Karim L. Rome

1993 - 2023

Karim Louis Rome, formerly of Hartford, died unexpectedly on July 3rd in The Bronx, New York City, after an illness, at age 30. Born in Hartford on April 7, 1993, Karim leaves his grieving parents, mother Sadani Thioye Rome and father Thomas Rome, of The Bronx; loving younger sister Laina Muradzikwa of The Bronx; and older brother and mentor Mo Seck (and Kate Skidmore, and nephew Behr Seck) of Annandale, Virginia. Karim also leaves his maternal grandparents, of Dakar, Senegal: grandmother Fatou Kiné Fall and grandfather Demba Thioye. Karim's paternal grandparents, of Bloomfield, grandmother Ann Nicolle Rome and grandfather Lewis Rome, have predeceased him. He also leaves numerous beloved aunts, uncles, and cousins both in the United States and in Senegal, and a wide community of friends and colleagues throughout Connecticut's cultural landscape, and in the "Hartt Diaspora" in New York City.

Karim attended public schools in Hamden and West Hartford, and in Long Beach, California, and then William H. Hall High School in West Hartford, and the CREC Greater Hartford Academy of the Arts and The Artists Collective in Hartford. Following high school, Karim earned a scholarship to The Hartt School, the University of Hartford's conservatory, and the school's Jackie McLean Institute of Jazz, where he attained his Bachelor of Music degree in 2015.

Karim was a tenor saxophonist nourished, as so many of Hartford's musicians are, on Jackie McLean's legacy through the eye-to-eye teaching of the alto saxophone legend's own son, longtime Hartt School professor and tenor saxophonist René McLean. Professor McLean, alongside fellow Hartt professors trombonist Steve Davis and double bass violinist Nat Reeves, imparted Jackie McLean's unique perspectives on American jazz history and music from Africa to Karim, with palpable impact. Karim became a pensive, searching composer and soloist with an unmistakably original tenor saxophone sound.

Given Karim's Senegalese origins, he naturally also gravitated toward a diversity of African and African diasporic musical idioms, beyond the confines of the hard bop canon. In that frame of reference, Karim found much joy as a member of veteran Hartford drummer and bandleader Jocelyn Pleasant's Afro-Fusion ensemble The Lost Tribe, as a featured performer in the multidisciplinary work of choreographer Arien Wilkerson, and as musical director in off-Broadway productions by actor and filmmaker Rock Wilk. Karim has also appeared in festival venues around the world, notably performing with Senegal's mythic Orchestre Baobab and with Morocco's Hassan Hakmoun, the groundbreaking gnawa maalem and modernist.

On July 6th, Karim Rome was buried in a private ceremony for immediate family and close friends at Hillside Cemetery in Cortlandt Manor, New York, where he was remembered as a genuine and soulful friend, son, and brother who somehow, with a trademark self-effacing humor and kindness, seems to have touched more lives in his thirty years than one might aspire to touch in a hundred twenty.


THE KARIM ROME MEMORIAL HARTFORD JAZZ SCHOLARSHIP

Karim Rome's family is establishing a scholarship for future arts students from the Greater Hartford community. To honor Karim's memory, and in lieu of flowers or tree-planting, your donation to the inaugural endowment for this scholarship would be most welcome in any amount. Checks payable to "Karim Rome Memorial Hartford Jazz Scholarship" may be mailed c/o Butler Norris & Gold, Attorneys, 254 Prospect Avenue, Hartford, CT 06106. Or, you may also make an in-person contribution at the upcoming memorial concert at The Artists Collective. Please note that the date of the memorial concert has been rescheduled from August 5 (as originally published here) to Sunday, October 1, 2023 at 2 PM at The Artists Collective, 1200 Albany Avenue, Hartford, Connecticut 06112. Further details of the concert and additional directives for scholarship giving will be forthcoming on social media.