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Acknowledgements

Although I completed a dissertation on Bud Powell what seems like ages ago, I cannot claim that he’s always been “on top of my desk” in the ensuing years. There were many other projects to complete, including my book Race Music: Black Cultures from Bebop to Hip-Hop; writing, recording, and performing my own music; curating the exhibition Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing: How the Apollo Theater Shaped American Entertainment for the National Museum of African American History and Culture; many smaller writing assignments; wonderful collaborations with other artists and scholars; and much more. Mr. Powell patiently waited his turn.

When I started to think about him seriously again, and with more maturity, the lessons of his musical life and the issues surrounding them became clearer and more salient. Powell became a wonder. I first and foremost thank him for sharing his beautiful gift with the world, and I hope, with this book, that others will find a greater appreciation for the profundity, sublimity, and courage that I’ve found in his work.

The many roads traveled from graduate school to an endowed professorship have been filled with people and institutions that have supported my work in numerous ways. At the University of Michigan, a scholarly and musical community sparked my excitement for intellectual pursuits and showed me how they might intersect with my ongoing interest in performance. The Thurgood Marshall Dissertation Fellowship at Dartmouth College allowed me time and resources to complete my dissertation on Powell. Tufts University’s collegial faculty and inspiring students provided great opportunities to understand how teaching could impact one’s intellectual life.

I can never thank my colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania enough for their very special brand of support, liveliness, fierceness, and thoughtfulness. The energies of the departments of music and Africana studies have guided and encouraged all the quirky turns in my career path and all the extra-musicological projects I’ve taken on. I couldn’t ask for a better collection of people to work among. My friend and colleague Tim Rommen has always been valuable as a sparring partner and arbiter in all things musical and intellectual through the years. Penn undergraduates never disappoint in helping to create an atmosphere in which ideas take form and then move out into the world. Graduate students in my various seminars through the years have read and responded to drafts of this book in its various stages, and it is better because of their keen eyes and sharp intellectual insights. In this regard, I must thank in particular Garry Bertholf and John Meyers for their readings of an entire draft. To the former students on whose dissertations I had the honor of serving as advisor, your insights and energy remain with me always. The office staff in both the music and Africana studies departments continue to amaze with the level of support they provide in all things great and small. Thank you. I also thank the faculty and students at Princeton and Harvard Universities for opportunities to teach and to engage your intellectual communities. I also wish to acknowledge Tony Peebles and Fredara Hadley for technical support and Chuck Stewart and Michael Cuscuna for the photographs in this book.

The Jazz Studies Group at Columbia University, founded by the eminent scholar Bob O’Meally, created a space for the most advanced and motivating interdisciplinary thinking about this art form. The conversations, presentations, and debates among regular attendees and guests always provoked new ways to think about—and in certain cases introduced me to—some of the ideas in this book. The staff and resources of the Center for Black Music Research, Columbia College Chicago, for many years have been a source of information and direction. I also thank the McColl Center for Visual Art in Charlotte, North Carolina, for the wonderful artist-in-residency that allowed me the time, space, and place to put the finishing touches on this book.

I cannot list all of the friends and family who have made my life richer and, in turn, my work more enjoyable. My parents, Guthrie Ramsey, Sr., and Celia Ramsey Wynn, together with my wonderful siblings and beautiful children, have shared with me many experiences and memories to cherish outside my professional life, all of which have made the writing easier. The young ones coming along particularly inspire me: E. J., Zoe, Lyberty, London, Jada, Myles, and Levi. They touch my life in amazing ways. My in-laws, an extraordinary group of writers and thinkers, have kept me on my toes, always pushing me toward new ideas and ways of doing. I particularly thank Hettie Jones for reading a draft or two and for readily offering me her ideas about craft and clarity. And to Amiri Baraka, I extend thanks for clearing the philosophical and political space many years ago for the kind of work this book represents.

Although I’ve had many mentors along the way, I must make special note here of Samuel A. Floyd, Jr., and Richard Crawford, two gentlemen who have had and will always have the greatest influence on my work as a scholar. Their standards of generosity and rigor have made me the scholar I am today. I don’t have the words to fully express the depth of my gratitude to them. I owe thanks as well to the trailblazers of the particular brand of jazz studies to which I aspire, one that seeks to understand how the details of sound organization signify in the social world. For providing excellent examples before me, I acknowledge Mark Tucker, Robin D. G. Kelley, Ingrid Monson, Scott DeVeaux, Farah Griffin, Jeffery Magee, David Brackett, George Lewis, David Ake, Eric Porter, Tammy Kernodle, Robert Walser, Ronald Radano, and many more too numerous to name here. My editor, Mary Francis at the University of California Press, is the best in the business and continues to be an ideal partner in this process because of her intellectual gifts, experience, drive, and “cool breeze” manner. I’m looking forward to working on more projects together.

Musician, engineer, and producer J. Anthony Thompson has helped me to stay in the groove for the past few years, collaborating on various musical projects and providing a great example of how to push things to the finish line. My big “Cuzzo,” Ernest Perry Lyles, never leaves my side in whatever endeavor I take on. He’s always there, providing whatever is required, be it motivation or productive distraction. My friend and brother Tukufu Zuberi, a scholar of many talents, has been a constant source of inspiration and support through the years.

This book is dedicated with humble appreciation to the “eye-minded” one, Kellie Jones, an astonishing partner, friend, and scholar who continually brings much knowledge, light, sweetness, and power to the world, and to whom I extend gratitude for sending some my way every day.

Charlotte, North Carolina