Meek Mill, Meghan Trainor, Rapsody To Perform At NFL Kickoff Experience In Chicago

Jeff Hahne / Getty Images – Meek Mill
Meek Mill performs at the NBA All-Star Game in February in Charlotte, N.C.

The NFL announced a star-studded Chicago concert on Friday that will directly precede the league’s Sept. 5 season opener between the Chicago Bears and Green Bay Packers.

Meek Mill, Meghan Trainor and Rapsody will perform in Grant Park, the home of Lollapalooza and many other Windy City music events, as part of the NFL’s 2019 Kickoff Experience, which runs from 12 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. CT on Sept. 5.

Mill, Trainor and Rapsody are Inspire Change advocates affiliated with the Inspire Change initiative the league launched in January to promote education and economic advancement, police and community relations and criminal justice reform.

Portions of Mill and Trainor’s sets will be aired during NBC’s pregame show between 7:30 p.m. and 8:10 p.m. ET.

The NFL will also encourage fans at the concert to remain in Grant Park to watch the game, which begins the league’s 100th season, on massive screens.

Notably, the lineup suggests that Jay-Z, who announced an entertainment partnership between the NFL and his own Roc Nation earlier this month, has already had an impact on the league’s Inspire Change initiative.

After Mill was sentenced to two to four years in prison for a probation violation, Jay-Z fought for his release, even penning a New York Times op-ed about Mill and criminal justice reform in November 2017.

Since Mill’s release in April 2018, he and Jay-Z have remained close allies. In April, the duo launched REFORM Alliance, an organization focused on prison reform, and in June, they announced that Free Meek, a docuseries about Mill’s experience with the criminal justice system, was in the works. The partnership is also creative: In July, Mill’s new Dream Chaser Records was launched under Roc Nation.

“With its global reach, the National Football League has the platform and opportunity to inspire change across the country,” said Jay-Z when his role as an NFL “live music entertainment strategist” was announced. “Roc Nation has shown that entertainment and enacting change are not mutually exclusive ideas — instead, we unify them. This partnership is an opportunity to strengthen the fabric of communities across America.”