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For Herbie Hancock, who improvised with Miles Davis, taking musical risks is second nature. So it was no sweat working with such disparate talents as India.Arie, Jeff Beck, P!nk, Tinariwen, Seal and Lisa Hannigan (singing Bob Dylan as Gaeilge) on new album The Imagine Project. The jazz legend talks to BELINDA MCKEONin New York

HE HAS been melting the boundaries between musical genres since before half those genres had even been named. One of the most innovative musicians ever to sit in front of a piano, Herbie Hancock stands, at the age of 70, as a true jazz legend. But on his new album – which brings the tally to a vertiginous 48 – Hancock’s concern is just as much with language as it is with music. That’s because The Imagine Project, a collection of international collaborations, brings together renditions of iconic songs that trip along a gamut not only of musical traditions, but of mother tongues.