Makaya McCraven is a prolific drummer, composer, and producer. Known for his unique approach to jazz, which blends live improvisation with sampling, he’s been described as a “beat scientist” and “one of the most important figures in the jazz world” by critics. His music draws from a wide range of influences, including hip-hop, electronica, and folk music.

McCraven believes that the word “jazz” is “insufficient, at best, to describe the phenomenon we’re dealing with.” Profiled in Vice, Rolling Stone, The Guardian, and NPR, among other publications, his music is at the very vanguard of this indescribable phenomenon. According to the New York Times, “McCraven has quietly become one of the best arguments for jazz’s vitality.”

Following up on his widely acclaimed 2018 album Universal Beings, McCraven’s newest release, In These Times, is the triumphant finale of a project seven years in the making. It cements his renown as a “cultural synthesizer” and an artist with a unique gift for collapsing space, destroying borders, and blending past, present, and future into polytextural arrangements of post-genre jazz.

Watch “Dream Another,” by Makaya McCraven.