We have 4 core programs operating in Southern California:

1) The Prison Electronic Music Program delivers music education programs to currently incarcerated people in CA state prisons via the Arts In Corrections program. It is a multi-week course providing the fundamentals of digital literacy and career skill building, with a focus on music for healing, transformation, and empowerment.

2) Youth Music Production and DJ program serves youth from underserved communities and in high-stressed environments. Over the last eight years, Give a Beat has delivered hundreds of workshops to over 2,000 youth in partnership with numerous organizations. These collaborative partnerships specialize in serving system-impacted, resilient youth.

3) Our “On a New Track” Reentry Mentoring Program is a group mentoring model that pairs music-industry professionals with formerly incarcerated individuals as a part of a music production, DJing, business and entrepreneurial reentry course designed to open up career pathways and reduce recidivism.

4) Give a Beat Records supports people after incarceration, helping them produce, distribute, and market original music for global release, giving artists access to a platform to share their voices with the world.

Our programs aim to help end mass incarceration by utilizing Bryan Stevenson’s strategy, stating that the best way to create lasting change is by getting proximate to those experiencing injustice, changing the narrative, doing uncomfortable things, and maintaining hope.

Give a Beat services and community engagement strategies apply these concepts to generate transformative outcomes. Program participants learn music as a tool for healing and creative expression, with related business skills to enhance creative career pathways. We create proximity between our music network and program participants throughout all 4 programs. This facilitates a greater transformation of the criminal justice system by gaining awareness of the inequities of incarceration, thereby changing the public narrative to cultivate more empathy and compassion.