After years of planning, the ribbon-cutting ceremony for the Go-Go Museum and Cafe, celebrating a genre popularized in the D.C. area, will have an opening ceremony on Nov. 18.
According to a press release shared by Popville, the long-awaited 8,000-square-foot museum located in Anacostia will be open to the public on Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend. The Go-Go Museum and Cafe will be available for special events. It will be open to the public on the first and third Saturdays of each month.
Community organizer and go-go promoter Ron Moten, a co-founder of the #DontMuteDC movement, started in 2019 to protect go-go music, is the person behind the museum. Dr. Natalie Hopkinson, a co-founder of Don’t Mute DC who published her 2007 doctoral dissertation and book on go-go music, is the museum’s chief curator.
The Go-Go Museum and Cafe will have a cafe, of course, and three specific areas dedicated to exhibitions and interactive attractions. A recording studio is on the premises. An outdoor space with a stage will be available for live performances.
Attendees can view technology not necessarily seen in area museums, include holograms of Backyard Band pioneer and Wire star Ralph Anwan Glover and Sugarbear of EU, where visitors can interact with the figures. There’s a graffiti exhibit where visitors can tag the museum walls using digital spray cans. Fans of the genre can see artifacts such as a Rare Essence bomber jacket, a DJ Kool touring jacket, a wig and touring outfit from Maiesha and the Hip Huggers, a cutout Chuck Brown used for in-store promotions along with many other items connected to go-go music.
The museum is located near the Frederick Douglass National Historic Site and home, Busboys & Poets, at 1920 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd. SE.
Additional information can be found on the museum’s website.
