Ben Sharpa

Ben Sharpa was a South African hip hop artist who died on 26 July 2018.

Born in the rugged ghetto slums of Soweto, South Africa in 1979, Sharpa experienced the full force of the brutal apartheid regime and the revolutionary turmoil that surrounded the struggle against it. While Ben was still a young child, his father took the opportunity to escape the hardship of life in South Africa by relocating his family to Chicago, Illinois, where he took the post of Audiologist at Cook County Hospital before moving on to become a lecturer at the prestigious Michigan State University.

When Sharpa came back to South Africa in 1993 for the first free elections, he quickly set about establishing himself as a major force in the underground, forming cult crews GroundWorks and Audio Visual. Ben’s music addressed themes of social consciousness, politics, conspiracy theories and the hustle to survive.

In 2007 Ben was ‘discovered’ by electronic music maven and ‘Queen of Dubstep’, BBC Radio 1 DJ Mary-Anne Hobbs, who described him as “one of the most inspired and agile lyricists in the world today”. Soon after, Ben performed at the annual Glastonbury Festival (June 2007) on the BBC Introduces stage. Since then Ben has performed at various festivals across Europe including Dour (BEL), Fête de la Musique (FR), and Paleo (CH). Sharpa’s latest project is a collaboration between himself and audio-visual outfit Pure Solid entitled '4th Density Light Show'.