Winley Records
Paul Winley Records Inc. (more commonly credited as Winley Records) was a doo-wop record label founded in 1956 that, in 1979, became one of the earliest hip hop labels. It was situated on 125th Street, Harlem, New York City. Winley released doo-wop by The Paragons and The Jesters, and hip hop records by Paul Winley's daughters, Tanya and Paulette, produced by Winley's wife, Ann. The label can lay claim to a number of firsts: one of the earliest rock and roll compilations, one of the earliest breaks compilations, an early solo female rap artist and an early instance of social commentary in rap. Winley was also the first label to record one of hip hop's most important figures, Afrika Bambaataa. Paul Winley Paul Winley entered the music business through writing songs for his brother's Washington D.C. doo-wop group, The Clovers. Through them, he met Ahmet Ertegün, who—unusually for a label mogul—himself wrote for The Clovers subsequent to signing them. Winley moved to New York C ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Doo-wop
Doo-wop (also spelled doowop and doo wop) is a genre of rhythm and blues music that originated in African-American communities during the 1940s, mainly in the large cities of the United States, including New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Baltimore, Newark, Detroit, Washington, DC, and Los Angeles. It features vocal group harmony that carries an engaging melodic line to a simple beat with little or no instrumentation. Lyrics are simple, usually about love, sung by a lead vocal over background vocals, and often featuring, in the bridge, a melodramatically heartfelt recitative addressed to the beloved. Harmonic singing of nonsense syllables (such as "doo-wop") is a common characteristic of these songs. Gaining popularity in the 1950s, doo-wop was "artistically and commercially viable" until the early 1960s, but continued to influence performers in other genres.Hoffmann, FRoots of Rock: Doo-Wop In ''Survey of American Popular Music'', modified for the web by Robert Birklin ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Otis Blackwell
Otis Blackwell (February 16, 1931 – May 6, 2002) was an American songwriter whose work influenced rock and roll. His compositions include "Fever" (recorded by Little Willie John), "Great Balls of Fire" and " Breathless" (recorded by Jerry Lee Lewis), "Don't Be Cruel", " All Shook Up" and " Return to Sender" (with Winfield Scott; recorded by Elvis Presley), and " Handy Man" (recorded by Jimmy Jones). Biography Blackwell was born in Brooklyn, New York. He learned to play the piano as a child and grew up listening to both R&B and country music. His first success was winning a local talent contest ("Amateur Night") at the Apollo Theater in Harlem in 1952. This led to a recording contract with RCA and then with Jay-Dee. His first release was his own composition "Daddy Rolling Stone", which became a favorite in Jamaica, where it was recorded by Derek Martin. The song later became part of the Who's mod repertoire. Enjoying some early recording and performing success, he found ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pumpkin (musician)
Errol Eduardo Bedward (January 21, 1961 – August 24, 1990), better known by his stage name Pumpkin was a musician, percussionist, and band leader. He was renowned for being the one behind many old school hip hop tracks for the Profile, Enjoy, and Tuff City record companies.Lewis, Darlene (2008) ''Hip-Hop Before the Bling'', , p. 3Shapiro, Peter (2005) ''The Rough Guide to Hip-Hop'', 2nd ed., Rough Guides, London, , p. 368-9 He worked with several influential early hip-hop acts from 1979 to 1984, such as Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five Spoonie Gee, Treacherous Three, Funky Four, Grandmaster Caz Curtis Brown (born April 18, 1960), better known by the stage name Grandmaster Caz or Casanova Fly, is an American rapper, songwriter, and DJ. He was a member of the hip hop group The Cold Crush Brothers from 1979 to the mid-1980s. He is best know ..., the Fearless Four, and Dr. Jeckyll & Mr. Hyde, and several more obscure names. His 1983 single "King of the Beat" was followed ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Sugar Hill Records (rap)
Sugar Hill Records was an American record label specializing in hip hop music that was founded in 1979 by husband and wife Joe and Sylvia Robinson with Milton Malden and funding from Tony Riviera and Morris Levy, the owner of Roulette Records. History Joe Robinson had parlayed a music publishing company that he established years before in New York into Red Robin, Fury, Fire, Enjoy, All Platinum, Stang, Vibration, and Turbo Records before establishing the Sugar Hill label. Artists included his wife Sylvia Robinson, of Mickey & Sylvia fame (who had success in the 1950s with "Love Is Strange"), The Moments ("Love on a Two Way Street"), Brother to Brother, Shirley and Company (" Shame Shame Shame"). Beginnings The Sugar Hill label's first record was "Rapper's Delight" (1979) by The Sugarhill Gang, which was also the first top 40 hip hop single. Afterwards Super Wolf, The Sequence, Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five, Funky Four Plus One, Crash Crew, Treacherous Three, and th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Clifton "Jiggs" Chase
Clifton "Jiggs" Chase (born 1940) is an American jazz-funk organ player, composer, and influential record producer from New Jersey, United States. One of the earliest known recordings is his organ playing on the 1967 Buddy Terry recording ''Natural Soul'' (Prestige Records), alongside Woody Shaw. Career In 1976, he did a record date in New York as a side-man to tenor saxophonist Pharoah Sanders on the album " Pharoah". Jiggs Chase would go on to become the Music Director for Pharoah Sanders Ensemble and as such would bring to his attention, Rickie Byars (Boger) who became lead singer in the Pharoah Sanders Ensemble and who for a time replaced Phyllis Hyman. Jiggs Chase was very influential in the career of Rickie and continued to expose her talents in bands where he served as Music Director which included the Joe Thomas Band and various jazz trios in the New York and New Jersey area. During the 1980s he was an in-house arranger and producer for Sugar Hill Records. Although his ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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George Benson
George Washington Benson (born March 22, 1943) is an American guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He began his professional career at the age of 19 as a jazz guitarist. A former child prodigy, Benson first came to prominence in the 1960s, playing soul jazz with Jack McDuff and others. He then launched a successful solo career, alternating between jazz, pop, R&B singing, and scat singing. His album ''Breezin''' was certified triple-platinum, hitting no. 1 on the ''Billboard'' album chart in 1976. His concerts were well attended through the 1980s, and he still has a large following. Benson has won ten Grammy Awards and has been honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Biography Early career Benson was born and raised in the Hill District of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. At the age of seven, he first played the ukulele in a corner drug store, for which he was paid a few dollars. At the age of eight, he played guitar in an unlicensed nightclub on Friday and Saturday ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Public Enemy (group)
"Public enemy" is a term which was first widely used in the United States in the 1930s to describe individuals whose activities were seen as criminal and extremely damaging to society, though the phrase had been used for centuries to describe pirates, vikings, highwaymen, bandits, mobsters, and similar outlaws. Origin and usage The expression dates back to Roman times. The Senate declared emperor Nero a ''hostis publicus'' in AD 68. Its direct translation is "public enemy". Whereas "public" is currently used in English in order to describe something related to collectivity at large, with an implication towards government or the State, the Latin word "publicus" could, in addition to that meaning, also refer directly to people, making it the equivalent of the genitive of ''populus'' ("people"), ''populi'' ("popular" or "of the people"). Thus, "public enemy" and "enemy of the people" are, etymologically, near-synonyms. The words "'' ennemi du peuple''" were extensively used duri ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Sampler (musical Instrument)
A sampler is an electronic or digital musical instrument which uses sound recordings (or " samples") of real instrument sounds (e.g., a piano, violin, trumpet, or other synthesizer), excerpts from recorded songs (e.g., a five-second bass guitar riff from a funk song) or found sounds (e.g., sirens and ocean waves). The samples are loaded or recorded by the user or by a manufacturer. These sounds are then played back by means of the sampler program itself, a MIDI keyboard, sequencer or another triggering device (e.g., electronic drums) to perform or compose music. Because these samples are usually stored in digital memory, the information can be quickly accessed. A single sample may often be pitch-shifted to different pitches to produce musical scales and chords. Often samplers offer filters, effects units, modulation via low frequency oscillation and other synthesizer-like processes that allow the original sound to be modified in many different ways. Most samplers have Mult ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Malcolm X
Malcolm X (born Malcolm Little, later Malik el-Shabazz; May 19, 1925 – February 21, 1965) was an American Muslim minister and human rights activist who was a prominent figure during the civil rights movement. A spokesman for the Nation of Islam until 1964, he was a vocal advocate for Black empowerment and the promotion of Islam within the Black community. A posthumous autobiography, on which he collaborated with Alex Haley, was published in 1965. Malcolm spent his adolescence living in a series of foster homes or with relatives after his father's death and his mother's hospitalization. He committed various crimes, being sentenced to 10 years in prison in 1946 for larceny and burglary. In prison he joined the Nation of Islam (adopting the name MalcolmX to symbolize his unknown African ancestral surname while discarding "the White slavemaster name of 'Little'"), and after his parole in 1952 quickly became one of the organization's most influential leaders. He was the public ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Billboard Chart
The ''Billboard'' charts tabulate the relative weekly popularity of songs and albums in the United States and elsewhere. The results are published in ''Billboard'' magazine. ''Billboard'' biz, the online extension of the ''Billboard'' charts, provides additional weekly charts, as well as year-end charts. The two most important charts are the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 for songs and ''Billboard'' 200 for albums, and other charts may be dedicated to a specific genre such as R&B, country, or rock, or they may cover all genres. The charts can be ranked according to sales, streams, or airplay, and for main song charts such as the Hot 100 song chart, all three data are used to compile the charts. For the ''Billboard'' 200 album chart, streams and track sales are included in addition to album sales. The weekly sales and streams charts are monitored on a Friday-to-Thursday cycle since July 2015; previously it was on a Monday-to-Sunday cycle. Radio airplay song charts, however, follow th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Billboard Charts
The ''Billboard'' charts tabulate the relative weekly popularity of songs and albums in the United States and elsewhere. The results are published in '' Billboard'' magazine. ''Billboard'' biz, the online extension of the ''Billboard'' charts, provides additional weekly charts, as well as year-end charts. The two most important charts are the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 for songs and ''Billboard'' 200 for albums, and other charts may be dedicated to a specific genre such as R&B, country, or rock, or they may cover all genres. The charts can be ranked according to sales, streams, or airplay, and for main song charts such as the Hot 100 song chart, all three data are used to compile the charts. For the ''Billboard'' 200 album chart, streams and track sales are included in addition to album sales. The weekly sales and streams charts are monitored on a Friday-to-Thursday cycle since July 2015; previously it was on a Monday-to-Sunday cycle. Radio airplay song charts, however, follow ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Apollo
The Apollo Theater is a music hall at 253 West 125th Street between Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard (Seventh Avenue) and Frederick Douglass Boulevard (Eighth Avenue) in the Harlem neighborhood of Upper Manhattan in New York City. It is a noted venue for African-American performers, and is the home of ''Showtime at the Apollo'', a nationally syndicated television variety show which showcased new talent, from 1987 to 2008, encompassing 1,093 episodes; the show was rebooted in 2018. The theater, which has a capacity of 1,506, opened in 1913 as Hurtig & Seamon's Music Hall. It was designed by George Keister in the neo-Classical style. Alterations were made that year for showing movies, and it was renamed the Apollo Theater. (It was often referred to as the "125th Street Apollo" to distinguish it from the legitimate Apollo on 42nd Street). In 1924, the Minsky brothers leased the theater for burlesque shows. In 1934, it became a venue for black performers and was opened to black ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |