Growing up in Miami, Strickland always thought of music "in a very mixed up way". He heard Haitian sounds, Afro-Cuban rhythms and southern rap in the streets, while at home his father would jump from Stevie Wonder to John Coltrane to P-Funk on his reel-to-reel deck.
It became clear early on that Strickland played in two worlds: the old one, which belongs to his jazz heroes, and the new one, in which he cleverly weaves different genres into a colorful tapestry.
Strickland's band and concept project Twi-Life also thrives at the interface of jazz and hip-hop, in the twilight of both genres, so to speak. This play with twilight as a concept, which emphasizes both the dichotomy and the connection between day and night, emphasizes the necessity of venturing artistically beyond the boundaries of categories or genres. No-nonsense jazz at its finest.