Shows
Baba’s hip-hop theater productions have received rave reviews off-Broadway and at festivals around the world, including two Drama Desk Award Nominations and a Fringe First Award in Edinburgh for Outstanding New Writing. Six of his shows have been produced in New York, and he is currently performing a three-show cycle at the Soho Playhouse, with Rap Guide to Evolution, Consciousness, and Climate Chaos running in rotation. Baba also regularly tours and performs at college campuses and performing arts venues across North America and around the world.
LATEST PRODUCTION
The science of perception, hallucination and free will comes to life on stage as “peer reviewed rapper” Baba Brinkman takes a deep dive into the neurobiology of human experience. Baba’s brain consists of roughly 80 billion neurons, none of which has any clue that he exists. And yet somehow those cells come together to produce a steady stream of ill rhymes, laughs, and mind-blowing scientific discoveries. Take a deep dive into embryos, octopuses, and self-conscious robots, and see whether your sense of reality survives intact.Made with support from the Sackler Centre for Consciousness Studies, the Sandpiper Fund, the Schein Foundation, the Anthropocene Institute, and the Canadian Core for Neuroethics.
Videos
DARWINIZM
Baba’s first Darwinian hip-hop album and show, The Rap Guide to Evolution, premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2009, winning multiple awards and pioneering the ground-breaking “peer-reviewed rap” genre. Baba’s new album and show, Darwinizm, is an all-new collection of songs and insights into human nature and evolution, premiering in 2019.
Coming Soon
THE RAP GUIDE TO CLIMATE CHAOS
Baba Brinkman breaks down the politics, economics, and science of global warming, following its surprising twists from the carbon cycle to the energy economy, in a pull-no-punches performance that confronts both the scale of the challenge and also the failings of human psychology that make it such an easy problem to ignore. With scientists, activists, contrarians, and even the Pope adding their voices to the soundtrack, get ready for a funny and refreshing take on the world’s hottest topic.
Rap Guide to Climate Chaos premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2015 and ran for six months off-Broadway in 2016, garnering rave reviews and welcoming Bill Nye, Naomi Oreskes, Michael Mann, and Gavin Schmidt as guest talkback speakers.
THE CANTERBURY TALES REMIXED
Geoffrey Chaucer’s timeless Canterbury Tales comes to vivid life in an “entertaining and brilliant” (Time Out) virtuoso performance linking today’s hip-hop lyrics with the greatest stories ever told. The Pardoner, the Merchant, the Nun’s Priest, and the Wife of Bath weave together rhymes and characters that rival Nicki Minaj and Kanye, spinning tales of greed, lust, jealousy and revenge for modern and medieval audiences alike.
RAP GUIDE TO RELIGION
Nominated for a Drama Desk Award in the category “Unique Theatrical Experience,” Rap Guide to Religion fearlessly explores the religious instincts and experiences seemingly shared by most humans. Taking a scientific approach, Baba Brinkman performs faith-illuminating songs inspired by the best of evolutionary and cognitive science, seeking the natural origins of our supernatural beliefs.
Why do most humans believe in a higher power? What are those beliefs good for? And once they are gone, what can replace them? Fresh from a six month off-Broadway run in 2015, this groundbreaking new work explores the various ways and means by which religion evolves, leaving audiences with a new appreciation of religion, and its critics.
OFF THE TOP
A hit at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival three years running, Off the Top teams up science rapper Baba Brinkman (Rap Guide to Evolution) with neuroscientist Dr. Heather Berlin (host of “Science Goes to the Movies” on PBS) to explore the science of improvisation and comedy.
A married couple in real life, Baba and Heather bring you the latest research on spontaenous creativity while putting their odd-couple relationship under the microscope. Learn how a rapper seduces a scientist, how hard it is to solve a math problem while rapping, and how your subconscious comes to the surface in spontaneous moments. Humorous, lyrical, and rich with subliminal stimuli, this is hard-core science communication at its best.
THE RAP GUIDE TO EVOLUTION
A hip-hop inspired tour of modern evolutionary biology, winner of the Scotsman Fringe First Award in Edinburgh and nominated for a Drama Desk Award off-Broadway. Baba Brinkman’s original peer-reviewed rap show combines the skills and charisma of a live MC with the precision of a scientist, offering deep insights into human nature and the origins of all living things, including rappers.
INGENIOUS NATURE
Everyone’s looking for love, or sex, occasionally even both. Evolutionary psychology claims to explain why, and how this state of affairs came about. But can it help us find the right one? A young man decides to take the “science of mating” seriously in his quest for a happy ending. Will the theory work in practice? It turns out, ovulation studies can make for awkward first date conversation. Premiering off-Broadway in November 2012, Ingenious Nature is now available for bookings.
RAPCONTEUR
Premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2010. Comedy hip-hop retellings of some of the world’s great oral epics, featuring Beowulf, Gilgamesh, and Chaucer’s Merchant’s Tale, with music by Mr. Simmonds. This production is no longer available for touring, having been re-written and updated as The Canterbury Tales Remixed (above).
THE RAP GUIDE TO HUMAN NATURE
Premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2010, this comedy rap sequel to The Rap Guide to Evolution zeros in on human behaviour and evolutionary psychology. The Rap Guide to Human Nature is no longer available for touring, having recently been revised and adapted into the off-Broadway production Ingenious Nature.
THE REBEL CELL
Premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2008. Co-written with MC Dizraeli, the Rebel Cell is a verse play set in England in the year 2013, a scorching political satire and lyrical debate between Che Guevara-style revolutionary politics and Nelson Mandela-style civil disobedience.
THE RAP CANTERBURY TALES
Premiered at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2004. Winner: Three Weeks Editor’s Choice Award, Edinburgh 2007. Combining virtuoso lyricism with physical theatre and dramatic storytelling, Baba Brinkman recreates Chaucer’s best-loved Tales in an engaging, accessible, and often hilarious hip-hop style. This performance is no longer available for touring, having recently been fully revised and re-written as The Canterbury Tales Remixed (above).
