It’s 2021, and jazz poet Gil Scott-Heron is inducted posthumously into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame for his “early influence” on rap. Scott-Heron bristled at the “Father of Rap” distinction, saying, “I don’t know if I can take the blame for rap music. I listen to the jazz station.”
An artistic polymath, Scott-Heron created art in many genres. He was a poet and novelist, he wrote jazz charts and was a proficient vocalist, keyboardist and guitarist. But above all, Gil Scott-Heron was an activist, an ally of the people. His art was groundbreaking, but poets like Malik al-Nasir contend that art “was merely the delivery system for the message.”
Says Malik, “Gil Scott-Heron was first and foremost an activist. He was driven by the need for civil rights. He brought complex issues to the forefront and distilled them down for the common man. He was a ghetto reporter.”
Active in the Black Power and Black Arts movements, Scott-Heron raised his voice through poetry and music. Critics praised his albums as “infectious groove … that belies the intelligence and integrity” of the vital message. Scott-Heron continued to write, perform, and protest until his death in 2011. In 1979, he contributed the song, “We Almost Lost Detroit,” for the No Nukes movement. In 1985, he wrote and sang “Let Me See Your I.D.” for Artists United Against Apartheid.
Gil Scott-Heron’s voice still calls for change. Egyptian protesters blared his poem, “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised” during the Arab Spring of 2011. And that poem became an anthem for the Black Lives Matter movement in the United States.
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