Rickey Vincent


Rickey Vincent is an African American-author, historian, and radio host based in the San Francisco Bay Area. He is best known as the author of Funk: The Music, the People and the Rhythm of The One. Funk is considered one of the seminal guides to the history of the genre, winning the ASCAP Foundation Deems Taylor Award for Music Writing in 1997.
Vincent obtained a Master of Arts in Ethnic Studies at San Francisco State University in 1987 and a Ph.D. in Ethnic Studies at UC Berkeley in 2008. He is a lecturer at Berkeley, City College of San Francisco, San Francisco State University and California College of the Arts in Oakland. Vincent has hosted the KPFA radio program “The History of Funk” since 1997. In 2001, HUSHconcerts founded the San Francisco Funk Festival based upon Vincent's academic work to place the musical genre in a societal and artistic context.
Vincent has appeared on television documentaries involving black music and culture, including multiple episodes of Unsung. In 2013, Vincent released his second book, Party Music: The Inside Story of the Black Panthers Band and How Black Power Transformed Soul Music.