d.Benjamin m. is STILL in his BIRTHDAY SUIT!

Being born and bred on Manhattan’s Lower East Side gave dBm an acute sensibility when it came to street life, art, expression, sensuality and all things "colored". The neighborhood nicknamed Losaida was full of cultural influences that would shape and color this young man into the social butterfly he is today. Performing at an early age in plays like "The Taming of the Shrew" and "The Tempest" by Shakespeare at PS 110 on the Lower East Side gave dBm the outlet he hungered for and would later pursue. In JHS he found his "voice" with the help of lounge singer Mercedes Moore aka Ms. Jacques at JHS 25 and performed with the choir at various events throught the city as the lone man amongst the bunch. However a fatal stabbing of a student forced the Dept. of Ed. to close the troubled school and relocate all the students. The next 2 school years dBm decided to pull together his best friend since 4th grade Justin aka Rats and his cousin Will aka Meanie and they formed the R&B tribute trio known as Poeme’ (pronounced Po’-Whem). Traveling around the diff’t talent shows and sweet 16’s throughout the lower half of the money making borough they became known as the go-to guys if you wanted to make the young girls squeal. High School got in the way of the Poeme’ with the members traveling to diff’t parts of the city, the group dissolved. dBm began attending Talent Unlimited HS where he joined the Musical Theater program. TU the child of the school made famous in "Fame" Julia Richman High School was the perfect fit for dBm as it was known as the "ghetto" version of Laguardia High School where his older brother attended and excelled in Choir. dBm would appear in "South Pacific" as Capt. Bracket and later be honored to get the starring role in "Guys and Dolls" as Sky Masterson. Again struggle would pull him away from his senior year in TU and he found himself in Hopewell VA. The week before he began attending classes he met Ms. Taylor the show choir teacher who forced dBm to give an on the spot performance of one of his "Guys and Dolls" numbers. Not one to shy away from a challenge or possible embarrassment, dBm performed to the shocked faces of the entire Hopewell choir. He would later go on to become a Bairtone in the choir and be picked for the 4 man 4 woman Show Choir Group that was picked to travel to Disney World to perform in their High School performers week. New York was calling dBm and right after graduation he escaped back and right back to what has been his calling. While in Talent Unlimited High School dBm picked up a flier and decided to go on his first proffesional audition ever. Without a memorized monologue he freestyled a story on a "hustler" begging to get into the pearly gates and being refused while bargaining with God. He was accepted into the NITESTAR theater program. He became an actor/educator for NITESTAR a theater program that travels the 5 boroughs of NY and nationally performing skits, songs and plays aimed at teaching healthy decision making and HIV/STD prevention for young people. dBm would write, create and meet life long friends in NITESTAR for the 5 years he was with them. He left NITESTAR to pursue his love of educating young people on the dangers of HIV and AIDS with the memory of losing his grandmother to AIDS complications while he was an actor in the company. Working fulltime for various Community Based Organizations in NY for the past 10 years it seemed dBm’s childhood dreams of putting his heart on stage would never come true. Until the day he met "The Architect" of Sankofa Hassan. The Architect sat dBm down with 2 other potential bandmates and played a few songs and threw around ideas and musical tastes. 3 months later Sankofa was formed. On Oct. 31st 2006 Sankofa premiered to friends and loved ones in a basement in Staten Island. dBm is the voice behind a young brash band of brothers who’ve graced stages high & low throught NY for the past year. Hitting their 40th or so performance this past Halloween at the Danger’s spectacular event, this Motely Crue of characters are on the rise. dBm wrote all of this and doesnt generally refer to himself in the third person.