Stream An Interview On The Revival Of Jazz In Black Music : All Songs Considered - NPR

Pianist and producer Robert Glasper has spent much of the past decade reconnecting jazz with popular black music, transforming the work of artists like rapper Kendrick Lamar, Flying Lotus and Brittany Howard. Peter Van Breukelen/Redferns hide caption

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Peter Van Breukelen/Redferns

Robert Glasper began the 2010s on a mission. He'd ended the previous decade with an album called Double Booked, which made a selling point out of his straddling of two worlds — acoustic jazz piano on one side, R&B/hip-hop groove on the other. The second of those involved a group called The Robert Glasper Experiment, and he felt it had a statement to make.

It arrived in the form of an album called Black Radio, which Blue Note released in 2012. Studded with notable guest artists (like rappers Lupe Fiasco and Yasiin Bey, and singers Lalah Hathaway and Erykah Badu), it heralded a renewed spirit of collaboration between jazz and what had previously been known as neo-soul. When Black Radio won a Grammy in 2013 — not in a jazz category but for Best R&B Album — it felt like the opening of a new chapter.

On this episode of All Songs Considered, host Robin Hilton is joined by Nate Chinen, from WBGO and Jazz Night in America, and Rodney Carmichael, from NPR Music, to discuss the influence of Glasper's approach — not only in jazz circles but also on hip-hop touchstones like Kendrick Lamar's To Pimp A Butterfly, and beyond-soul masterworks released this year, like Flying Lotus' Flamagra and Brittany Howard's Jaime.

They'll also consider precursors, notably the stylistic slant of producer J Dilla and the shadow he cast on a landmark from the previous decade, D'Angelo's Voodoo. And they'll consider what this amalgamated style portends for the next decade of black music.

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