Book Rakim for colleges, corporate events, fairs, festivals, casinos & private shows. Contact Degy Entertainment for booking info.
Rakim is an East Coast hip hop MC whose name sits at the center of the golden age. His solo catalog opens with The 18th Letter in 1996, continues with The Master in 1999, and reaches The Seventh Seal in 2009, three records spaced far enough apart that each one arrived as an event rather than a release cycle. The Source named him the #1 Lyricist of All Time, and the writing is why.
He came up on Long Island. Born William Michael Griffin Jr. on January 28, 1968 in Wyandanch, he made his reputation as an MC in the duo Eric B. & Rakim, whose Paid in Full and Follow the Leader both went gold.
The credentials have kept accumulating since. The 18th Letter earned RIAA gold certification in 1997, BET presented him with a Lifetime Achievement Award, and on May 21, 2025 the Peabody Institute at Johns Hopkins University awarded him the George Peabody Medal for Outstanding Contributions to Music and Dance in America. On stage he works rooms like Blue Note Los Angeles, City Winery St. Louis, and The Webster, which makes him a strong fit for college programming boards, festival and fair lineups, casino and corporate stages, and private engagements looking for a headliner with four decades of catalog behind him.
