ROSCOE MITCHELL

Black to the Future: Roscoe Mitchell and the Liberation of Sound
by Raul da Gama

For decades, African American artists have protested tirelessly against the limits imposed by the term “jazz”. While the label has become a convenient shorthand for an extraordinary genre of music, its origins are steeped in a Eurocentric framework that fails to capture the visceral, vibrant rhythms birthed from Black creative expression. In truth, this art form is more faithfully understood as Indigenous Black American Music. The same applies to all artistic forms that emerge from the boundless wellspring of Black creativity—be it poetry, painting, drama, or any other discipline.

At the forefront of this reclamation stands Roscoe Mitchell: a towering composer, multi-instrumentalist and sonic visionary whose life’s work exemplifies a categorical refusal to be confined. For Mitchell, sound itself becomes a way to reframe the Black experience while also challenging the very frameworks that define the continuum of American music.

To read more, visit https://mags.hothousejazzmagazine.com/5853afc8ce.html#page/16.