Herbie Hancock travelled the world to record his new album The Imagine Project beginning the process in the Indian city of Mumbai. The vocals-led album features a who’s who of top singers and instrumentalists, many of whom are household names. As the album is released this month, the hugely influential pianist and composer, an iconic figure in jazz, talks about its making, recalls highlights of his career so far, and explains how he addresses through his music the need for differing cultures to work and live together. Interview :: Stephen Graham

Earlier this year Herbie Hancock turned 70. A significant milestone for the pianist who has been an inspiration to musicians the world over since he debuted with Takin’ Off in 1962. The Blue Note years are very distant, understandably, yet the music from that special time is as fresh today as it was then, its appeal endless. Different generations come to Herbie Hancock’s music. If you’re a music student today you’ll study many of his classics, bona fide standards including ‘Maiden Voyage’ and ‘Dolphin Dance’; if you’re a clubber you’ll have danced to Us3’s updated version of ‘Cantaloupe Island’, which appeared in 1993 reborn as ‘Cantaloop (Flip Fantasia)’; if you’re one of the MTV Generation” you’ll know ‘Rockit’ and if you’re from an older generation still and you’re a Gershwin enthusiast you’ll know his album Gershwin’s World which when it came out marked the centenary of the great composer’s birth and the world in which he lived, and saw Hancock perform memorably with Stevie Wonder on WC Handy’s ‘St Louis Blues’.

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