" ..What can be shown is a relationship between jazz music or at the very least jazz musicians serving as conduits for the spread of Islam in America for previous generations.
In his essay "The America I have seen" the Eyptian Sayyid Qutb once wrote "The American is primitive in his artistic tastes, whether in his judgment of art or his own artistic works. Jazz music is his music of choice. It is this music that the savage bushmen created to satisfy their primitive desires, and their desire for noise on the one hand, and the abundance of animal noises on the other. The American’s enjoyment of jazz does not fully begin until he couples it with singing like crude screaming. And the louder the noise of the voices and instruments, until it rings in the ears to an unbearable degree, the greater the appreciation of the listeners."
Yet it was their involvement with the cultral arts and jazz in particular which brought many artist into contact with Muslims and Islam.
Early American Muslim da'ees (missonaries, callers to Islam) such Shaykh Daoud Ahmed Faisal, Al-hajj Talib Ahmad Dawud (Alfonso "Barrymore" Rainey), Idrees Sulieman (Leonard Graham), Al-Hajj Abdullah Rasheed Ahmad (Lynn Hope), Abdullah Ibn Buhaina (Arthur "Art" Blakey) and Daud Salahuddin all had been jazz musicians at one point.
A number of Islamic organizations were founded by these da'ees (callers to Islam) in their efforts to prostylitize, Shaykh Daoud Faisal founded the Islamic Propagation Center of America/Islamic Mission to America, the Muslim Village Madinah al-Salaam and the more enduring State Street Mosque (now known as Masjid Daoud), Al-Hajj Talib Dawud founded the Muslim Brotherhood, USA, al-Hajj Abdullah became a teacher at the Philadelphia unit of the Addeynu Allahu Universal Arabic Association (AAUAA) and Abdullah Ibn Buhaina's New York apartment was used as an Islamic mission when he formed the all Muslim jazz band, the Messengers (later renamed The Jazz Messengers).
So ubiquteous were Muslim be-bop jazz musicians in the 1940's and 1950's that in 1957 Langston Hughes wrote the short poem "Be-Bop Boys" Imploring Mecca / to acheive / six discs / With Decca, as an ode to Muslim jazz musicians praying for success with their record companies.
Later in the 1960's musicians who would become Muslim da'ees include Imam al-Hajj Koli Ahmad Tawfiq who founded the Mosque of the Islamic Brotherhood (MIB), Imam Yusuf Muzaffarudin Hamid who formed the Islamic Party of North America (IPNA) , Daud Salahuddin was Amir of the Chicago unit of the IPNA and Imam Dawoud Adeyola who became Imam of Muslim Village Jabul Arabiyya the orginally the West Valley unit of the AAUAA.
During 1959 Al-Hajj Talib Ahmad Dawud (husband of the great Muslim jazz singer Dakota Staton aka Aliyah Rabia) formed a jamaat (Muslim Community) in Detroit under the aupices of the Muslim Brotherhood, USA (an Ahmadiyya affiliate) and by 1961 he had 125 members. Also in Detroit as jazz moved to post be-bop avant-garde, Muslim jazz musicians would continue leading roles as da'ees. Philadelphia native Shaykh Ahmad Mubarak Abdullah Mutakalim (Shaykh Mubarak) founded Masjid Kalimaat in the late 1960's, then in 1971 Shaykh Mubarak joined with Detroit natives Imam Abdul Jalil (Muhammud Bey Abdul Jalil) and his wazir Furuq Z Bey (members of the avant-grade jazz group Griot Galaxy and the "Bey tribe" community that formed around them) to form the Masjid (Mosque) As-Salaam Orthodox Islamic Movement in Detroit.
So from the above, which is hardly exhaustive I would say there is considerable evidense that there has been missionary efforts on the parts of Muslim jazz musicians..."
Sheikh Akil Fahd, is an imam and Muslim community activist based in Detroit, and is himself of African-American herritage. He has recently set up a group to discuss, and share details, of the various African-American Islamic movements that have existed, over the years, across the United States. African-Americans are thought to make up around about 42% of all Muslims living in the United States.
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