as part of Fabbrica Europa 2024

Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) is one of the most important and representative figures of the poetic and political movement in the history of Black Culture. Born on October 7, 1934 in Newark, New Jersey, he is the author of more than forty publications including essays, poetry collections, writings on theater and music history and criticism. The influences on his literary work and his civil commitment range from the music of Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane, Thelonius Monk and Sun Ra to the Cuban Revolution, the teaching of Malcolm X and the international revolutionary movements.

“The Essence of Reparations” is Baraka’s first collection of essays published in a book that radically explores what would become the watershed movement of the twenty-first century on themes related to racism, nationalist oppression, colonialism, self-determination, and national and human liberation, which he has long addressed both creatively and critically.

“Blues People” is his most famous work, which has become a classic of African-American music and culture. Written in the mid-1960s, it analyzes with rigor and passion the inextricable connection between blues and jazz and the history of blacks, from slavery to the struggle for emancipation and civil rights. In outlining this path, Amiri Baraka, while considering the weight of his African roots, emphasizes the processes of hybridization and cross-breed that characterize the blues and other African-American musical and cultural forms.
Between 2006 and 2007, Amiri Baraka recorded some of his poems in the album “Akendengue Suite” by Dinamitri Jazz Folklore.

Ten years after Baraka’s death, four of them – Dimitri Grechi Espinoza, Emanuele Parrini, Simone Padovani and Beppe Scardino – have been invited to dialogue with his voice in four solo music paintings, to offer four original portraits that show his creative, political and human complexity.

in collaboration with
Scuola di Musica Elettronica del Conservatorio Luigi Cherubini di Firenze
Professor: Damiano Meacci – Students: Irene Fortunato, Edoardo Martini, Lorenzo Milani
and with The Recovery Plan