| Sons Of Kemet are born of many vital elements, a name that nods to ancient Egyptian culture, and a line-up that comprises some of the most progressive 21st-century talents in British jazz and beyond. Band-leader, composer and sax and clarinet don Shabaka Hutchings brings together his fiery vision alongside London-based bandmates Tom Skinner and Seb Rochford and latest addition Theon Cross. Kemet is het Oudegyptische woord voor Egypte en betekent ‘zwart land’. Het verwijst naar de zwarte, vruchtbare modder op de oevers van de Nijl. Sons Of Kemet are: Shabaka Hutchings – saxophone, clarinet Oren Marshall – tuba Tom Skinner – drums Seb Rochford – drums |
| The group used saxophone and clarinet (Hutchings), tuba (Cross), and two drummers (Skinner, Hick) to make their music and played a mixture of jazz, rock, Caribbean folk, and African music. On 9 September 2013, Sons of Kemet released their debut album Burn, which received the Arts Desk Album of the Year 2013 and a nomination for Gilles Peterson's Album of the Year. Their next album Lest We Forget What We Came Here to Do received the same nomination for the year 2015. The group won Best Jazz Act at the 2013 MOBO Awards. On 30 March 2018, Impulse! released the band's third album, Your Queen Is a Reptile. It was nominated for the 2018 Mercury Prize. On 14 May 2021, the fourth album by Sons of Kemet, Black to the Future, was released. Hubert Adjei-Kontoh, writing for Pitchfork, described the album as a "propulsive mind- and body-moving record", while Kitty Empire writing for The Guardian described it as "an eloquent dance between anger and joy" and praised the lyric writing and instrumentals of the album. On June 1, 2022, they posted that after the current run of shows, "we will closing this chapter of the band's life for the foreseeable future." |