Jazz

LISTEN: 81 Of Langston Hughes' 100 Favorite Jazz Recordings On Spotify

Langston Hughes

Late jazz poet and essayist Langston Hughes compiled a list of his 100 favourite jazz compositions. Here are 81 of them.

As one of the early innovators of “jazz poetry”, Langston Hughes added a new flavour to the hottest music of an area. His role in the Harlem Renaissance extended through his work, pushing the boundaries of what it meant to be black and how to feel enriched by it. This quote from Open Culture explains how jazz played its part:

“For Hughes, jazz was a broad category that embraced all black American music—not only the blues, ragtime, and swing but also, by the mid-fifties, rock and roll, which he believed, would ‘no doubt be washed back half-forgotten into the sea of jazz’ in years to come. But whatever the future held for jazz, Hughes had no doubt it would be ‘what you call pregnant,’ and as fertile as its past.”

Stream the playlist on Spotify.

(via Open Culture)

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