Tara Chase

Tara Chase is one of Canada’s most well-known female emcees to emerge in the country’s classic era of Hip Hop. Born and raised in Montreal, Chase grew up listening to her father’s old rap albums while initially dreaming of becoming a DJ. While she was developing her style and was putting in work opening up shows for major acts with her crew in Montreal, Chase was frustrated by her inability to find a job and decided to move to Toronto to look for opportunities. It was from her new homebase in Toronto that Chase made her official commercial debut in 1997 following the recording and release of “Autonomy” – a track produced by fellow emcee Saukrates – which appeared on the album Rap Essentials Volume 2. Considered her first commercial success, Chase continued to release music as a solo emcee while also appearing alongside members of The Circle – initially named Figurez Ov Speech (featuring other prominent Toronto Hip Hop practitioners such as Kardinal Offishall, Saukrates, Choclair, YLook, and Solitair) – as the group’s only female emcee. She would later decide to return to her studies in the mid-2000s and attend the University of Toronto where she majored in Biology. Currently, Tara Chase serves as Senior Solutions Designer at McKesson Canada.