The Meridian Center for Cultural Diplomacy is the leading center in the United States that employs the arts and culture as a tool of diplomacy and cross-cultural understanding. From the legendary Jazz Ambassadors program featuring music greats such as Dizzy Gillespie, Dave Brubeck, Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, and Sarah Vaughan who toured the world to promote a positive view of the United States when Cold War tensions were at their height to today’s Hip Hop Diplomacy program that helps transform conflict in countries across the globe, Meridian has connected people and helped bridge divides for more than 60 years. We work in partnership with the U.S. Department of State, our American embassies abroad as well as the diplomatic community here in Washington, D.C. to develop and curate exhibitions, exchanges and programs that range from film screenings to mural arts programs to music performances. Our programs have reached millions of people in more than 260 cities in 60 countries worldwide.