Kamasi Washington expands jazz's boundaries on new album 'The Epic'
Saxophonist Kamasi Washington at Atom Factory in Culver City on April 22, 2015. (Al Seib / Los Angeles Times)
By CHRIS BARTON contact the reporter
When jazz saxophonist Kamasi Washington was contributing string arrangements to rapper Kendrick Lamar's "To Pimp a Butterfly," few could have predicted that both L.A. artists would end up dominating the conversation about hip-hop and jazz in 2015.
But Lamar's album, released this spring, has earned widespread acclaim for expanding the boundaries of rap, a genre that's easy to pigeonhole for those who follow only the mainstream.
Washington is earning similar raves for his explorations on "The Epic," a bold, three-disc statement that features a 10-piece band, a 20-person choir and a 32-piece orchestra. The album comes out Tuesday on L.A.'s Brainfeeder label, and Washington will celebrate the release Monday with a show at the Regent Theater.
Though the records appear to reside on different sides of the musical spectrum, they're connected by a shared commitment to independent, artistic vision, forward-looking blends of sound and far-reaching narratives that push against genre constraints.
They're also linked by a shared band of tightly knit L.A. artists who appear on both albums, including brothers Ronald and Stephen Bruner (the latter better known by his stage name Thundercat), Miles Mosley and Ryan Porter.
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