You have to be taught to be second class; you're not born that way.
Today is Lena Horne's 92nd birthday. This iconic beauty was born in New York on this date in 1917.
Her civil rights chops were nurtured by her activist grandmother, who took young Lena with her to the NAACP, the Urban League and the Ethical Culture Society meetings.
Lena began working at Harlem's Cotton Club when she was 16. She was a dancer first, then she became part of the chorus and later a solo singer.
She branched out and began singing with orchestras, and was discovered while singing with white orchestra leader Charlie Barnet. Lena then began playing clubs in Greenwich Village and performed at Carnegie Hall.
Beginning in 1942 Lena Horne appeared in films, broadening her career to include movies, Broadway and recordings.
My identity is very clear to me now, I am a black woman.
Lena Horne was the favorite pinup girl for Black GI's serving during World War II. She is not only an iconic beauty to our people, she was a passionate civil rights warrior. She has been honored with dozens of awards for her lifetime of success and service to her people.
When I grow up, I want to be just like her. Aging gracefully and regally while still speaking truth to power.
They say deaths come in threes, and that is especially true of celebrity ones. Farrah Fawcett died this morning, Ed McMahon a day ago, and it was in the back of my mind who would be the third.
As of the time I'm writing this, the LA Times is confirming that Michael Jackson has died.
This is a sad on for me because I have a personal connection to it.
Michael Jackson's death is striking me a little harder than the average celeb death on many levels.
I and my brother got to tag along with my Dad when the station had a 'Meet The Jackson Five contest back in the day. We picked up the winner, and zipped off to the Sam Houston Coliseum for the concert. The show was the bomb until the crowd bumrushed the stage and put a quick end to it. I was backstage and barely avoided being trampled as the frenzied crowd chased the J5 to their waiting limos to the street.
At the rendezvous at the Galleria Oaks Hotel, I got to meet him along with the contest winner and my friend Ernest Carswell. Ernest and I used to win a lot of money off those photos in junior high school from peeps who assumed we were lying about doing so.
I still have the autographed pics at my parents house.
I like a lot of peeps of my generation and those like my sisters who grew up in the 80's was a big fan, and it was amplified by the fact I had met him.
It was also a sense of immense pride to many African-Americans that an R&B artist blew up to become a household name around the world, thanks to Quincy Jones' composing genius and his immense talent.
You were a once in a generation performer, and you will be missed.
June marks the 30th anniversary observance of Black Music Month, and I haven't had much discussion about it thanks to various higher profile breaking news stories.
I planned at the beginning of the month to talk about some of my fave groups, concerts I've attended and and why the American music scene owes a major creative debt to its African descended people.
So I'm going to make up for lost time and dedicate some posts until the end of the month to doing just that.
Y'all know my teen years were spent in the 70's. Thanks to Dad I got to attend a long list of great concerts and see some slammin' groups and artists back in the day.
My first concert experience happened during the summer of 1976. The Summit (later Compaq Center) had only been open a year and was several decades from becoming Lakewood Church's new sanctuary.
The group that my dad was taking me and my brother to see? WAR
The best part about this show was I got to see it from the comfort of the sky boxes with the staff of the radio station.
I got my grub on, had a bottomless soda cup and had the option of either watching the concert from nice comfortable seats or watch the closed circuit TV feed of the show.
The first one I attended without the parental units tagging along was one headlined by Bootsy's Rubber Band in 1976. I had floor seats 20 rows from the stage for this one. I also saw Bootsy in 1978 during his Player Of The Year Tour.
When I showed up for school that Monday wearing my Bootsy concert t-shirt, I opened my big mouth and accidentally let it slip I had a extra ticket that ended up going to waste.
Half the girls at JJ (and some of my homies as well) were pissed at me for a week.
In my defense, I did get those tickets last minute, and several peeps I called weren't home. Most of the time I didn't get those comp tickets until several hours before the show or I'd come home and the tickets were lying on my bed.
It seemed like during that era in the 70's and 80's, every time I turned around there were great shows to attend. Don't even get me started on the Budweiser Superfests and Kool Jazz Festivals stadium tours devoid of jazz artists, but full of great R&B ones.
But it's the first ones you attend that are the most memorable.
April 20 has a lot of negativity associated with it in terms of being Adolf Hitler's birthday and the anniversary date of the Columbine High School shootings in Littleton, CO. The 10th anniversary of that event is being marked today.
But it's also the birthday of one of my favorite singers in Luther Vandross, who was born in New York on this date in 1951.
He's been gone from us since July 1, 2005, but for those of us who bought his albums, got our groove on or conceived our children by candlelight with his voice in the background, got married with someone trying to sing one of his songs or attended his sold out concerts, we definitely love and miss him.
'Lufer' was a once in a generation kind of singer, and this legend was taken away from us far too soon.
Marian Anderson had grown up from a poverty stricken childhood in south Philadelphia to become the most celebrated opera singer of her times. She had sung for the kings and queens of Europe. She'd sung in major concert halls across Europe, New York and Philadelphia.
But she couldn't sing in her own nation's capital because of her skin color.
When her manager tried to book her for a concert in Washington's Constitution Hall, the largest venue in DC at the time, the Daughters of the American Revolution, who owned it, said no because they refused to allow African Americans to perform there. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt subsequently resigned her DAR membership in protest of the organization's diss of Marian Anderson. An attempt to move the concert to a local Washington high school was thwarted by the local school board.
So the First Lady, then Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes, and a coalition of Black and White leaders mobilized to set up a concert on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial that took place on Easter Sunday, April 9, 1939.
She sang, 'My Country, 'Tis of Thee' in front of an 75,000 person integrated crowd that included Supreme Court justices and senators. It was a seminal event that came to symbolize the hope and ideal of racial equality in America.
Another free concert will be held at the Lincoln Memorial will be held later today to honor the 70th anniversary of that seminal civil rights event.
The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission and the National Park Service are jointly sponsoring it as part of the series of events celebrating the 200th anniversary of Lincoln's birth and the approaching 100th day of President Obama's historic first term in office. It will incorporate some of the songs Marian Anderson sung 70 years ago and feature modern day opera singer Denyce Graves singing classical songs as well.
The Chicago Children's Choir, the women's a cappella group Sweet Honey in the Rock and the U.S. Marine Band are also scheduled to perform.
Former Secretary of State Colin Powell will read excerpts from Lincoln's second inaugural address during the anniversary concert, and at the conclusion of the event 200 people will be sworn in as US citizens.
Yes, we've come a long way as a country on racial issues in 70 years, but the journey is still not complete. But events like this serve to remind of where we were, how far we've come and ensure we don't go back to that antiquated way of thinking ever again.
While I was perusing the celebrity birthdays on New Year's Eve, I discovered that one of my favorite singers was celebrating a milestone birthday.
Back in the day I was a huge disco fan, and one of my favorite singers was Donna Summer. She started off as a gospel singer, but what a lot of people don't realize about her is that she's an accomplished songwriter as well.
She has won five Grammys and is the only artist to have three consecutive number one double albums and three number one pop singles in the same year. While she's known for the disco hits, her musical repertoire encompasses rock, pop, R&B and gospel.
She has sold over 130 million records worldwide and I definitely have my share of Donna's music in my collection. She's one of the most successful female artists of the 1970s and 1980's and was inducted in 2004 to the Dance Music Hall of Fame.\
Y'all know how much I love Eartha Kitt. I was saddened to find out she died today of colon cancer at 81.
She went from being an ostracized mixed race girl from South Carolina to an internationally loved star garnering multiple nominations for Tonys, Grammys and Oscars. And don't forget that famous cat purr.
She was sent at age 8 to by her mother to live with her aunt in Harlem and auditioned for the famed Katherine Dunham Dance Troupe during her teens. She was hired as a featured dancer and vocalist and toured worldwide with the company for several years.
The stint with the Katherine Dunham Dance troupe launched Kitt into a life of roles in the entertainment field. She was a well liked cabaret singer in Europe during the 50's and performed on Broadway. That lead to a recording deal in which she produced 20 albums and acted in hundreds of movie and television roles.
In 1968, however, Kitt encountered a substantial professional setback after she made anti-war statements during a White House luncheon that reportedly made then First Lady Lady Bird Johnson cry. The resulting positive and negative public reactions to Kitt's statements was much more extreme and resulted in professional exile in the United States.
After enduring the professional ostracism by performing in Europe, once the anger faded over the Vietnam War remarks, she returned to US shores and garnered a new generation of fans that ensured she was performing almost until the end of her remarkable life.
She recently finished taping a PBS special six weeks ago in Chicago which is set to air in February. Her recording of one of my favorite Christmas songs, "Santa Baby" was certified gold last week.
Kitt was well known for her distinctive voice and made a name for herself in her portrayal of Catwoman in the television series "Batman." That role produced Kitt's recognizable sultry cat growl.
She worked in film, theater, cabaret, music and on television during her lengthy career.
Heaven just became a little more PURRRRRfect and we have just lost another iconic singer. Rest in peace, Eartha. You've earned it.
Pardon Nile Rodgers and the rest of Chic if they're starting to feel like All my Children's Susan Lucci. Susan was nominated 18 times for a Daytime Emmy Best Actress Award before she finally won it in 1999.
They've been nominated in 2003, 2006, 2007, and now 2008 for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and when the votes are counted, they fall just short of becoming one of the five inductees in that year's class.
Chic is one of my my fave groups from my high school days (and still are). For those of you with knee-jerk reactions to disco, you can stop right now because this band was cutting edge.
Ask the Sugarhill Gang, because without Chic's Good Times song, Rapper's Delight, the song that catapulted hip hop into prominence doesn't happen.
Ask Sister Sledge, who thanks to Nile and 'Nard's production talents, created a song that became a championship anthem for the 1979 Pittsburgh Pirates.
Once again Chic has been nominated along with Jeff Beck, Wanda Jackson, Little Anthony and the Imperials, Metallica, Run-D.M.C., the Stooges, War and Bobby Womack, but only five of these outstanding nominees will get in. After the votes are tabulated, the announcement will be made next month as to who will comprise the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Class of 2009.
The induction ceremony will take place in April, and this time I'm hoping along with other Chic fans that they'll FINALLY get in.
Today is our country's 234th birthday. Later tonight, depending on where you are, there will be fireworks, celebrations, and concerts galore.
We African-Americans love this country too. Enough to bitch and make it better, but that's a whole 'nother post.
We've all heard the national anthem being sung in myriad ways, but every now and then you hear a version of it by a singer that just makes you stop in your tracks, tear up, or just wanna testify. Some of those anthem versions have been sung by peeps that share my ethnic heritage.
As far as anthems with soul, this is hands down the version I consider the best. Marvin Gaye sang this version at the 1983 NBA All-Star game in Los Angeles. Unfortunately it would be one of his last public appearances before he was tragically shot to death by his father on April 1, 1984.
The best anthem with soul, version 1.1 is Whitney Houston's done before the 1991 Super Bowl in Tampa. It was done with the political backdrop of a major troop buildup happening in the Middle East and Desert Storm about to jump off.
Here's Mariah Carey's at the 2002 Super Bowl in New Orleans, only a few months after the 9-11 attacks.
Did you think I was gonna leave out my Houston homegirl Beyonce Knowles Carter?
Once again, another Super Bowl, the 2004 one played in Houston. And who better to sing the national anthem than one of our hometown Grammy winning girls? (Yolanda Adams wouldn't have been a bad pick either)
21 years later, the NBA All-Star game returns to Los Angeles, and Marvin's daughter Nona Gaye does a special duet with dad at the 2004 NBA All-Star game.
The 2004 MLB All-Star game in Houston. Fantasia sung this version, although at the time I was channeling my inner Maya Wilkes. I felt since the game was being played here, we should have had a Houston homeboy or homegirl sing it. But Fox was televising the game, and they have this maddening tendency to stick their American Idol singers in these slots to cross promote the show (which I hate with a passion). I quit bitching after the first few notes.
The 2006 NBA All Star game in Houston. The national anthem singers for this event? Destiny's Child. Y'all better recognize that Houston's got talent.
As of yet I haven't found the video of the all-harmonica version Stevie Wonder played before the Super Bowl in his hometown of Detroit. When I do it's definitely going on this post.
I hope I've made the point that love of country is not just for white conservative 'christian' Republican males. There are 300 plus million of us multricultural souls living inside and outside the borders of this piece of planet Earth we call the USA. There are thousands of others serving in our military around the world. Thanks for all you do and the personal sacrifices you make to serve our country.
I was introduced to this talented artist by one of the members on my Transistahs-Transbrothas group.
Tia had adopted Elisabeth's song 'The World Ain't Ready' from her It Can Happen To Anyone album as her theme song. She told us about her in a post to the group. When I checked out Elisabeth's website and listened to the lyrics of the song, I can see why. I was blown away by it and plan to buy it next payday along with the Daddy's Little Girls DVD when it comes out June 12.
Elisabeth states that the song 'The World Ain't Ready' was inspired by a transgender high school classmate in her Joliet, IL hometown. She recalled in a BET.com interview that she had amazing skin, a woman's body and would dress as a girl at school but as soon as the bell rang would run to the bathroom, change clothes and go home to her family as a boy.
When I heard her last name I immediately made the assumption that she was related to the great Bill Withers, but at this time Elisabeth hasn't revealed whether she is or not. But based on her bio and her Tony Award winning performance as Shug in Braodway's The Color Purple she is poised for stardom. If you're headed to the Essence Fest in New Orleans this year you're in for a musical treat.
You have to be taught to be second class; you're not born that way.
She branched out and began singing with orchestras, and was discovered while singing with white orchestra leader Charlie Barnet. Lena then began playing clubs in Greenwich Village and performed at Carnegie Hall.
