Dr. Ajay Heble is an internationally renowned scholar, a visionary arts leader, and an innovative community builder. Instrumental in establishing the academic field of Critical Studies in Improvisation, he has made fundamental contributions to our understanding of musical and other forms of improvisation as vital models for social change. Dr. Heble is Professor Emeritus in the College of Arts at the University of Guelph. Until his retirement from the University, he was the founding Director of the International Institute for Critical Studies in Improvisation (IICSI). He is the author or editor of several books, and he was the founding Artistic Director of the award-winning Guelph Jazz Festival and Colloquium, a capacity in which he served for 23 years. He is the recipient of numerous awards including the Killam Prize for the Humanities and the SSHRC Impact Award. In 2024, he was inducted as a fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.
Can musical improvisation teach us to think otherwise? Can it liberate us from pre-digested ways of seeing (and thinking about) the world? And how do we curate spaces that fuel these experiments in connection, possibility, and care?
The following is an excerpt from Ajay Heble’s Introduction to Classroom Action: Human Rights, Critical Activism, and Community-Based Education, a book (edited by Heble, with chapters by his former students)
