Jazz Negotiations Poetry By Echezonachukwu Nduka

In Jazz Negotiations, emotive dialogues with histories, identities, and quotidian realities seek to redefine Africanness. Shaped by music and jazz form, narratives run from one end of the world map to the other, stopping in cities, amplifying voices, reviewing racial tensions, and questioning belief. 

Through Nduka’s musical verses, we hear the confessions of melodies in hidden and open spaces, the weeping of nature for harm caused by humans, the wounds of yesteryears living in the trauma of now, and the promise of the future. 

In a wide range of thematically linked poems that move through the landscapes of Nigeria and the United States, we find the borderless natures of grief and joy, sound and silence, and the unending possibilities of language.

Echezonachukwu Nduka is a Nigerian-born poet, pianist, and scholar. His writing has appeared in publications including Transition, Lolwe, Jalada Africa, The Indianapolis Review, Isele Magazine, Unbound: An Anthology of New Nigerian Poets Under 40, among others. His debut poetry book, Chrysanthemums for Wide-eyed Ghosts, was shortlisted for the Pan-African Writers Association (PAWA) Poetry Prize. A Centaur Records artist, he is noted for his work in African pianism, and performs a seasonal recital titled Resounding African Pianism. He is currently a Benjamin Franklin Fellow and Doctoral Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania.