Kassa Overall

Seattle-raised, Brooklyn-based Kassa Overall is a jazz musician, emcee, singer, producer and drummer. One of the fastest rising stars of NYC’s legendary jazz scene and a self-described “backpack jazz” artist, he melds the praxis of avant-garde improvisation with hip-hop production techniques on his latest album, I Think I’m Good, which was released on Gilles Petersons Brownswood Recordings on February 28. The album tilts the nexus of jazz and hip-hop in new directions that reflect his panoramic, multi-cultural background, from Joan Baez to West Coast G-Funk to the sounds of New York’s avant-garde scene. Since the 2019 release of his critically acclaimed debut album Go Get Ice Cream and Listen to Jazz, NYC and global audiences have had the opportunity to experience Overall’s singular brilliance, which has been embraced with rave reviews from Afropunk, NPR, BBC, San Francisco Chronicle and the New York Times. Overall has been working at the forefront of jazz for two decades, touring and recording as a sideman drummer with artists as varied as Geri Allen, Francis and the Lights, Yoko Ono and Arto Lindsay. He’s featured on drummer Terri Lyne Carrington’s Social Science, worked with Brandee Younger and shared stages with many of the greats, including Donald Byrd, Mayer Hawthorne, Yoko Ono and Gary Bartz.