Piano

Jason Moran

(1975–)

United States

Jason Moran (b. 1975) — Piano. Led Black Stars, Ten. Worked with Ambrose Akinmusire, Nasheet Waits, Walter Smith III.

Moran is interested not only in jazz as music but as culture, collaborating with visual art and installation. As artistic director at the Kennedy Center he is trying to change the presentation of jazz itself. At the piano his most visible debt is to Thelonious Monk — spare, angular, deeply thoughtful.

Jason Moran's albums

Omega

Immanuel Wilkins · 2020

Jason Moran functions not just as a performing pianist but as a producer-mentor to younger musicians. He produced Immanuel WilkinsImmanuel Wilkinsイマニュエル・ウィルキンス's debut Omega Omega OmegaImmanuel Wilkins · 2020 (2020), which the New York Times named the top jazz album of 2020. With his band Bandwagon, he continually explores the boundary between technology and improvisation.

— New York Times Jazz Albums of 2020, Giovanni Russonello, 2020

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Jason Moran's albums

Jason Moran's videos

July 14, 2024, NN North Sea Jazz Festival, Rotterdam. Charles Lloyd's Sky Quartet with Eric HarlandEric Harlandエリック・ハーランド on drums and Larry GrenadierLarry Grenadierラリー・グレナディア on bass — one of the most compelling acoustic jazz units working today.

— NN North Sea Jazz Festival, 2024

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Eric Harland

Larry Grenadier

Videos featuring Jason Moran

Jason MoranJason Moranジェイソン・モラン is a pianist, visual artist, composer, and former artistic director of jazz programming at the Kennedy Center. His approach — freely crossing stride piano and hip-hop — treats jazz as cultural act as much as music.

— Jason Moran, Kennedy Center, 2024

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Jason MoranJason Moranジェイソン・モラン formed the Bandwagon trio in 1999 with Tarus Mateen and Nasheet Waits, integrating sampling and hip-hop editing into the piano trio — a generationally defining ensemble.

— The Bandwagon at 20, Whitney Museum of American Art, 2019

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In 2014, Jason MoranJason Moranジェイソン・モラン released All Rise: A Joyful Elegy for Fats Waller. Performed live in a giant papier-mache mask as a dance party, it was a satirical retort to jazz museumification.

— Jason Moran Reinvents Fats Waller, JazzTimes, 2014

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Jason Moran's leader album

Black Stars

Jason Moran · 2001

Ten

Jason Moran · 2010

Omega

Immanuel Wilkins · 2020

Perceive Its Beauty, Acknowledge Its Grace

Shabaka Hutchings · 2024

Jason Moran's name sits beside André 3000's on Shabaka Hutchings' 2024 album Perceive Its Beauty, Acknowledge Its Grace. The former OutKast rapper, now devoted to flute, turns up as a working sideman in a serious jazz session.

Jason Moran's albums