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Black Beauty (1928 Song)
Black Beauty is a 1928 jazz composition by Duke Ellington. According to Ellington scholar A.H. Lawrence, the composition originated as a solo piano piece titled "Firewater" that Ellington played at the Cotton Club at the end of intermissions, as his band members returned to the stage. After he orchestrated and recorded the tune, he decided the title did not suit the work. He renamed the piece "Black Beauty" and dedicated it to singer, dancer, and comedian Florence Mills, who had died the previous year. It became one of Ellington's signature songs. Ellington first recorded it in March 1928 with his orchestra—initially for the Brunswick label under the name "The Washingtonians", and then again a week later for the Victor label under the name "Duke Ellington & His Cotton Club Orchestra". Sixth months later, Ellington recorded a solo piano version for the OKeh label. Ellington recorded the song in the studio on several later occasions, the last being a small group version made for t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major form of musical expression in traditional and popular music. Jazz is characterized by swing and blue notes, complex chords, call and response vocals, polyrhythms and improvisation. Jazz has roots in European harmony and African rhythmic rituals. As jazz spread around the world, it drew on national, regional, and local musical cultures, which gave rise to different styles. New Orleans jazz began in the early 1910s, combining earlier brass band marches, French quadrilles, biguine, ragtime and blues with collective polyphonic improvisation. But jazz did not begin as a single musical tradition in New Orleans or elsewhere. In the 1930s, arranged dance-oriented swing big bands, Kansas City jazz (a hard-swinging, bluesy, improvisationa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Duke Ellington
Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington (April 29, 1899 – May 24, 1974) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and leader of his eponymous jazz orchestra from 1923 through the rest of his life. Born and raised in Washington, D.C., Ellington was based in New York City from the mid-1920s and gained a national profile through his orchestra's appearances at the Cotton Club in Harlem. A master at writing miniatures for the three-minute 78 rpm recording format, Ellington wrote or collaborated on more than one thousand compositions; his extensive body of work is the largest recorded personal jazz legacy, and many of his pieces have become standards. He also recorded songs written by his bandsmen, such as Juan Tizol's " Caravan", which brought a Spanish tinge to big band jazz. At the end of the 1930s, Ellington began a nearly thirty-year collaboration with composer-arranger-pianist Billy Strayhorn, whom he called his writing and arranging companion. With Strayhorn, he composed multipl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cotton Club
The Cotton Club was a New York City nightclub from 1923 to 1940. It was located on 142nd Street and Lenox Avenue (1923–1936), then briefly in the midtown Theater District (1936–1940).Elizabeth Winter"Cotton Club of Harlem (1923- )" Black Past (retrieved September 9, 2014). The club operated during the United States' era of Prohibition and Jim Crow era racial segregation. Black people initially could not patronize the Cotton Club, but the venue featured many of the most popular black entertainers of the era, including musicians Fletcher Henderson, Duke Ellington, Jimmie Lunceford, Chick Webb, Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Fats Waller, Willie Bryant; vocalists Adelaide Hall,Iain Cameron Williams, Chapter 15, ''Underneath A Harlem Moon: The Harlem to Paris Years of Adelaide Hall'', Continuum, 2002. Ethel Waters, Cab Calloway, Bessie Smith, Aida Ward, Avon Long, the Dandridge Sisters, the Will Vodery Choir, The Mills Brothers, Nina Mae McKinney, Billie Holiday, Lena Horne, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Florence Mills
Florence Mills (born Florence Winfrey; January 25, 1896 – November 1, 1927), billed as the "Queen of Happiness", was an American cabaret singer, dancer, and comedian. Life and career Florence Mills (Florence Winfrey) was born a daughter of formerly enslaved parents Nellie (Simon) and John Winfrey in 1896 in Washington, D.C. She began performing as a child. At the age of six she sang duets with her two older sisters, Olivia and Maude. They eventually formed a vaudeville act, calling themselves the Mills Sisters."Early Days Desperate, Says Flo", ''Pittsburgh Courier'', February 28, 1925, p. 14. The act did well, appearing in theaters along the Atlantic seaboard. Florence's sisters eventually quit performing, but Florence stayed with it, determined to pursue a career in show business. She joined Ada Smith, Cora Green, and Carolyn Williams in the Panama Four, which had some success. She then joined a traveling Black show, the Tennessee Ten, and in 1917 she met the dance director a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Okeh Records
Okeh Records () is an American record label founded by the Otto Heinemann Phonograph Corporation, a phonograph supplier established in 1916, which branched out into phonograph records in 1918. The name was spelled "OkeH" from the initials of Otto K. E. Heinemann but later changed to "OKeh". Since 1926, Okeh has been a subsidiary of Columbia Records, a subsidiary of Sony Music. Okeh is a jazz imprint, distributed by Sony Masterworks, a specialty label of Columbia. Early history Okeh was founded by Otto (Jehuda) Karl Erich Heinemann (Lüneburg, Germany, 20 December 1876 - New York, USA, 13 September 1965) a German-American manager for the U.S. branch of Odeon Records, which was owned by Carl Lindstrom. In 1916, Heinemann incorporated the Otto Heinemann Phonograph Corporation, set up a recording studio and pressing plant in New York City, and started the label in 1918. The first discs were vertical cut, but later the more common lateral-cut method was used. The label's parent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Columbia Records
Columbia Records is an American record label owned by Sony Music, Sony Music Entertainment, a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America, the North American division of Japanese Conglomerate (company), conglomerate Sony. It was founded on January 15, 1889, evolving from the Graphophone#Commercialization, American Graphophone Company, the successor to the Volta Laboratory and Bureau#Commercialization of phonograph patents, Volta Graphophone Company. Columbia is the oldest surviving brand name in the recorded sound business, and the second major company to produce records. From 1961 to 1991, its recordings were released outside North America under the name CBS Records International, CBS Records to avoid confusion with EMI's Columbia Graphophone Company. Columbia is one of Sony Music's four flagship record labels, alongside former longtime rival RCA Records, as well as Arista Records and Epic Records. Artists who have recorded for Columbia include AC/DC, Adele, Aerosmith, Julie And ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fats Waller
Thomas Wright "Fats" Waller (May 21, 1904 – December 15, 1943) was an American jazz pianist, organist, composer, violinist, singer, and comedic entertainer. His innovations in the Harlem stride style laid much of the basis for modern jazz piano. His best-known compositions, " Ain't Misbehavin'" and " Honeysuckle Rose", were inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1984 and 1999. Waller copyrighted over 400 songs, many of them co-written with his closest collaborator, Andy Razaf. Razaf described his partner as "the soul of melody... a man who made the piano sing... both big in body and in mind... known for his generosity... a bubbling bundle of joy". It is likely that he composed many more popular songs than he has been credited with: when in financial difficulties he had a habit of selling songs to other writers and performers who claimed them as their own. Waller started playing the piano at the age of six, and became a professional organist at 15. By the age of 18, he was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Claude Bolling
Claude Bolling (10 April 1930 – 29 December 2020) was a French jazz pianist, composer, arranger, and occasional actor. Biography He was born in Cannes, France, and studied at the Conservatory of Nice, Nice Conservatory, and then in Paris. A child prodigy, by the age of 14 he was playing jazz piano professionally, with Lionel Hampton, Roy Eldridge, and Kenny Clarke. Bolling's books on jazz technique show that he did not delve far beyond bebop into much avant-garde jazz. He was a major part of the traditional jazz revival in the late 1960s, and he became friends with Oscar Peterson. He wrote music for over one hundred films, including a 1957 documentary about the Cannes Film Festival, and films such as ''The Hands of Orlac (1960 film), The Hands of Orlac'' (1960), ''World in My Pocket'' (1961), ''Me and the Forty Year Old Man'' (1965), ''Atlantic Wall (film), Atlantic Wall'' (1970), ''Borsalino (film), Borsalino'' (1970), ''To Catch a Spy'' (1971), ''Le Magnifique'' (1973), '' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bert Kaempfert
Bert Kaempfert (born Berthold Heinrich Kämpfert; 16 October 1923 – 21 June 1980) was a German orchestra leader, multi-instrumentalist, music producer, arranger, and composer. He made easy listening and jazz-oriented records and wrote the music for a number of well-known songs, including "Strangers in the Night", “Danke Schoen” and "Moon Over Naples". Early life and career Kaempfert was born in Hamburg, Germany, where he received his lifelong nickname, Fips, and studied at the local school of music. A multi-instrumentalist, he was hired by Hans Busch to play with his orchestra, before serving as a bandsman in the German Navy during World War II. He later formed his own big band and toured with them, following that by working as an arranger and producer, making hit records with Freddy Quinn and Ivo Robić. Kaempfert met his future wife, Hannelore, in 1945. They married a year later, on 14 August 1946. They had two daughters, Marion and Doris. Bert Kaempfert & His Orchestra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Swingin' Safari
"A Swingin' Safari" is a 1962 instrumental composed by Bert Kaempfert, using his alias, Bernd Bertie. It was recorded by Kaempfert on Polydor Records and released in the United States on Decca Records. The song features a distinctive main theme played on the piccolo as substitute for the traditional tin whistle, and a trumpet solo by Manfred "Fred" Moch. The prominent bass line is by Ladi Geisler. Kaempfert's recording of the song did not reach the charts, but a near-simultaneous cover by Billy Vaughn reached #13 on the U.S. ''Billboard'' Hot 100 and No. 5 on the Easy Listening chart. Similarities to "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" "A Swingin' Safari" shares a number of compositional elements in common with The Tokens' 1961 hit "The Lion Sleeps Tonight," which itself was derived from several earlier arrangements of Solomon Linda's 1939 song "Mbube". In particular, "A Swingin' Safari" uses the chord changes, tempo, shuffle rhythm, and high soprano obbligato of the Tokens' hit, and t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Judy Carmichael
Judy Carmichael (born November 27, 1957) is a Grammy-nominated jazz pianist and vocalist who has been honored as a Steinway Artist.Grammy nominated jazz pianist Judy Carmichael to perform Nov 14 at Cleveland State , Cleveland Daily Banner, November 10, 2011 Stride Piano Carmichael specialises in a form of early jazz called stride piano, which is a physical style of playing associated with James P. Johnson.[...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
