Jazz Meets Poetry: A Centennial Tribute To Gwendolyn Brooks at The Nash

To mark the 100th birthday of the late poet and author Gwendolyn Brooks, Valley jazz musicians and poets will celebrate in downtown Phoenix. The two-set event will include on-the-spot improvisation among the poets and bands, music numbers by the bands and an open share for community members to read works by Brooks and others or their original poetry.

Rosemarie Dombrowski, Phoenix's first-ever poet laureate, will kick off the event with a special invocation. Brooks, a protégé of Langston Hughes, is perhaps best known for her 1960 poem "We Real Cool" from the book The Bean Eaters. Yet her work Annie Allen earned her a Pulitzer Prize in 1950...

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To mark the 100th birthday of the late poet and author Gwendolyn Brooks, Valley jazz musicians and poets will celebrate in downtown Phoenix. The two-set event will include on-the-spot improvisation among the poets and bands, music numbers by the bands and an open share for community members to read works by Brooks and others or their original poetry.

Rosemarie Dombrowski, Phoenix's first-ever poet laureate, will kick off the event with a special invocation. Brooks, a protégé of Langston Hughes, is perhaps best known for her 1960 poem "We Real Cool" from the book The Bean Eaters. Yet her work Annie Allen earned her a Pulitzer Prize in 1950. Brooks was the first African American to receive a Pulitzer in any literary genre.

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