Kenny is an award-winning filmmaker, producer, and media educator based in Durham, NC. He founded The Groove Productions in 1996 when he began sharing through film ways that artists and the arts empower human connection and better our world. Moonchild is a continuation of this work.

His films, “Go Fast, Turn Left” (1997) and “Shine On: Richard Trice and the Bull City Blues” (2000), screened across North Carolina as part of the NC Humanities Council’s Road Scholars program. He co-directed and shot “Bending Space” and “Bending Sticks”, films celebrating the work of visionary artists Georges Rousse and Patrick Doughterty that screened at festivals around the world and aired on PBS. His disability rights film, “A New Kind of Listening” (2009), received the ‘Positive Images in Media Award’. from TASH in 2010. “A Weaverly Path” (2011) offers an immersive portrait of internationally recognized weaver Silvia Heyden. “Peace in Our Pockets” (2016) follows the peacebuilding work of Kenyan activists,in the lead up to Kenya's 2013 elections. Kenny’s most recent award winning film, “You Gave Me a Song” (2019), celebrates the life and music of old-time musician Alice Gerrard.

Rafael was born in Bahia, Brazil to Peruvian parents of Quechua descent. He grew up in Cleveland, OH after migrating to the US at the age of 12. He currently resides in Queens, NY. He served as Founder and Executive Director of VAMOS Unidos in the Bronx, NY, advocating immigrant and worker’s rights. His films delve into the intersectionality of gender, race, migration, and class. Rafael received a 2018 Princess Grace Award in film, was a John Grist Documentary/BAFTA New York Scholar, and is a 2023 Jerome Foundation Fellow. He graduated with an MFA from The City College of New York in 2019. His short film, “Out of the Shadows,” won Best Documentary Film Award in the 2019 Cityvisions and has appeared in festivals across the US. In 2019 he was assistant director for the documentary and fiction blend film, “Caer,” which premiered at Sheffield Doc Fest 2021 and debuted in the US at the 2021 Outfest Fusion Festival. He is currently working on two documentaries, “Defend the Sacred” and “My Existence is Resistance” while teaching media production courses at the City College of New York.

Dilsey’s life mission is to use the Arts and film to advance society by building social bridges and fostering a greater understanding of the equality of all people. She provided story development for the FOX documentary series, “Phenoms”, and production support to the HBO Sports documentary, “Momentum Generation”. She was the creator, producer and director of NUESTRO BARRIO, the first Spanish-language series to air on English-language television in the United States.

Dilsey is the founder of Café con Leche Media and the co-founder of One Human Family, a non-profit organization that promotes racial and religious unity which is featured in her latest documentary short, “Now Let Us Sing”. She recently produced and directed four documentary shorts for ITVS/Independent Lens's on rural jails in North Carolina and Tennessee. The East Tennessee based short, “Daughters of Addiction”, was broadcast on PBS last fall. In 2021, Dilsey was selected to produce and direct a film for PBS's American Masters "In the Making" season 2.

Darrell operates as a change agent impacting communities, institutions and individuals through highlighting relevant historical and cultural elements through documentation, creative immersion, program development, performance and discourse with an emphasis on diversity and equity. Mr. Stover is a lecturer in the Interdisciplinary Studies Department at North Carolina State University where he explores issues of race and gender in science, technology, the African American experience and popular culture.

Leilani Clark is an Afro-Indigenous (Santa Clara Pueblo/Diné-Navajo) filmmaker, poet, performance artist, and community organizer. Born and raised in Tucson, AZ, during her youth she became involved in human and immigrant rights organizing in the borderlands and the fight for cultural education in Arizona public schools. Since 2013, Leilani has developed her art of poetry, storytelling and spoken word to inspire liberatory practices of racial, gender and environmental justice. Leilani has been a featured artist, keynote speaker, and presenter for numerous community and academic events throughout the Southwest and West Coast. She currently resides between New York City and Raleigh, North Carolina and is producing two documentary films under her production company, Elevate Media Films, and releasing short stories on issues of human rights, equity, arts & culture with her independent digital media news outlet, Elevate Media News.

Aisha is Operations Managing Editor for “Sapelo”, an online publication which celebrates and analyzes the experiences of Black Muslims in the United States to create new understandings of who they are, what they have done, and why that matters. She works at RTI International as a Senior Manager of International Communications.

Melva Fager Okun was introduced to the Durham jazz scene by her longtime friend and vocalist Frankie Alexander. Through Frankie, Melva met Bus Brown and Brother Yusuf Salim. She documented the making of Bus’ 1982 album, “The Storyteller”, music to be featured in “Moonchild”, and her photographs are featured on the album cover. Bus soon became a mentor to Melva and her piano playing, and they stayed in touch even after Bus moved back to Baltimore. From 2005 - 2011 she hosted, “Melva’s Musings on Jazz”, a radio show airing on WCOM out of Carrboro. Her program celebrated local  jazz musicians and the burgeoning Triangle area jazz scene, and featured appearances by the faculty of the NCCU Jazz Studies Program. A regular guest was trombonist Robert Trowers, Director of the Jazz Studies Program at NCCU.

Carey Kirk (she/her) is a digital media consultant and passionate advocate for social justice, based in Alamance County, NC. With a heart for people and an unyielding commitment to change, Carey wears many hats as a community organizer and storyteller.

Carey's journey has been marked by collaboration and innovation. She lent her expertise to local filmmakers, playing a pivotal role in the promotion and distribution of impactful films such as "Stay Prayed Up" and PBS American Masters' "In The Making: Rissi Palmer: Still Here." Carey also served as an associate producer for the captivating music video "Rise of Dreama Caldwell" by Joe Troop, where she found a powerful connection at the crossroads of documentary film production, Black history, and music—an intersection that deeply struck a chord with her.

A graduate of Webster University in St. Louis, Carey now calls Haw River, NC, home, where she resides with her two daughters.

John has a passion for visually helping artists’, organizations’ and companies’ tell stories that focus on bettering their communities and providing a voice to marginalized people. He collaborates with regional and national production houses, filming a variety of projects that tackle issues related to environmental justice, criminal justice reform, student debt relief, and public transit. In 2018 Laww picked up a camera to help a friend film at Duke Performing Arts at Duke University where he discovered he had a knack for visually helping artists’ tell their story.

John served in the United States Marine Corps for close to a decade, touring in Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan for Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. Upon his return to the states he pursued his life long passion of being a performing artist, sharing the stage with De La Soul, 2 Live Crew, Little Brother, Rapsody and many more and co-founding the DURM Hip Hop Summit and Beats and Bars Festival in Durham, NC.

Over the past thirty-six years, Warren has had the pleasure and opportunity to act as Director of Photography on three regional Emmy award winning documentaries and several others that received prestigious awards. He has traveled to and worked in forty different states and over twenty-five countries on five continents.

Warren has served as Director of Photography for UNC’s acclaimed “North Carolina’s World War II Experience”, as Director/Cinematographer on “Down Home: The North Carolina Jewish Experience” and as Director of Photography on UNC-TVs “Gold Fever and the Bechtler Mint”, as well as directing and photographing major projects for Duke University, NC. State University and the Governor’s Institute on Substance Abuse.

Born in historic Old West Baltimore, Philip works to preserve, document, and uplift the African American story. In 1994 he founded the Nanny Jack & Co, LLC, an African American heritage consulting firm with a vast archive of thousands of African American artifacts from slavery to pop culture.

Philip has served on numerous heritage and preservation boards including as a Commissioner on the Baltimore City Commission for Historical and Architectural Preservation (CHAP). He has consulted with the Smithsonian, Johns Hopkins University, the History Channel and the National Park Service, and his company has provided content for films, books, and magazines.

Philip is editor of “The World War II Black Regiment That Built The Alaska Military Highway” (2002) and wrote “The Art of Collecting” (1998), “Black America Series: Baltimore” (1999) and more recently, “Images of America: Old West Baltimore” (2020). 

Joe Vanderford is a jazz critic and Emmy Award-winning sports videographer. As a radio announcer, he has hosted jazz programs on several stations, including WUNC-FM, an NPR affiliate, when it debuted in 1977. He produced and directed the 'Yusuf & Friends' series for NC Public TV in 1979. Since then, he has covered sporting events around the country, primarily for ESPN. Joe and his wife Deb have 4 children and reside in Carrboro NC.