Talon Bazille is a rap artist, producer and sound designer from the Cheyenne River Lakota and Crow Creek Dakota tribes in South Dakota. He began recording at age 13, under the wing of supportive uncles. Venturing off on his own in high school, Bazille worked to stay in gifted and talented programs, as they became a means of recording. As graduation approached, however, creativity came to a halt. Focus shifted to post-secondary aspirations, as there wasn’t much belief in there being a survival in following a path of music.

Soon after entering college at the University of Pennsylvania, though, Bazille found himself gravitating to hip hop once more. Shifting to radio, he hosted a weekly show in an effort to promote underground hip hop artists. As a result, he took the plunge back into creating his own music, producing beats and learning how to engineer audio in the process. Upon graduating with a bachelor’s degree in psychology, Bazille released what he considers his “personal thesis” project: “Sake” (Talon in Dakota), a 51-track self-produced solo album. He graduated in 2015 with a bachelor’s in psychology and the Association of Native Alumni's student leadership award, and his group-thesis for the psychology department was titled “Academic & Non-Academic Correlates to Academic Success in College”, under Dr. Melissa Hunt.

In 2018, Bazille founded the Wonahun Was’te’ mobile studio (translating to “Good, healing sound of music” - a name gifted by Ciye’ General ThunderHawk), where for around two years he provided free access to recording and production for Crow Creek Sioux Tribal members and allies around central South Dakota. The studio was supported in 2019 by First People’s Fund through the Cultural Capital Fellowship.

Shortly after, Bazille released a three-part series in collaboration with DCM Collective, Panoramic Dreams, and First Peoples Fund entitled, “Traveling the Multiverse with Iktomi'' which is now available on all platforms. Within the series, Bazille collaborated with both Non-Indigenous & other Intertribal artists as a way of depicting both the universal and timeless aspects/teachings of Iktomi, the trickster spirit of Ocheti Sakowin oral histories, while also aiming to serve as artistic resilience through these struggles, traumas, conflicts, etc. All three albums were performed as a livestreamed “Ikto Theatre” show hosted and broadcasted by The Cave Collective in Rapid City, SD.

Today, Bazille continues both solo and collaborational releases inside and outside of hip hop, including creating soundscape installations for artist’s works, like Keith Braveheart’s art exhibit “Creation.Story”, Dyani White Hawk-Polk’s “RELATIVE” and two upcoming sound design pieces for the Oscar Howe Continuum 2023 tribute show.

In 2022, Bazille was both a featured performer and sound designer for First Peoples Fund’s multi-day concert/show/event “We The Peoples Before”, as part of the Kennedy Center’s 50th anniversary in Washington D.C. Feb. 2022. His first full sound design was later, for Cornerstone Theatre Company’s community play, “Wicoun” which toured Native communities on and off reservations in South Dakota in the Summer of 2023.

His albums “WCWW” & “DOPA” are his latest released expressions in rap/hip hop, but you can also find him producing for and collaborating with artists of all genres, like The Neon Eyes band, The Band Blackbird, Santee Witt, and others. Coming from a background of both reservation and urban life, and its struggles, Bazille’s goal is to never forget who and what he came from, even in his own walk of healing. Demonstrating this in July 2023, Bazille released a posthumous album for his little brother who passed away in March 2022. The album features 8 songs, mixed and mastered by Bazille as an act of getting through grief and showing the youth an example of healthy grieving, moving on. “I don’t want to preach. I just want to show.”

It is this passionate openness to all things music and Dakota mindset that fuels his current work with the Oglala Lakota Artspace in a program made in collaboration with First Peoples Fund & Playing For Change Foundation, the Wicahpi Olowan Music Studio & Program. Located in Kyle, SD, the program aims to serve all ages of community members in recording, performing, learning, and doing all things music. For more information on Bazille, his music and other artistic projects/news/content, visit www.BAZTK.com


Follow his work with the studio, along with solo and collaborative projects listed here on the website, updated weekly by Bazille himself.


Feel free to navigate the pages above and listen to music, watch a video, read up on writings from the artist, or contact Bazille for a performance, collaboration, etc.


Wopida tanka for visiting the site, na (and) anpetu was'te' yuha (have a good day).

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