Busta Rhymes to get Harlem Day Hip Hop Icon and VMA Visionary Award

Busta Rhymes is positioned this fall at a peak of recognition across hip-hop and popular culture, with two high-profile honors announced in quick succession. The veteran rapper will be awarded the inaugural MTV VMA Rock the Bells Visionary Award at the 2025 MTV Video Music Awards on September 7, where he is also slated to perform. Earlier, he will receive the Hip Hop Icon Award during Harlem Day, the finale of Harlem Week, on August 17 in St. Nicholas Park. The announcements come on the heels of his recent Hollywood Walk of Fame star ceremony, underscoring a year of renewed visibility for an artist whose career spans more than two decades.

Details surrounding the Harlem Week accolade place the honor within a long-standing community tradition. The Greater Harlem Chamber of Commerce executive board will present the Hip Hop Icon Award as part of Harlem Day, a cornerstone event of Harlem Week, a yearly calendar of free, local activities celebrating the neighborhood and its residents since 1974. The three-day closing stretch includes the Harlem Music Festival, and the ceremony in St. Nicholas Park will be accompanied by performances from Rhymes’s family, with his son Trillian...