Disruptive music
A musical visionary took the stage at the Radcliffe gymnasium on Monday. His innovations, said Harvard Professor and Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study Fellow Ingrid Monson, are on a par with those of jazz legends Charlie Parker and Miles Davis. But he doesn’t play the trumpet or saxophone; he plays the balafon. Neba Solo is helping to reframe both music and culture in his native Mali in West Africa. Solo “has had an enormous influence on the community of musicians around [him]. He is that kind of leader in what he does,” said Monson. “He both comes from a tradition, but he has challenged the borders of the tradition.” Monson, Quincy Jones Professor of African-American Music, is using her fellowship year to write the book “Kenedougou Visions,” based on the life of Solo, renowned for creating an entirely new type of balafon and an original musical style, as well as for addressing...