Stanley Crouch

Journalist, author, critic

An outspoken writer and critic, Stanley Crouch’s culture pieces have appeared in Harper's, The New York Times, Vogue, Downbeat, The Daily Beast, The New Yorker, and more.

He has served as artistic consultant for jazz programming at Lincoln Center since 1987, and is a founder Jazz at Lincoln Center. In June 2006 his first major collection of jazz criticism, "Considering Genius: Jazz Writings," was published.

He is the author of many other essay collections and novels, including “Notes of a Hanging Judge,” “The All-American Skin Game; or, The Decoy of Race: The Long and Short of It,” “Always in Pursuit: Fresh American Perspectives,” “The Artificial White Man: Essays on Authenticity,” and “Don't the Moon Look Lonesome: A Novel in Blues and Swing.” He is presently completing a book about the Barack Obama presidential campaign.

Crouch, born in Los Angeles in 1945 , he began writing at the age of eight and became active in the Civil Rights Movement while in junior high school. After graduating from high school, he attended junior colleges in the Los Angeles area, and worked for a poverty program in East Los Angeles, teaching a literacy class.

Then in August 1965 , Crouch witnessed the Watts Riot first hand. This experience radicalized Crouch and he became a black nationalist.

While working as an actor-playwright at the Studio Watts Company, Crouch discovered the writings of Ralph Ellison and Albert Murray who then became major influences in Crouch's thinking. This influence caused him to turn away from the Black Nationalist movement, finding it too reactionary.

Crouch taught at the Claremont Colleges in California before moving to New York, where he played the drums in an avant-garde jazz band and later became a staff writer for the Village Voice.

It was during this time that Crouch started to find his voice as a writer, which he has since perfected.