Radiating out of Sacramento, California, Dre-T is a Hip-Hop performing artist, producer, and community organizer. His music is a fuse of protective, genius and spiritual energy. "I just like to teach what I'm learning", says the 22 year old MC. His wisdom of the current elements that affect and infect his community, along with the soulful style of instrumentation truly reflects the reality of his generation. After over 10 years of music production and songwriting, Dre-T's been blessed enough to share stages with international artists, KRS One, Ab-Soul, Los Rakas, the Wu-Tang Clan's GZA and many more. Dre-T is also an event-producer, with experience as an MC of four annual youth poetry slam seasons, and as the founder and host of spoken word-based open mic night, Penny 4 Your Thoughts at Sol Collective every Sunday from 7-9 p.m.

COMMUNITY

Dre-T's relatable background of mis-education is a driving force of movement and action for his audience. The rare presence of his father had a strong affect on the young artist's childhood, he barely graduated from high school in 2010, and started a family at 18 years old. However, in the exact same year, Dre-T was blessed with an opportunity that would forever change his life. He graduated from becoming a youth poetry slam champion, to becoming employed as a professionally trained Poet-Mentor Educator working with Sacramento Area Youth Speaks, a literacy organization out of UC Davis. Through this, he attainted the skills to develop curriculum and utilize the power of spoken word & music to engage inner-city youth and educators with creative writing workshops. From the fall of 2010 to this day, Dre-T continues not only to perform, but to listen and to educate at community centers and schools in the greater Sacramento area. He has spoken on panels for Dr. Pedro Nogurea, the California Equity Summit, and has reciprocated an exchange of professional development from Dr. Jabari Mahiri and his teaching credential students at UC Berkeley. August 4, 2013 was the first night Dre-T introduced Foreign Native, his newly found creative expression movement that fosters; 1.) Truth Seeking 2.) Community Integrity 3.) Identity Development 4.) Meaning-Making 5.) Engagement & Participation. With the help of colleagues and mentors, his organization received a $20,000 grant from the California Endowment to foster leadership skills and increased engagement for youth in South Sacramento. Culture, arts, and activism center, Sol Collective sponsored Foreign Native for its first year, providing the non-profit status and creative space to document its first year's work of accomplished goals and visions.

It is very clear to see why Dre-T is a beacon of hope for the city of Sacramento. In the midst of youth violence, teenage parenthood and the overall miseducation of the poor and less-empowered, he's figured out how to navigate away from the negativity that's constantly in the faces of young people like himself.