Sacha Jenkins, the writer, author, musician, documentarian, filmmaker (and so much more) passed away on Friday, May 23; he was 54. Known especially in the hip-hop world for his expansive contributions in nearly every facet of documenting and archiving the culture, Jenkins legacy through storytelling will live on in eternity. According to his family, he passed from multiple system atrophy.
His wife Raquel Cepeda-Jenkins, shared a moving and heartfelt carousel of slides on Instagram, both with pictures and documenting (a bit) of his final days. A few excerpts are shared here.
“Sacha was still brilliant, creative and present… his creative impulses kept him alive. What was a blessing, over the last couple months became a curse. Sacha had struggled to speak, to do what he did best: communicate.”
“Friday greeted us like most mornings over the last couple of months; Sacha, in bed, his head slightly tilted to the left, eyes shut, barely moving. He would purse them tightly, which gave away that he was pretending, yet again, to be asleep—or, to keep it 100—dead. He would peek as I held my hand over my chest and began raising my voice, ‘Man, don’t play with me,’ and he’d respond, grinning, “I’m still here, maybe tomorrow?’ I’d mess with him by smiling as I hummed Paul Simon’s ‘50 Ways to Leave Your Lover,’ while helping him do whatever he needed me to do to get by that day.
Sacha was suffering from an excruciating battle with Multiple Systems Atrophy, or MSA. It’s a gnarly disease. I’ve read that about 15,000-75,000 people in the United States suffer from it. In the beginning it manifests like Parkinson’s but after a couple years, takes off on another course altogether. It’s aggressive as f–k, unforgiving, isolating, and ultimately, fatal.
On Friday, May 23, I walked into the room like I did every other morning. I was venting about having to remind our son, 13, that breakfast was on the table like a million times. Sacha didn’t respond…Our son walked into the room, a look of dread overcoming him. We began to yell ‘Sacha!’ in unison. All we wanted was for Sacha to wake up. He didn’t.”
His wife continues to explain in heartbreaking detail how she realized that Jenkins had passed on.
“I got up and walked over to the window and opened it,” she continues. “I prayed for his spirit to soar, to fly up, up in the sky. To walk without pain, and ultimately, return to me so that we could remain together. I can still feel him.”
As a hip-hop head and enthusiast, I first came to know of Jenkins through the “Ego Trip” magazine he started with journalist, Elliot Wilson, which was both niche and visionary in the way it covered hip-hop through the lens of communities that are commonplace today, but in the mid-90s felt fringe for the evolving hip-hop world. Skateboarders and punk bands found a space that viewed all of us as part of the community. Today, groups like Odd Future and even artists like Lil Uzi Vert and Playboi Carti are both the norm and trendsetters, but in the mid-90s, to see a Black kid on a deck with spikes and rocking eyeliner listening to Nas felt extreme. Jenkins created a space that allowed us to see all of ourselves.
Jenkins was also a music editor at Vibe and had writing clips at all of the spaces that mattered to the culture, and brought the culture with him to Rolling Stone; as a kid devouring all of the hip-hop I could, I often saw Jenkins name and recognized his name early as one to know. He was also a filmmaker and documentarian who helped bring television shows like “Miss Rap Supreme” and “Ego Trip’s The (White) Rapper Show” to VH1. He earned an Emmy Award nomination for his work on “Wu Tang Clan: Of Mics and Men,” a documentary about the legendary Staten Island MC collective, and also brought to life “Fresh Dressed,” “Louis Armstrong’s Black & Blues,” and “Everything’s Gonna Be All White.” Jenkins’ work was everywhere and will live long past most of our time on Earth.
On a personal level, Jenkins was the kind of creative whose ideas always seemed to be the ones I was looking to learn about—that gift is one I could never say thank you for enough.
Jenkins is survived by his wife, fellow filmmaker and author, Raquel Cepeda-Jenkins, his children, including his 13-year-old son and his daugher, film producer Djali Brown-Cepeda, and his grandson.
Rest in power, Sacha Jenkins.
