ArtistInfo

Faustin Lenon

dr, *1970
Musician
A.k.a. Faustin Maxim Moran Lenon Blaksam Jump "Chico" Slamm Sagat

Baltimore based rapper and poet, born January 4, 1970. As a youngling of age 4 made a drum set out of cardboard boxes, pots, pans and an ice bucket top for a cymbal; after watching a television performance of The Jackson 5. Faustin was inspired by a wide range of music including Soul, Rhythm and Blues, Disco, Funk from his father born in Washington D.C. and including Salsa, Merengue, Mozambique, Bomba, Plena, Soca, Calypso, Samba and Reggae from his Mother who is a native of Panama. Obviously had taken an interest in music; by age 7 organized "jam sessions" with fellow musicians in Elementary School (Waverly Elementary) Raymond and Faustin Jr. collaborated on songwriting under the Waverly Elementary School Music Classes taught by Mr. Arnette. Faustin and Raymond would meet after school and write songs on an a Kimball Upright Piano and any drums available. After writing three songs, they entered the Waverly Elementary School 51 Talent show and were able to entertain an audience of over 100 people with a reasonable applause. By the age of 9, he attended a few classes at Baltimore’s Peabody Conservatory of Music for Piano Practice/Technique and reading/writing music. Faustin basically continued experimenting with various forms of instruments including Piano, Xylophone, Steel Drums, Congas, Timbales, Kit Drums and Djun Djun. Until age 12 when getting his first pair of Turntables, Faustin seemed to get away from creating music to playing music from his own perspective, so that by the age of 14, he was a known neighborhood DJ under the East Side DJ's Man, DJ Darrell Middleton and DJ Rock. Along with DJ Grittle (Timothy Middleton) (Darrell‘s little brother), DJ Jamie and DJ Flash (Faustin) all in the 8th grade formed a 3 man DJ Team that eventually got acclaim throughout the neighborhood and Spinned parties for about a year until they all wound up going to high school. By then, Faustin had interests in recording and frequented the 3 neighborhood recording studios and wound up recording at Top Notch Recording Studios (Baltimore). After recording a compilation of tracks consisting of drums, bass lines and some experimental keyboard lines, Faustin knew that what he wanted to do was to Compose, write and produce Music. In the Beginning of the Hip Hop Explosion at age 13 (1983); writing rhymes and free styling became Faustin’s best aspiration as a vocalist. While experimenting with different aliases such as Jump "Chico" Slamm, Blaksam and Blackstar Oneson, Faustin developed a wide array of M.C. styles including Word Play, Word Bending, Braggadocio, Battle Rapping, Commentating and Simile / Metaphor. Being very musically inclined, had perfected different deliveries or "lyrical rhythms" or "flow". Also being fluent in Spanish or Castellano made it easier to experiment with the other Romantic Languages including French, Italian and Portuguese.

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