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Summertime (George Gershwin Song)
"Summertime" is an aria composed in 1934 by George Gershwin for the 1935 opera ''Porgy and Bess''. The lyrics are by DuBose Heyward, the author of the novel '' Porgy'' on which the opera was based, and Ira Gershwin. The song soon became a popular and much-recorded jazz standard, described as "without doubt ... one of the finest songs the composer ever wrote ... Gershwin's highly evocative writing brilliantly mixes elements of jazz and the song styles of blacks in the southeast United States from the early twentieth century". Composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim characterized Heyward's lyrics for "Summertime" and " My Man's Gone Now" as "the best lyrics in the musical theater". ''Porgy and Bess'' Gershwin began composing the song in December 1933, attempting to create his own spiritual in the style of the African American folk music of the period. Gershwin had completed setting DuBose Heyward's poem to music by February 1934 and spent the next 20 months completing an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Song
A song is a musical composition performed by the human voice. The voice often carries the melody (a series of distinct and fixed pitches) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs have a structure, such as the common ABA form, and are usually made of sections that are repeated or performed with variation later. A song without instruments is said to be a cappella. Written words created specifically for music, or for which music is specifically created, are called lyrics. If a pre-existing poem is set to composed music in the classical tradition, it is called an art song. Songs that are sung on repeated pitches without distinct contours and patterns that rise and fall are called chants. Songs composed in a simple style that are learned informally by ear are often referred to as folk songs. Songs composed for the mass market, designed to be sung by professional singers who sell their recordings or live shows, are called popular songs. These songs, which have broad appe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abbie Mitchell
__NOTOC__ Abriea "Abbie" Mitchell Cook (25 September 1884 – 16 March 1960), also billed as Abbey Mitchell, was an American soprano opera singer. She performed the role of Clara in the premiere production of George Gershwin's ''Porgy and Bess'' in 1935, and was also the first to record "Summertime (George Gershwin song), Summertime" from that musical. Biography Mitchell was the mixed-race daughter of an African-American mother and a Jewish-Germany, German father from New York City's Lower East Side.D. C. Hine, ed., ''Black Women in America, An Historical Encyclopedia''. Carlson Publishing Inc., 1993. . She was reared by a maternal aunt, Alice Payne, in Baltimore, Maryland, where she attended a Catholic convent school.Abbie Mitchell , in ''Notable Black American Women'', Book 1. Gale Research, 1992. Mitchell never completed her formal sch ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Billy Stewart
William Larry Stewart II (March 24, 1937 – January 17, 1970) was an American R&B singer and pianist popular during the 1960s. Biography Stewart was 12 years old when he began singing with his younger brothers Johnny, James, and Frank as the Four Stewart Brothers, and they later went on to get their own radio show every Sunday for five years at WUST in Washington, D.C. He was a graduate of Armstrong High School, now Friendship Armstrong Academy. Stewart made the transition to secular music by filling in occasionally for the Rainbows, a D.C. area vocal group led by the future soul star, Don Covay. It was through the Rainbows that Stewart met another aspiring singer, Marvin Gaye. Rock and roller Bo Diddley has been credited with discovering Stewart playing piano in Washington, D.C., and inviting him to be one of his backup musicians. By 1955, this led to a recording contract with Diddley's label, Chess Records and Diddley played guitar on Stewart's 1956 recording of "Billy's ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chris Columbus (musician)
Joseph Christopher Columbus Morris (June 17, 1902 – August 20, 2002), better known as Crazy Chris ColumboRye, Howard (2002)"Chris Columbus."''Grove Music Online''. Retrieved 3 December 2022. or just Chris Columbo, was an American jazz drummer. He was sometimes credited as Joe Morris on record, though he is no relation to free jazz guitarist Joe Morris or trumpeter Joe Morris. Career Columbus was active as a jazz musician from the 1920s into the 1990s, and was a father figure to Sonny Payne. He led his own band from the 1930s into the late 1940s, holding a residency at the Savoy Ballroom for a period. Chris Columbusat Allmusic During the mid 1940s he also began drumming behind Louis Jordan, remaining with him until 1952. In the mid-to-late 1950s, Columbus backed Wild Bill Davis's organ combo, and he recorded with Duke Ellington in 1967. He worked again as a leader in the 1970s, in addition to doing tours of Europe with Davis. While in France he played with Floyd Smith, Al Gr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Billie Holiday
Billie Holiday (born Eleanora Fagan; April 7, 1915 – July 17, 1959) was an American jazz and swing music singer. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and music partner, Lester Young, Holiday made significant contributions to jazz music and pop music, pop singing. Her vocal style, strongly influenced by jazz instrumentalists, inspired a new way of manipulating Phrase (music), phrasing and tempo. Holiday was known for her vocal delivery and Jazz improvisation, improvisational skills. After a turbulent childhood, Holiday began singing in nightclubs in Harlem where she was heard by producer John Hammond (record producer), John Hammond, who liked her voice. Holiday signed a recording contract with Brunswick Records, Brunswick in 1935. Her collaboration with Teddy Wilson produced the hit "What a Little Moonlight Can Do", which became a jazz standard. Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, Holiday had mainstream success on labels such as Columbia Records, Columbia and Decca Records, Decca. H ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Jazz Discography
''The Jazz Discography'' is a print, CD-ROM, and online discography and sessionography of all categories of recorded jazz — and directly relevant precursors of recorded jazz from 1896. The publisher, Lord Music Reference Inc., a British Columbia company, is headed by Tom Lord and is based in Chilliwack, British Columbia, Canada. The initial 26 of 35 print volumes, which comprise the discography, were issued from 1992 to 2001 in alphabetic order. In 2002, ''The Jazz Discography'' became the first comprehensive jazz discography on CD-ROM. Scope ''The Jazz Discography'' covers all categories of jazz and other creative improvised music, including traditional, swing, bebop, modern, avant-garde, fusion, third stream, and others. As of January 2008, the database contained 34,861 leaders, 181,392 recording sessions, 1,030,109 musician entries, and 1,077,503 tune entries. Early listings There is an ongoing debate over when and where the word "jazz" became a common, commercial ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child
"Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child", also "Motherless Child", is a traditional spiritual. It dates back to the era of slavery in the United States. An early performance of the song was in the 1870s by the Fisk Jubilee Singers. "Blue Gene" Tyranny, "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child" article ''AllMusic'' Commonly heard during the Civil rights movement in the United States, it has many variations and has been recorded widely. Description The song is an expression of pain and despair as the singer compares their hopelessness to that of a child who has been torn from its parents. Under one interpretation, the repetition of the word "sometimes" offers a measure of hope, as it suggests that at least "sometimes" the singer ''does not'' feel like a motherless child."Sweet Chariot: the story of the spirituals" [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Blues
Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated among African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballad (music), ballads from the African-American culture. The blues form is ubiquitous in jazz, rhythm and blues, and rock and roll, and is characterized by the Call and response (music), call-and-response pattern, the blues scale, and specific chord progressions, of which the twelve-bar blues is the most common. Blue notes (or "worried notes"), usually thirds, fifths or sevenths flattened in Pitch (music), pitch, are also an essential part of the sound. Blues shuffle note, shuffles or walking bass reinforce the trance-like rhythm and form a repetitive effect known as the groove (popular music), groove. Blues music is characterized by its lyrics, Bassline, bass lines, and Instrumentation (music), instrumen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Minor
A minor is a minor scale based on A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. Its key signature has no flats or sharps. Its relative major is C major and its parallel major is A major. The A natural minor scale is: Changes needed for the melodic and harmonic versions of the scale are written in with accidentals as necessary. The A harmonic minor and melodic minor scales are: Scale degree chords The scale degree chords of A minor are: * Tonic – A minor * Supertonic – B diminished * Mediant – C major * Subdominant – D minor * Dominant – E minor * Submediant – F major * Subtonic – G major Well-known compositions in A minor *Johann Sebastian Bach ** English Suite No. 2, BWV 807 ** Sonata No. 2 in A minor, BWV 1003 ** Partita in A minor, BWV 1013 ** Violin Concerto in A minor, BWV 1041 ** Allein zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ, BWV 33 *Ludwig van Beethoven ** Violin Sonata No. 4, Op. 23 ** String Quartet No. 15, Op. 132 ** Bagatelle in A minor, "Für Elise" ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pentatonic Scale
A pentatonic scale is a musical scale with five notes per octave, in contrast to heptatonic scales, which have seven notes per octave (such as the major scale and minor scale). Pentatonic scales were developed independently by many ancient civilizations and are still used in various musical styles to this day. As Leonard Bernstein put it: "The universality of this scale is so well known that I'm sure you could give me examples of it, from all corners of the earth, as from Scotland, or from China, or from Africa, and from American Indian cultures, from East Indian cultures, from Central and South America, Australia, Finland ...now, that is a true musico-linguistic universal." There are two types of pentatonic scales: Those with semitones (hemitonic) and those without (anhemitonic). Types Hemitonic and anhemitonic Musicology commonly classifies pentatonic scales as either ''hemitonic'' or ''anhemitonic''. Hemitonic scales contain one or more semitones and anhemitonic s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward Jablonski
Edward Jablonski (March 1, 1922 – February 10, 2004) was the author of several biographies on American cultural personalities, such as George Gershwin, Harold Arlen, Alan Jay Lerner, and Irving Berlin, as well as books on aviation history. Early life Jablonski was born in Bay City, Michigan, to a family of Polish-American journalists and writers. His father had been a writer for Sztandar Polski and another relative, Paul F. Jablonski, wrote for ''The Bay City Times''. Early on he fell in love with the music of George and Ira Gershwin. A fan letter he wrote to Ira while in school quickly turned into regular correspondence and eventually a lasting friendship with the lyricist. While Jablonski was interested in music, his true fascination was with aviation. Supposedly, he spent much of his time watching the planes at the James Clements Airport near the South End of Bay City. Later on in his life, he became interested in aerial warfare. Telling an interviewer in 1986, "Aviation ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
