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Remembering Guru (July 17, 1961 – April 19, 2010 )

A monotone that could carry any beat ever made, and the man who first took rap into a room full of jazz musicians. Thirty-three tracks remembering Guru.

Keith Elam, 1961–2010

Guru — born Keith Edward Elam in Boston, the son of a judge, and a Morehouse graduate — was one half of Gang Starr with DJ Premier, and one of the most distinctive voices rap has produced. It was not a technically flashy delivery. It was flat, unhurried and completely unmistakable, and it sat on top of Premier's chopped, dusty production like the two had been designed for each other.

His other great contribution was Jazzmatazz, launched in 1993: a series that put him in the studio with actual jazz musicians — Donald Byrd, Roy Ayers, Branford Marsalis, Courtney Pine — rather than sampling them. At the time this was close to heretical in both camps. It is now the obvious ancestor of everything from The Roots to Robert Glasper's Black Radio.

He died of cancer in April 2010, at 48, amid a bitter public dispute over his final years that has never fully been resolved.

What to listen for

"Moment Of Truth" is the Gang Starr essential and one of the most quoted rap records ever made — a song about consequence, delivered without a trace of self-pity. "Skills" and "She Knowz What She Wantz" show the Premier partnership at full strength.

The Jazzmatazz material is the reason this playlist is thirty-three tracks. "Loungin'" with Donald Byrd is the definitive statement — a hard-bop trumpet legend playing over a rap beat, and neither party condescending to the other. "Sights In The City" with Courtney Pine and Carleen Anderson is the British chapter and appears twice here.

"Le Bien, Le Mal" with MC Solaar is a landmark of transatlantic rap — French and English trading verses in 1993, long before that was normal.

"State of Clarity" with Common and Bob James and "Hustlin' Daze" with Donell Jones show the later reach.

Go deeper

Gang Starr's Moment of Truth (1998) and Daily Operation (1992) are the two albums. DJ Premier's production catalogue beyond Gang Starr — Nas, Biggie, Jay-Z — is one of the most important in the genre.

Jazzmatazz Vol. 1 (1993) is the historically significant one and holds up completely.

For where the idea went: The Roots, Digable Planets, A Tribe Called Quest's Low End Theory, and eventually Robert Glasper's Black Radio and Kamasi Washington. Guru got there first.

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