborates with major educational and research institutions, international non-profits, and corporate sponsors to deliver direct services and professional development.
OUR HISTORY
Today’s Future Sound (TFS) was founded in 2010 by producer and beat maker Ben Durazzo. In 2012, Durazzo brought on Dr. Elliot Gann as Executive Director to build a base of educators, DJ instructors, and volunteers that would broaden the scope of influence nationally and globally.
Dr. Gann received his PsyD in Clinical Psychology from the Wright Institute.Building off of both his dissertation research findings on and experience with therapeutic Hip Hop activity groups, Dr. Gann is leading Today’s Future Sound to continue such work and further advocate for its use, including expanded wellness/mental health, educational, economic and social justice applications.
Today’s Future Sound (TFS) is a fiscal project of the Oakland Parks and Recreation Foundation, a 501c3 based in Oakland, CA.