Chess goes hip-hop
By Ted Geoghegan Special to amNewYork
6:45 PM EDT, June 24, 2008
In 2003, Jay-Z opened 40/40 nightclub in NYC and installed a vertical chessboard in its VIP Cognac Room. (Associated Press)
The public perception of the geeky chess club is getting a hardcore makeover, thanks to Wu Tang Clan founder RZA, Jay-Z and other rap luminaries.
Welcome to the world of hip-hop chess — a growing faction of urban youth who have traded in war on the streets for combat across the chessboard. Call it the thinking man’s battleground, an opportunity to flex one¹s intellect in an environment where brains always win over brawn.
“[Chess] teaches you how to exist in the world. It teaches you how to think multiple moves ahead, to strategize,” says RZA. “It teaches you how to attack and how to defend.” RZA launched his online game room, WuChess, earlier this month.
Two 1994 films, “Searching for Bobby Fischer” and “Fresh” feature energetic scenes involving NYC street hustlers, passionately battling it out over the game. Those moments, one WuChess player explained to us online, were some of the first to really show chess on the streets, portraying it in an exciting environment that he could relate to.
Chess has been a longtime mainstay on the sidewalks and parks of New York, but thanks to new social networking sites such as WuChess.com and The Hip-Hop Chess Federation, it is quickly attracting a plethora of new young players.
WuChess challenges urban youth to games of “hardcore chess with half the stuffiness,” while offering exclusive downloads and positively fostering hip-hop culture. RZA even hops onto the site and takes part in matches when not competing in live tournaments.
Here is the full story.
Where did Jay-Z go to middle school????
Perennial scholastic powerhouse I.S. 318! Pre-chess team days though.
Mr G
Oh good lord. Please do not encourage this. Can’t there be one bastion where such crap isn’t tolerated? Let there be some other waystation for these folks as they hip hop their way to the unemployment office.
“Let there be some other waystation for these folks as they hip hop their way to the unemployment office.”
The current issue of Forbes estimates Jay-Z’s income (year ended 6/30/08) at $82 million.
Not to mention Wu-Tang Financial….
Oh good lord. Please get ignorant posters like Tuesday, June 24, 2008 7:56:00 PM CDT out of their fantasy world.
Who cares if you like Polka or Country or Death Metal or Rap… If everyone was like you the world would be a boring place.
Judge people by their actions not by what they listen to.
These people are trying to help educate the youth of America and beyond and you criticize “these folks”…who are “these folks” you are talking about? Sounds like another bitter racist with no life to me.
Thhh Thhh Thhh That’s all “Folks”!!!
I once read a quote by a jazz musician from New Orleans, describing why he had such a passion for chess. He talked about the similarities between chess and jazz music .. the importance of structure, the need to master thematic motifs, and the role of improvisation and creativity. I had not thought of chess in those terms before, but his perspective made a lot of sense to me.
So I’m not surprised that hip-hop aficionado’s would be drawn to chess. After all, the urban culture and experience articulated by hip-hop is full of struggle, transcending constraints, the impact of choices (good & bad!), and the potential for results ranging from glorious victory to brutal defeat. As we know, chessplayers deal with those issues every move of every game that we play.