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Sonelius Smith
Sonelius Larel Smith (born December 17, 1942, Hillhouse, Mississippi) is an American jazz pianist and composer. His family moved to Memphis in 1948, where he learned to play piano. He got a degree in music education at Arkansas Agricultural, Mechanical, and Normal College in Pine Bluff, Arkansas in 1969. While a student there, he played in a small ensemble for three years and worked with John Stubblefield. Smith moved to New York City in 1969 and began playing with Kenny Dorham, Roy Brooks, Charles Mingus, Roland Kirk, Robin Kenyatta, Rashied Ali, Warren Smith, Frank Foster, Harold Vick, Donald Byrd, Elvin Jones, Archie Shepp, Freddie Hubbard, Art Blakey, and Lionel Hampton, among others. He joined Stanley Cowell's ensemble around 1973 and also worked with Shamek Farrah and Flight to Sanity in the mid-1970s. In 1974, he was musical director for Nancy Fales' ''Ark'', directed by Ralph Lee at La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club in the East Village of Manhattan.La MaMa Archives D ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hillhouse, Mississippi
Hillhouse is an unincorporated community located in Coahoma County, Mississippi, United States. Hillhouse is approximately south of Rena Lara and north of Gunnison on Mississippi Highway 1. Hillhouse is located on the former Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad and was once home to three general stores. A post office operated under the name Hillhouse from 1890 to 1972. Notable person * Sonelius Smith Sonelius Larel Smith (born December 17, 1942, Hillhouse, Mississippi) is an American jazz pianist and composer. His family moved to Memphis in 1948, where he learned to play piano. He got a degree in music education at Arkansas Agricultural, Mec ..., jazz pianist References Unincorporated communities in Coahoma County, Mississippi Unincorporated communities in Mississippi {{CoahomaCountyMS-geo-stub ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frank Foster (jazz Musician)
Frank Benjamin Foster III (September 23, 1928 – July 26, 2011) was an American tenor and soprano saxophonist, flautist, arranger, and composer. Foster collaborated frequently with Count Basie and worked as a bandleader from the early 1950s.Profile AllMusic; accessed June 21, 2017. In 1998, Howard University awarded Frank Foster with the Benny Golson Jazz Master Award. Early life and education Foster was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, United States, and educated at Wilberforce University. In 1949, he moved to Detroit, Michigan, where he joined the local jazz scene, playing with musicians such as Wardell Gray. Career Drafted into the U.S. Army in 1951, Foster served in Korea with the 7th Infantry Division where he fought alongside (although unknowingly) future collaborator Shawn ‘Thunder’ Wallace. Upon finishing his military service in 1953 he joined Count Basie's big band. Foster contributed both arrangements and original compositions to Count Basie's band including the stan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
East Village, Manhattan
The East Village is a neighborhood on the East Side of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is roughly defined as the area east of the Bowery and Third Avenue, between 14th Street on the north and Houston Street on the south. The East Village contains three subsections: Alphabet City, in reference to the single-letter-named avenues that are located to the east of First Avenue; Little Ukraine, near Second Avenue and 6th and 7th Streets; and the Bowery, located around the street of the same name. Initially the location of the present-day East Village was occupied by the Lenape Native Americans, and was then divided into plantations by Dutch settlers. During the early 19th century, the East Village contained many of the city's most opulent estates. By the middle of the century, it grew to include a large immigrant populationincluding what was once referred to as Manhattan's Little Germanyand was considered part of the nearby Lower East Side. By the late 1960s, many artists, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club
La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club (La MaMa E.T.C.) is an Off-Off-Broadway theatre founded in 1961 by Ellen Stewart, African-American theatre director, producer, and fashion designer. Located in Manhattan's East Village, the theatre began in the basement boutique where Stewart sold her fashion designs. Stewart turned the space into a theatre at night, focusing on the work of young playwrights. La MaMa has evolved during its fifty-year history into a world-renowned cultural institution. Background Stewart started La MaMa as a theatre dedicated to the playwright and primarily producing new plays, including works by Paul Foster, Jean-Claude van Itallie, Lanford Wilson, Sam Shepard, Adrienne Kennedy, Harvey Fierstein, and Rochelle Owens. La MaMa also became an international ambassador for Off-Off-Broadway theatre by touring downtown theatre abroad during the 1960s.Bottoms, Steven J. ''Playing Underground: A Critical History of the 1960s Off-Off-Broadway Movement''. Ann Arbor: Univers ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ralph Lee
Ralph Lee is an American puppeteer and theatre artist. His work is centered on the design and use of masks in theatre and performance. The majority of his productions take place outside of traditional performance venues, include parades, pageants, celebrations, and outdoor theatrical performances. Masks and large puppets are central to his productions, which aim to make artistic experiences accessible to all members of the community. He stages his productions in familiar, public locations, charging no admission fee whenever possible and creating vivid images that can immediately resonate with the audience. Early life and career Lee started making puppets as a child growing up in Middlebury, Vermont. He graduated from Amherst College in 1957, and studied dance and theater in Europe for two years on a Fulbright Scholarship. Upon returning to the United States and moving to New York City, Lee acted on Broadway and off-Broadway, in regional theaters, and as a member of The Open Thea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Music Director
A music(al) director or director of music is the person responsible for the musical aspects of a performance, production, or organization. This would include the artistic director and usually chief conductor of an orchestra or concert band, the director of music of a film, the director of music at a radio station, the person in charge of musical activities or the head of the music department in a school, the coordinator of the musical ensembles in a university, college, or institution (but not usually the head of the academic music department), the head bandmaster of a military band, the head organist and choirmaster of a church, or an organist and master of the choristers (the title given to a director of music at a cathedral, particularly in England). Orchestra The title of "music director" or "musical director" is used by many symphony orchestras to designate the primary conductor and artistic leader of the orchestra. The term "music director" is most common for orchestras ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shamek Farrah
Shamek Farrah is an alto saxophone player, who was featured on many Strata-East Records albums, and released two albums on the label as leader.allmusic Biography/ref> Reviewing ''First Impressions'', Allmusic said: "This is the standard spiritually intense new jazz one learns to expect from the label, soaked in some Eastern influences but always with its ear to the street.". Overview )))">allmusic ((( First Impressions > Overview )))/ref> He was born Anthony Domacase in New York City, New York. He began studying the alto saxophone under Garvin Bushel at age 12. In the late 1960s he began performing with upcoming Latin and Latin-jazz groups around the New York area. In the mid 1970s and 80’s when live loft jazz was popular in New York City, He performed with his own groups and other prominent jazz musicians such as Sonelius Smith, Rashid Ali, John Stubblefield, Carlos Garnett, Walter Davis Jr. In late 1972, at age 25, he signed with Strata-East Records and in 1974 his first ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stanley Cowell
Stanley Cowell (May 5, 1941 – December 17, 2020) was an American jazz pianist and co-founder of the Strata-East Records label. Early life Cowell was born in Toledo, Ohio. He began playing the piano around the age of four, and became interested in jazz after seeing Art Tatum at the age of six. Tatum was a family friend. After high school, Cowell studied at Oberlin College and received a graduate degree in classical piano from the University of Michigan. During his time at college, he played with jazz multi-instrumentalist Roland Kirk, which proved to be formative for the pianist. He moved to New York in the mid-1960s. Later life and career Cowell played with Marion Brown, Max Roach, Bobby Hutcherson, Clifford Jordan, Harold Land, Sonny Rollins and Stan Getz. Cowell played with trumpeter Charles Moore and others in the Detroit Artist's Workshop Jazz Ensemble in 1965–66. In 1971, Cowell co-founded the record label Strata-East with trumpeter Charles Tolliver. The label woul ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lionel Hampton
Lionel Leo Hampton (April 20, 1908 – August 31, 2002) was an American jazz vibraphonist, pianist, percussionist, and bandleader. Hampton worked with jazz musicians from Teddy Wilson, Benny Goodman, and Buddy Rich, to Charlie Parker, Charles Mingus, and Quincy Jones. In 1992, he was inducted into the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame, and he was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 1996. Biography Early life Lionel Hampton was born in 1908 in Louisville, Kentucky, and was raised by his mother. Shortly after he was born, he and his mother moved to her hometown of Birmingham, Alabama. He spent his early childhood in Kenosha, Wisconsin, before he and his family moved to Chicago, Illinois, in 1916. As a youth, Hampton was a member of the Bud Billiken Club, an alternative to the Boy Scouts of America, which was off-limits because of racial segregation. During the 1920s, while still a teenager, Hampton took xylophone lessons from Jimmy Bertrand and began to play drums. Hampton was raised ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Art Blakey
Arthur Blakey (October 11, 1919 – October 16, 1990) was an American jazz drummer and bandleader. He was also known as Abdullah Ibn Buhaina after he converted to Islam for a short time in the late 1940s. Blakey made a name for himself in the 1940s in the big bands of Fletcher Henderson and Billy Eckstine. He then worked with bebop musicians Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker, and Dizzy Gillespie. In the mid-1950s, Horace Silver and Blakey formed the Jazz Messengers, a group that the drummer was associated with for the next 35 years. The group was formed as a collective of contemporaries, but over the years the band became known as an incubator for young talent, including Freddie Hubbard, Wayne Shorter, Lee Morgan, Benny Golson, Kenny Dorham, Hank Mobley, Donald Byrd, Jackie McLean, Johnny Griffin, Curtis Fuller, Chuck Mangione, Chick Corea, Keith Jarrett, Cedar Walton, Woody Shaw, Terence Blanchard, and Wynton Marsalis. ''The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz'' calls the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Freddie Hubbard
Frederick Dewayne Hubbard (April 7, 1938 – December 29, 2008) was an American jazz trumpeter. He played bebop, hard bop, and post-bop styles from the early 1960s onwards. His unmistakable and influential tone contributed to new perspectives for modern jazz and bebop. Career beginnings Hubbard started playing the mellophone and trumpet in his school band at Arsenal Technical High School in Indianapolis, Indiana. Trumpeter Lee Katzman, former sideman with Stan Kenton, recommended that he begin studying at the Arthur Jordan Conservatory of Music (now the Jordan College of the Arts at Butler University) with Max Woodbury, the principal trumpeter of the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra. In his teens, Hubbard worked locally with brothers Wes and Monk Montgomery, and worked with bassist Larry Ridley and saxophonist James Spaulding. In 1958, at the age of 20, he moved to New York and began playing with some of the best jazz players of the era, including Philly Joe Jones, Sonny Rollin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Archie Shepp
Archie Shepp (born May 24, 1937) is an American jazz saxophonist, educator and playwright who since the 1960s has played a central part in the development of avant-garde jazz. Biography Early life Shepp was born in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, but raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He studied piano, clarinet and alto saxophone before narrowing his focus to tenor saxophone. He occasionally plays soprano saxophone as well. He studied drama at Goddard College from 1955 to 1959. He played in a Latin jazz band for a short time before joining the band of avant-garde pianist Cecil Taylor. Shepp's first recording under his own name, '' Archie Shepp - Bill Dixon Quartet'', was released on Savoy Records in 1962 and featured a composition by Ornette Coleman. Along with alto saxophonist John Tchicai and trumpeter Don Cherry, he formed the New York Contemporary Five. John Coltrane's admiration for Shepp led to recordings for Impulse! Records, the first of which was ''Four for Trane'' in 1964 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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