Left of Black S11 · E28 | The Sound of Afro South Asian Collaborations in Black Music with Elliott Powell

When you think of hip-hop or R&B, how often do you hear the strings of a sitar being strummed in the background? In this episode of Left of Black, host and Duke University Professor Mark Anthony Neal discusses the influence of South Asian collaborations in contemporary Black music with Elliott Powell, the Beverly and Richard Fink Professor in Liberal Arts at the University of Minnesota. His new book, Sounds from the Other Side: Afro–South Asian Collaborations in Black Popular Music (University of Minnesota Press), looks at how artists like Missy Elliott and Jay-Z have incorporated South Asian influences into their work and explores the history of these partnerships–going as far back as Miles Davis and John Coltrane.