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Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)
"Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)" is a traditional Jamaican folk song. The song has mento influences, but it is commonly classified as an example of the better known calypso music. It is a call and response work song, from the point of view of dock workers working the night shift loading bananas onto ships. The lyrics describe how daylight has come, their shift is over, and they want their work to be counted up so that they can go home. The best-known version was released by American singer Harry Belafonte in 1956 (originally titled "Banana Boat (Day-O)") and later became one of his signature songs. That same year the Tarriers released an alternative version that incorporated the chorus of another Jamaican call and response folk song, "Hill and Gully Rider". This version was played during an interview with Bob Carey (formerly of The Tarriers) on Folk Music Worldwide in January 1964. Both versions became simultaneously popular the following year, placing 5th and 6th on the 2 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Harry Belafonte
Harry Belafonte ( ; born Harold George Bellanfanti Jr.; March 1, 1927 – April 25, 2023) was an American singer, actor, and civil rights activist who popularized calypso music with international audiences in the 1950s and 1960s. Belafonte's career breakthrough album ''Calypso (album), Calypso'' (1956) was the first million-selling LP album, LP by a single artist. Belafonte was best known for his recordings of "Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)", "Jump in the Line (Shake, Senora)", "Jamaica Farewell", and "Mary's Boy Child". He recorded and performed in many genres, including blues, folk music, folk, gospel music, gospel, show tunes, and Great American Songbook, American standards. He also starred in films such as ''Carmen Jones (film), Carmen Jones'' (1954), ''Island in the Sun (film), Island in the Sun'' (1957), ''Odds Against Tomorrow'' (1959), ''Buck and the Preacher'' (1972), and ''Uptown Saturday Night'' (1974). He made his final feature film appearance in Spike Lee's ''Bl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Music Of Jamaica
The music of Jamaica includes Jamaican folk music and many popular genres, such as mento, ska, rocksteady, reggae, dub music, dancehall, reggae fusion and related styles. Reggae is especially popular through the fame of Bob Marley. Jamaican music's influence on music styles in other countries includes the practice of toasting, which was brought to New York City and evolved into rapping. British genres such as Lovers rock, jungle music and grime are also influenced by Jamaican music. Mento Mento is a style of Jamaican music that predates and has greatly influenced ska and reggae music. Lord Flea and Count Lasher are two of the more successful mento artists. Well-known mento songs include Day-O, Jamaica Farewell and Linstead Market. Mento is often confused with Calypso music, a musical form from Trinidad and Tobago. Calypso and Soca As in many Anglo-Caribbean islands, the calypso music of Trinidad and Tobago has become part of the culture of Jamaica. Jamaica's own ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gwen Ifill
Gwendolyn L. Ifill ( ; September 29, 1955 – November 14, 2016) was an American journalist, television newscaster, and author. In 1999, she became the first African-American woman to host a nationally televised U.S. public affairs program with '' Washington Week in Review''. She was the moderator and managing editor of '' Washington Week'' and co-anchor and co-managing editor, with Judy Woodruff, of the ''PBS NewsHour'', both of which air on PBS. Ifill was a political analyst and moderated the 2004 and 2008 vice-presidential debates. She authored the best-selling book ''The Breakthrough: Politics and Race in the Age of Obama''. Gwen Ifill was posthumously awarded the Dunnigan-Payne Prize for lifetime career achievement on Saturday, April 29, 2023, at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. Early life and education Gwendolyn L. Ifill was born in Jamaica, Queens in New York City. She was the fifth of six children of African Methodist Episcopal (AME) minister (Oliver) Urci ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shirley Bassey
Dame Shirley Veronica Bassey (; born 8 January 1937) is a Welsh singer. Known for her career longevity, powerful voice and recording the James Bond music, theme songs to three James Bond films - the only artist to officially perform more than one - Bassey is one of the most popular vocalists in Britain. Born in Cardiff, Bassey began performing as a teenager in 1953. In 1959, she became the first Welsh person to gain a number-one single on the UK Singles Chart. In the following decades, Bassey amassed 27 top 40 hits in the UK, including two number ones ("As I Love You" and the double A-side "Climb Ev'ry Mountain"/"Reach for the Stars (Shirley Bassey song), Reach for the Stars") plus a number one on the Dance Chart ("History Repeating (song), History Repeating"). She became well known for recording theme songs of the James Bond films ''Goldfinger (film), Goldfinger'' (1964), ''Diamonds Are Forever (film), Diamonds Are Forever'' (1971), and ''Moonraker (film), Moonraker'' (1979). ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Steve Lawrence
Steve Lawrence (born Sidney Liebowitz; July 8, 1935 – March 7, 2024) was an American singer, comedian, and actor. He was best known as a member of the pop duo Steve and Eydie with his wife Eydie Gormé, and for his performance as Maury Sline, the manager and friend of the main characters in the 1980 film '' The Blues Brothers'' and its sequel. Steve and Eydie first appeared together as regulars on '' Tonight Starring Steve Allen'' in 1954 and continued performing as a duo until Gormé's retirement in 2009. Early life Lawrence was born on July 8, 1935, as Sidney Liebowitz to Jewish parents in the borough of Brooklyn in New York City. His father, Max, was a cantor at the Brooklyn synagogue Beth Sholom Tomchei Harav, and his mother, Helen, was a homemaker. He attended Thomas Jefferson High School. During high school, Lawrence skipped school to spend time at the Brill Building in the hopes of being employed as a singer. Career In 1952 at the age of 16, Lawrence signed a cont ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sarah Vaughan
Sarah Lois Vaughan (, March 27, 1924 – April 3, 1990) was an American jazz singer and pianist. Nicknamed "Sassy" and "List of nicknames of jazz musicians, The Divine One", she won two Grammy Awards, including the Lifetime Achievement Award, and was nominated for a total of nine Grammy Awards. She was given an NEA Jazz Masters Award in 1989. Critic Scott Yanow wrote that she had "one of the most wondrous voices of the 20th century". Early life Vaughan was born in Newark, New Jersey, to Asbury "Jake" Vaughan, a carpenter by trade who played guitar and piano, and Ada Vaughan, a laundress who sang in the church choir, migrants from Virginia. The Vaughans lived in a house on Brunswick Street in Newark for Vaughan's entire childhood. Jake was deeply religious. The family was active in New Mount Zion Baptist Church at 186 Thomas Street. Vaughan began piano lessons at the age of seven, sang in the church choir, and played piano for rehearsals and services. Sarah and her family were a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Fontane Sisters
The Fontane Sisters were a trio (Bea, Geri and Marge Rosse) from New Milford, New Jersey. Early years Born to an Italian family, their mother, Louise Rosse, was both a soloist and the leader of the St. Joseph's Church choir in New Milford. Bea and Marge started out singing for local functions, doing so well that they were urged to audition in New York City. Originally they performed as a trio with their guitarist brother Frank, under the name the Ross Trio (Rosse with the "e" omitted). The group auditioned for NBC and was soon sent off to work in Cleveland. When they returned to New York in 1944, Frank was drafted into the Army; he went to France and was mortally wounded by a German sniper. Geri, who had just finished school, took her brother's place, making it an all-girl trio. The sisters first performed together as The Three Sisters. Sheet music of two of their songs, "I'm Gonna See My Baby", and "Pretty Kitty Blue Eyes", was published by Santly-Joy in 1944. Success The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Billboard Hot 100
The ''Billboard'' Hot 100, also known as simply the Hot 100, is the music industry standard record chart in the United States for songs, published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine. Chart rankings are based on sales (physical and digital), online streaming, and radio airplay in the U.S. A new chart is compiled and released online to the public by ''Billboard''s website on Tuesdays but post-dated to the following Saturday, when the printed magazine first reaches newsstands. The weekly tracking period for sales is currently Friday–Thursday, after being changed in July 2015. It was initially Monday–Sunday when Nielsen started tracking sales in 1991. This tracking period also applies to compiling online streaming data. Radio airplay is readily available on a real-time basis, unlike sales figures and streaming, but is also tracked on the same Friday–Thursday cycle, effective with the chart dated July 17, 2021. Previously, radio was tracked Monday–Sunday and, before Ju ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jamaican Folk Music
A notable year in the history of Jamaican music was 1907, when Walter Jekyll'''Jamaican Song and Story''was first published. The contents of this book include four parts entitled "Anancy Stories", "Digging Sings", "Ring Tunes", and "Dancing Tunes". Each part has an introduction, songs, stories, and melodies. Part 1: Anancy stories Includes 51 items, such as the story and melod"Leah and Tiger"(item 36, pages 108–9). The heading refers to a legendary figure, '' Anancy'', or ''Anansi'', the Ashanti word for "spider" and the name of a folktale character. Anancy stories and certain musical characteristics originated in West Africa. Part 2: Digging sings Includes 37 items, such a"The one shirt I have"(item 58, page 164). The heading refers to the digging of holes for the planting of yams. "Nothing more joyous can be imagined," writes Jekyll, "than a good 'digging-sing' from twenty throats, with the pickers—so they call their pickaxes—falling in regular beat." Digging sings i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Tarriers
The Tarriers were an American vocal group, specializing in folk music and folk-flavored popular music. Named after the folk song " Drill, Ye Tarriers, Drill", the group had two hit songs during 1956-57: "Cindy, Oh Cindy" (with Vince Martin) and " The Banana Boat Song." The two singles became US Top Ten hits and peaked at No. 26 and No. 15 respectively in the UK Singles Chart. Career The group formed from a collection of folk singers who performed regularly at Washington Square in New York City during the mid-1950s, including Erik Darling and Bob Carey. "Eventually it became the Tarriers, with Bob, me, Karl Karlton and Alan Arkin," Darling told Wayne Jancik in ''The Billboard Book of One-Hit Wonders''. According to Darling, "Karl didn't really mesh" and left the group before the remaining trio secured a contract with Glory Records in 1956, where the Tarriers scored two hits. The Tarriers appeared in a 1957 low-budget musical '' Calypso Heat Wave'', in which they lip-sync ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Banana
A banana is an elongated, edible fruit – botanically a berry – produced by several kinds of large treelike herbaceous flowering plants in the genus '' Musa''. In some countries, cooking bananas are called plantains, distinguishing them from dessert bananas. The fruit is variable in size, color and firmness, but is usually elongated and curved, with soft flesh rich in starch covered with a peel, which may have a variety of colors when ripe. It grows upward in clusters near the top of the plant. Almost all modern edible seedless ( parthenocarp) cultivated bananas come from two wild species – '' Musa acuminata'' and ''Musa balbisiana'', or hybrids of them. ''Musa'' species are native to tropical Indomalaya and Australia; they were probably domesticated in New Guinea. They are grown in 135 countries, primarily for their fruit, and to a lesser extent to make banana paper and textiles, while some are grown as ornamental plants. The world's largest producers of bananas ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Work Song
A work song is a piece of music closely connected to a form of work, either one sung while conducting a task (usually to coordinate timing) or one linked to a task that may be a connected narrative, description, or protest song. An example is " I've Been Working on the Railroad". Definitions and categories Records of work songs are as old as historical records, and anthropological evidence suggests that most agrarian societies tend to have them. When defining work songs, most modern commentators include songs that are sung while working, as well as songs that are ''about'' work or have work as the main subject, since the two categories are often interconnected. Norm Cohen divided collected work songs into the following categories: domestic, agricultural or pastoral, sea shanties, African-American work songs, songs and chants of direction, and street cries. Ted Gioia built on these categories by dividing agricultural and pastoral songs into subsections: hunting, cultivation a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
