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Fatman Scoop performing Friday night, before suffering a medical emergency on stage. Danielle Campbell Photos.
A Harlem-born hip-hop icon and mastermind of hype died after giving his heart to a Hamden stage. Now concert-goers, arts champions, town administrators and fellow entertainers are grappling with how best to remember his legacy—and carry on his joyful sound.
That legend is 56-year-old Fatman Scoop, who passed away after collapsing on stage at the final concert of the Hamden Summer Concert Series last Friday. In the wake of his passing, Hamden and New Haven residents are remembering the ways that he shaped their lives, from coming of age to his voice to their own careers as emcees, DJs, and music producers.
As of Thursday morning, the Connecticut Office of the Chief Medical Examiner said that his cause of death was still “pending further study.” A vigil is planned for Friday evening from 7 to 9 p.m. in Hamden Town Center Park, where the concert took place. Members of the Hamden Arts Commission have also called for another event further in the future, so that town residents may have more time to process, grieve, and heal.
“Fatman Scoop was the music to my teens and early adult years,” said Lushonda Howard, who advocated for Scoop’s performance during her time as chair of the Hamden Arts Commission, and called paramedics from the stage when he collapsed. “We’ve all been checking in with each other and taking the time to sit and think about what happened. We’re all still processing it.”
Huggins, who runs Huggy Bear Entertainment.
“He was a curator of a vibe,” said New Havener Ronald “Huggy Bear” Huggins, who was sharing the stage with Scoop and administered CPR before first responders arrived. “To me, he was a person I would watch for inspiration. He motivated me.”
Before he was Fatman Scoop, known for a full-lunged growl that could transform a club or a crowd in seconds, Scoop was Isaac Freeman III, one of two sons of Clara Elizabeth Freeman and Isaac Freeman Jr. Growing up in Harlem, he attended Cardinal Hayes High School and then later went to the New York Institute of Technology.
It was never his credentials that put him on the map: it was his work as a sharp-tongued artist and connoisseur of hype. If you heard him on a track—Missy Elliott’s 2005 “Lose Control” may be the most famous example—you probably instantly knew that it was him, and that it was going to be a good night. What was unexpected was that Hamden, a small Connecticut town, was the last place he would leave it all on the stage.
Huggins, who launched Huggy Bear Entertainment when he was still a student at James Hillhouse High School (he is now the city’s deputy director of youth services), remembered looking to Scoop as a mentor, a master of how the right emcee could mobilize a crowd, and the wrong one could leave the whole night feeling lukewarm. Roughly 10 years ago—he can’t remember exactly when—the two met in New Haven, after Scoop did a show at one of the city’s nightclubs.
“After that, we built a relationship,” Huggins recalled. In 2015, Scoop made an appearance at Hillhouse High School to talk to students about his life and work. Not long after, the two collaborated on the now-viral Huggy Bear Challenge, Scoop’s gravelly, rumbling vocals mingling with Diana Ross’ 1980 disco hit “I’m Coming Out.” He returned to New Haven in 2021, during a free concert from the city’s Youth and Recreation Department (YARD) at the Westville Bowl.
So when Huggins heard that he was coming to Hamden over the summer—the show was moved from July to August because of rain—“I was going to go to be a student,” he said. But Scoop put that notion to rest: he invited Huggins on stage with DJs Bink-B and Big E. “He was like, we gonna do this together.”
What happened next was the result of “years of friendship, chemistry and brotherhood,” Huggins said. From the moment Scoop came onstage, he electrified not just the crowd, but the other entertainers in his midst. Huggins was jamming, he remembered, and totally immersed in the moment. When Scoop announced “Hamden, if you ready to party, make some noise—” and then collapsed, Huggins was one of the first people to administer CPR.
As emergency responders arrived and took over, Huggins lifted the mic, and began to pray. He later said that it felt like the only thing to do in that moment: he knew that Scoop was a man of faith, and hoped that he could hear the prayers.
“In a moment like that, it’s easy to let chaos and pandemonium take over,” he said. “God was at the root of who he was. I believe that God is intentional.”
“I plan to continue to honor him onstage by giving it all I have,” he added. And “whatever Hamden does should be in alignment with his family.”
Howard, who was instrumental in bringing the concert to Hamden, said she is still reeling from Friday’s events. For months, she worked through municipal delays and unexpected funding hurdles to get the town to sign off on the show, she said. She nodded to former arts commissioner Diane Brown and promoter Paul Henderson Hollywood for working closely with her to make Fatman Scoop’s appearance possible.
“The work that I put into this was purely out of love for arts and culture,” she said. Friday, she watched firsthand as he “just popped up” onstage and began to hype up the crowd. She was amazed, and thrilled, to look out across the park and see over 1,000 people dancing to the sound.
When he fell, she initially thought he had tripped, she said. It was when she saw that “he didn’t look okay” that she called paramedics and ushered a nurse on stage. Hours later, she and Hollywood were at the hospital, waiting for news and in touch with his family, when they learned he had passed.
“We want to take our time and honor him,” she said. She added that she, and other members of the Arts Commission, wish they had been consulted or notified before the town announced Friday’s vigil.
“My thoughts and prayers are continuous for Fatman Scoop, his family and fans,” she later wrote on social media. “I pray that the candlelight vigil brings solace to those in need during these challenging times.”
Mayor Lauren Garrett, who was out of town to attend a friend's wedding, said that faith leaders, trauma counselors, and emergency responders will be on call Friday. “My primary concern is the safety of everyone involved and how we as a town are responding to this,” she said in a phone call Tuesday.
In the wake of his death, several concert-goers are also reflecting on what Fatman Scoop’s music meant to them. Saïeda Lataillade-Lewis, who grew up in the Bronx and now lives in New Haven, remembered Scoop as a voice of her generation, instantly recognizable when he jumped on a track.
“We knew that if we heard Fatman Scoop’s voice on a song or if he was promoting new music, we were going to have a summer anthem,” she remembered in a phone interview Tuesday. When she and friends heard his voice on Magoo and Timbaland’s “Drop,” popularized in the 2004 movie You Got Served, they loved it so much “we would do it, like, on command.”
Around six years ago, she was surprised and delighted to meet the artist at an Apple store on New York’s Upper West Side, where his big voice and ringing laughter echoed off the walls of the store’s basement offices (“He was so gracious, and wanted to talk to everyone who wanted to talk to him,” she remembered). So when she heard he was coming to Hamden, she made a plan to attend with several friends and bring her two young kids.
She was walking over to Josh’s Jungle, the park’s playground, when he collapsed. At first, she said, she turned around, but didn’t realize how serious things were. But at some point, the crowd caught on to the fact that it was a medical emergency. She said she is still checking in with friends who were at the concert, and thinks that the park could benefit from a memorial brick or plaque commemorating the performance.
“My heart definitely breaks, still,” she said, “He was a defining era in hip-hop. A defining sound in hip-hop. He just knew what to say to enhance the music.”
Avery “Slay” Washington, a son of New Haven and emcee who attended Tuskegee University with Lataillade-Lewis, remembered Scoop as “an icon and an inspiration.” When Washington began emceeing parties and events several years ago, Fatman Scoop was his muse. He loved the enthusiasm, vibrant and infectious, that he could hear on remixes of Rhianna’s “Pon The Replay” and “We Found Love” and Mariah Carey’s “It’s Like That.”
That’s still true years later, with recent gigs that include Black Wall Street on the New Haven Green and Playlist CT at the Canal Dock Boathouse. In Fatman Scoop, he saw a professor of pomp, and he was there to soak it in as a lifelong student. In his professional life, he brings that energy to his work as an educator and counselor at James Hillhouse High School.
“When I went to the concert, I was really excited to see him,” he said. “It was great to see him in all his glory,” he said. “When I looked at him, I saw that I could do this and the sky literally is the limit.”
While the musician seemed winded, he added, his death at such a relatively young age still comes as a complete shock. “It was definitely an unreal experience,” he said. “You can’t believe it in the moment.”
Jovan Brown, who moved to Hamden almost 30 years ago, also had that reaction. Growing up in New Haven, he thought of Fatman Scoop as “my generation’s Flavor Flav,” he said. Never did he imagine that the entertainer would appear in his hometown for the unofficial end of the summer.
While he usually records concerts, he said, this one felt different, because he was enjoying the music and catching up with friends. In the end, he only has two videos from the night.
“That’s how I prefer to remember him,” he said. “When it [the collapse] happened, my body just went numb. I had no reaction.” Now that he’s been able to reflect, he’s hopeful that the town’s tribute will feel as genuine as the musician did.
“He gave his all one last time for us,” he added. “He died doing what he loved. I do feel as a town, he definitely needs a proper sendoff.”
Danielle Campbell contributed reporting.