Gill Sotu (Host) is a veteran, poet, playwright, DJ, and performing artist. He is a two-time Grand Slam Poetry Champion, a two-time RAW Performing Artist of the Year, and a three-time TEDxSanDiego presenter. Currently he is a teaching artist and a commissioned playwright with The Old Globe, a program director with Intrepid Theatre Company, a creative director for TEDxSanDiego, and the artist-in-residence at Makers Church. He has been commissioned to produce original pieces for leading arts and community organizations around the country and is honored to be a part of this event.

Def Sound If music was a menu, Def Sound would be the vegan option. As an Afro Latinx multi-hyphenate artist (parents from Belize & Panama) born and based in South Central LA, Def Sound (mom given name Emmanuel Ashley Ricketts) is a non binary (pronouns they/them/he/him) Grammy Award considered contemporary hip-hop artist, producer, published poet, DJ, and award winning academic. Def’s work as a poet has been included in Saul Williams' Anthology CHORUS, while their music has been featured in LA WEEKLY, LA Record, The L.A. Times, LACMA’s Poetry series POETRY In Color, the art exhibition The Black Index curated by Bridget Cooks, the Emmy Nominated Television series Music Diaries, and the Emmy winning Artbound on KCET.

Def also hosts a monthly radio show/podcast  EXHIBIT AYE on listener powered non profit radio station DUBLAB. Lastly, Def is the 2021 recipient of the LINDON W. BARRETT Award from the African American Studies Department School of Humanities at UC Irvine. Having done guest talks at both CalArts and Stanford Def is using their work to synthesize theory, culture and magic of the mundane. Def is serving a buffet of healthy experimental raps and poems that feed both the mind and spirit.  Weaving together Poetry, Hip Hop and their Afro Latinx roots, Def is letting their food touch - using art as a healing mechanism.

Alyce Smith Cooper (Performer) has long been an arts and community advocate. She is a woman of many talents and wears many hats. As a poet, storyteller, actress, and television talk show host, she has often been found promoting issues of creativity, compassion, and inclusion. These actions fit in well with her roles of registered nurse, chaplain, and ordained minister, and finally garnered her inclusion into the Women’s Museum of San Diego Hall of Fame in 2014. Currently she sits on the Playhouse Leadership Council of La Jolla Playhouse and is a retired Elder from the African Methodist Episcopal Church. In 2015, Cooper, along with two co-authors, Dr. Judy Sundayo and Jamie Victoria Jones, published The Gumbo Pot Poems. The prize-winning book is currently being used as a textbook in local colleges and may be purchased on Amazon. She is currently in the process of writing the history of the Educational Cultural Complex for the San Diego Community College Continuing Education Department. James Vernon Cooper, her deceased husband, served as a U.S. Marine. She is the mother of two, grandmother of five, and great grandmother of 13. San Diego is home base for this poet/storyteller who is also known as The Golden-Brown Fairy Godmother. Most recently she co-created, under the auspices of La Jolla Playhouse, three music videos titled “Spittin Truth to Power While Light Leapin for the People” along with Hollywood-based artist/DJ Shammy Dee.