Matana Roberts

Matana Roberts (born 1975, Chicago) is a saxophonist, composer, and sound artist currently based in New York City.

Growing up in the colorful jazz scene in Chicago, Roberts began her professional career playing in clubs and bars, eventually becoming the house band of the Velvet Club with the jazz trio Sticks And Stones in the early 2000s. After moving to New York City in 2002, Roberts playing in the subways and streets for money and published her own zine documenting her experiences, before releasing her first project as a band leader with 2007’s The Chicago Project.

Roberts’s work is often narrative, avant-garde, and explorational. Common themes include the existential concepts of endurance, liberation, migration, and perseverance, and improvisation as it relates to the Black American Experience. Her monumental Coin Coin series is perhaps the greatest example of her successful praxis. Projected to be 12 chapters long, 2011’s Coin Coin Chapter One: Gens de couleur libres marks the first entry.

Matana Roberts is frequently a collaborator as well, having working on projects with Deerhoof, Vijay Iyer, the AACM, Roscoe Mitchell, and TV on the Radio.