WASHINGTON — Max Roach, the great drummer and bandleader and paradigm-shifter of jazz, though he disliked that word, never finished an autobiography. That’s a shame. He died in 2007 at 83, and his career spans the beginning of bebop, the intersection of jazz with the civil rights movement, free improvisation, and jazz’s current state of cross-disciplinary experiments and multimedia performances. Inasmuch as jazz is about change and resistance, he embodied those qualities: He fought anything that would contain or reduce him as an artist and a human being. He would have been well served by his own narrative, set in one voice.
But Roach was archivally minded, and, when he died, he left 400 linear feet of his life and actions to be read: scores and lead sheets, photographs, contracts, itineraries, correspondence, reel tapes and cassettes and drafts of an unfinished autobiography, written with the help of Amiri Baraka. On Monday, the Library of Congress will announce that it has acquired the archive from Mr. Roach’s family and that it will be made available to researchers.
“What I think he would hope people would see,” said the violist Maxine Roach, his daughter from his first marriage, “is that there was a lot about his life that was difficult, you know? The struggles. A lot about economics, and jazz as a word that we didn’t define ourselves.” (Roach felt that it was a pejorative term; he preferred to call it African-American music.) “But aside from all of that,” she continued, “I hope that people see his excellence and his mastery of his skill, which helped him rise in this country that’s been so hard on black men especially, and how he went through it and what price he paid.”
According to E! News, Prince will be cast on New Girl, because he is a “huge fan.” The ever enigmatic 58-year-old will appear in post Superbowl episode, which came about when he personally contacted the producers. “He knows everything about the show. He contacted Zooey [Deschanel] and Hannah [Simone] directly and asked to do [it],” executive producer Brett Baer said. “He’s a Nick and Jess shipper!”
A new musical inspired by the rap songs of the late Tupac Shakur is heading to Broadway. Holler If Ya Hear Me is scheduled to open at the Palace Theatre in New York on June 19, with preview performances set to begin on May 26. Holler isn’t a biographical account of Shakur, who was killed at the age of 25 in 1996 following a shooting in Las Vegas. Rather, the musical production will use the rapper’s lyrics to tell a story of contemporary inner-city lives.
Jamaican reggae singer Tessanne Chin was declared the winner of the fifth season of NBC’s The Voice tonight. “Jamaica is celebrating with the United States,” said host Carson Daly after the big reveal, as fireworks exploded in the background. Sharing Tessanne’s victory was her coach, Adam Levine — the second time one of his artists has claimed the top prize. “It’s been nothing but a joy to work with you,” she told her mentor moments before learning about her win. “You’ve been a shoulder to cry on, you’ve been a friend, you’ve been invested, you’ve been true. I love you, I trust you.”