Christian Scott

Recognized for his innovative trumpet work and direction of ensembles, Christian Scott—also known under the adopted West African name Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah—has earned acclaim for a boundary-crossing jazz aesthetic. Surfacing in the mid-2000s, he quickly set himself apart with a bold strain of post-bop rooted in his New Orleans background and incorporating modal jazz, electric fusion, post-rock, and hip-hop elements. That approach earned recognition on 2007’s Anthem, captured after Hurricane Katrina struck. Latin and African traditions along with electronic dance music vocabularies also informed his output, surfaces that appeared across 2012’s Christian a Tunde Adjuah, the 2017 Grammy-nominated The Emancipation Procrastination, and the 2019 Grammy-nominated Ancestral Recall.

Scott entered the world in New Orleans in 1983 and obtained his first trumpet at age 12 from his mother and grandmother. Because his uncle, modern jazz saxophonist Donald Harrison, was already established, Scott soon displayed notable command of the instrument—command that prompted Harrison to include him on gigs. Continuing along the same path, Scott attended the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts before earning a full scholarship to the Berklee School of Music in Boston. In 2004 he was chosen for the Berklee Monterey Quartet, drawn from four top students at the school, and performed at the Monterey Jazz Festival. Although he had already recorded with his uncle, Scott issued his first major-label solo project at age 22 on Concord Jazz, the 2006 album Rewind That. That release merged rock and R&B motifs with contemporary jazz, featured Harrison as a guest, and received a Grammy nomination the same year.

Scott followed in 2007 with Anthem, an impassioned statement addressing the hardships endured by fellow New Orleanians after Hurricane Katrina. His third studio album, Yesterday You Said Tomorrow, appeared in 2010. Broader ambitions surfaced on the 2012 double-disc set Christian a Tunde Adjuah, titled after his adopted West African name. Stretch Music arrived in 2015, an intensified experiment in genre fusion weighted toward electronic textures and featuring saxophonist Braxton Cook alongside flutist Elena Pinderhughes.

Ruler Rebel, issued at the close of March 2017, opened The Centennial Trilogy with politically charged material. Diaspora and The Emancipation Procrastination completed the sequence in June and October. The trilogy marked the centennial of recorded jazz while reflecting on persistent political and social fractures within the United States. The Emancipation Procrastination secured a 2018 Grammy nomination for Best Contemporary Instrumental Album. Ancestral Recall followed in 2019, again traversing genres and including singer Saul Williams, flutist Elena Pinderhughes, saxophonist Logan Richardson, and percussionist/singer Weedie Braimah; the album earned Scott another nomination in the Best Contemporary Instrumental Album category. The live recording Axiom, captured at New York’s Blue Note club, surfaced in 2020 and received two Grammy nominations, one of them for Best Improvised Solo on Scott’s interpretation of David Crosby’s “Guinnevere.”