With the early August opening of his and business partner Sky Grey’s new, Ybor City studio, Tampa rapper and producer Sam E. Hues has officially entered the newest chapter of his long, multifaceted creative career.

The Dojo, located at 1601 E. 4th Ave., will also have a full-blown, outdoor live music element before the fall is over, with the studio and venue operated and managed as two separate entities. With a stack of analog televisions in one corner, and a pile of tarps and paint cans in another, the outdoor area of the Dojo didn’t look like much when CL visited over the summer, but big-picture-thinker Hues knows exactly where everything in the soon-to-be venue will be. To me, it looks like the beginning stages of what will be one of Tampa’s popular event spaces.

“That’s where the stage is going to be. It’s going to be built coming out of those trees,” Hues says as he points to the corner of the vacant lot. While the outdoor venue is still in its infantile stages, the studio at the Dojo has been up and running since June. It books in two hour minimums ($55/hour), which include time with Hues’ friend, producer Maxx Forman, who was nominated for a Grammy thanks to a role in Joyner Lucas’ 2017 viral video hit, “I’m Not Racist.” In its early stages, the Dojo was only open to clients hand selected by Forman and Hues, but it’s since opened the books up to musicians playing every genre.

‘We’re here for everybody. I think everyone thinks we’re gonna be a hip-hop studio, but we’re absolutely open to anything,” Hues says. “I’m tied to a lot of different genres.”

Hues’ motivation for building the multi-use Dojo came out of his need for a permanent space that’s centralized around music.

“With venues, people come in and out, management changes, and the culture shifts” Hues, who played a blowout album release show at Skipper’s over the summer, explains. He has deep roots in Tampa and considers everything he does a byproduct of his friends, family; he in anchored in this city, and the Dojo is simply an embodiment of the passion for music and community that he has found here — he hopes that the Dojo can help musicians breaking into the scene find their community too.

“The community, as it exists now, wasn’t like this 10 years ago… it’s all about learning from each other. There wasn’t a place we could go to be around people who’ve been in the scene a little longer,” Hues explains. He doesn’t want newer artists to have to endure the same losses and creative heartbreaks he did. In spite of the Ls, the Dojo is Hues’ giant leap towards creating his permanent home base in Tampa’s music scene –– and it’s only the beginning. He envisions workshops, production classes, and even a monthly community brunch when he looks at the future of the Dojo.

“If I dont make money I’m fine with it. It’ll be more beneficial for the culture as a whole,” Hues ays. “We wanted a functional, community base. As much as it is for me, it’s for everyone else. For the culture, by the culture.”

The Dojo, 1601 E. 4th Ave., Ybor City. instagram.com/dojosounds.