Background
Born in a house with no running water in Accra, Ghana in 1975, Derrick Ashong is the son of a pediatrician.
Born in a house with no running water in Accra, Ghana in 1975, Derrick Ashong is the son of a pediatrician.
After being naturalized as an American citizen, he returned to Harvard through a Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans, and studied for a Doctor of Philosophy in Ethnomusicology and Afro-American studies, until Dave Stewart of Eurythmics fame invited him to come work at his entertainment company, Weapons of Mass Entertainment.
Derrick Ashong is married and has two children. Arts
The band later became known as Soulfège. Ashong has worked with such established artists as Debbie Allen, Janet Jackson, & Bobby McFerrin, and is Military Cross and leader of Soulfège, under the name "deoxyribonucleic acid", producing works that have aired globally via outlets including Music Television Africa, MNet Africa and British Broadcasting Corporation World Service.
In 1997, Ashong had a role in the Steven Spielberg-produced movie Amistad, playing the character Buakei, a role he gained through attending an open audition in New New York
He also appeared in a 2006 documentary about the Angola 3, entitled 3 Black Panthers and the Last Slave Plantation. Ashong founded a talent agency, ASAFO Productions.
Ashong is also the former host of The Derrick Ashong Experience on Oprah Radio, The Stream on First Rate (at Lloyd's) Jazeera English, and DNAtv on Fusion (American Broadcasting Company/Univision). He received another Emmy nod in 2015 for Take Back the Mic: The World Cup of Hip Hop, the flagship show of his digital media company, amp.it, which launched at the beginning of the same year.
Public roles
He is the author of FREE THIS Civil Defense!!! - The FAM Manifesto - a text outlining the philosophy of open source music, which ultimately led him to found his company, amp.it that rewards and recognizes fans for discovering, sharing and curating original, independent content.
Ashong reached prominent media attention when a YouTube video went viral, of him speaking on Barack Obama"s campaign to gain the Democratic nomination for the 2008 United States. presidential election. Surprising the interviewer who expected a short soundbite (perhaps based on Ashong"s casual appearance), Ashong gave a measured and protracted analysis of Obama"s campaign. The video has been viewed more than a million times.
He recently founded a Miami-based tech company, called amp.it which in 2015 completed the pilot season of its first media property, Take Back the Mic: The World Cup of Hip Hop, which was a 2015 Emmy finalist in the category of Original Interactive Programming.
Derrick Ashong has lectured on music, technology, the free market, and individualism at over a hundred institutions in the United States, Africa, Europe, the Caribbean and Asia, including the World Music Expo WOMEX in 2003 in Spain, United Kingdom Parliament, the United Nations, and Harvard and Stanford Business Schools.
Ashong was a founding member of the Harvard Black Alumni Society and founded the Black Men"s Forum.