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Quincy Jones’s music was the soundtrack to so many Black lives – and something we could be proud of | Michelle Kambasha

There will be countless tributes to the revered producer, but for me he evokes happy days growing up and the chaos of family parties, says music industry employee Michelle Kambasha

He was key in curating Jackson’s step from an earwormy, bubblegum pop artist who made inoffensive music to a progressive, sexy, disco visionary act. It was not only his success that Black people resonated with: it was the fact that he was authentic and unashamed of hisorigins, which were marked by poverty and racism, and had ataste for hedonism (something noticeable in the early minutes of the documentary, as he promises his actor daughter Rashida Jones that he’s given up drink). The music was a soundtrack as we grew up: be it the Black reimagining of The Wizard of Oz, The Wiz, or the film adaptation of Alice Walker’s Pulitzer-winning post-reconstruction saga The Color Purple.

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