Many artists have claimed to merge jazz with hip-hop and R&B, but most often this music ends up being little more than an MC rapping over a drum machine layered with sampled acoustic bass and horn lines (think Us3’s “Cantaloop”, or “Rebirth of Slick” by Digable Planets). While these efforts maintain the solid groove of hip-hop, they ignore the improvisational elements and harmonic sophistication that is the essence of jazz. However, there seems to be…