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[
"Arthur Miller",
"Early career"
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | What was his first play? | 1 | What was Arthur Miller's first play? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | The Man Who Had All the Luck | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American screenwriters
21st-century American short story writers
21st-century essayists
Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
American agnostics
American anti-capitalists
American autobiographers
20th-century American Jews
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male essayists
American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
American male screenwriters
American male short story writers
American memoirists
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American radio writers
Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
Deaths from cancer in Connecticut
Free speech activists
Hopwood Award winners
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Jewish agnostics
Jewish American dramatists and playwrights
Jewish novelists
Jewish writers
Marilyn Monroe
The Michigan Daily alumni
PEN International
People from Brooklyn Heights
People from Gravesend, Brooklyn
People from Midwood, Brooklyn
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | true | [
"Patrick Ryan Clark (born August 31, 1977) is an American Christian musician. He released an album, Translation, with Foreverything Records, in 2006. His subsequent release, an extended play, Search and Rescue, was released in 2008, by Foreverything Records. The first studio album, Where Would I Be, was released by Word Records in association with Warner Bros. Records and alongside Curb Records, in 2011. This album saw, two singles released, \"What Was I Fighting For\" and \"Mercy\", chart on various Billboard magazine Christian songs charts. His most recent release, Lifted Up, an extended play, was released in 2013, from Word Records in tandem with Curb Records. The extended play got one single, \"God Is Able\", to chart on two Billboard magazine Christian songs charts.\n\nEarly life\nClark was born as Patrick Ryan Clark, on August 31, 1977, in the city of Norman, Oklahoma. He relocated to Dallas, Texas to start his music career.\n\nMusic career\nHe started his music recording career in 2004, with his first album, Translation, and it was released on September 7, 2006, from Foreverything Records. His second release, an extended play, Search and Rescue, was released from Foreverything Records, in 2008. The first studio album, Where Would I Be, was released on August 23, 2011, just eight days before his 34th birthday, from Word Records in association with Warner Bros. Records and alongside Curb Records. This release had two singles, \"What Was I Fighting For\" and \"Mercy\", chart on the Billboard magazine charts. The song, \"What Was I Fighting For\", reached a peak position of No. 26, on the Christian AC Indicator chart. Its second single, \"Mercy\", charted on the Billboard magazine Christian Songs chart, at No. 50. This song was profiled in a New Release Tuesday's Behind the Song feature. His subsequent release, an extended play, Lifted Up, was released by Word Records in tandem with Curb Records, on March 26, 2013. The extended play got one single, \"God Is Able, to chart on two Billboard magazine charts, on the Christian Songs at No. 47., while it placed at a peak of No. 10 on the Christian Soft AC chart.\n\nPersonal life\nClark is married to Gretchen, where they used to reside in Dallas, Texas, yet have since moved back to Norman, Oklahoma.\n\nDiscography\nAlbums\n Translation (September 7, 2006, Foreverythingmusic)\n Where Would I Be (August 23, 2011, Word/Warner Bros./Curb)\nEPs\n Search and Rescue (2008, Foreverythingmusic)\n Lifted Up (March 26, 2013, Word/Curb)\nSingles\n \"What Was I Fighting For\" (2011) Christian AC Indicator No. 26\n \"Mercy\" (2011) Christian Songs No. 50\n \"God Is Able\" (2013) Christian Songs No. 47 and Christian Soft AC No. 10\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Facebook page\n\n1977 births\nLiving people\nAmerican performers of Christian music\nMusicians from Oklahoma\nMusicians from Texas\nSongwriters from Oklahoma\nSongwriters from Texas",
"What Price Glory?, a 1924 comedy-drama written by Maxwell Anderson and critic/veteran Laurence Stallings was Anderson's first commercial success, with a long run on Broadway, starring Louis Wolheim.\n\nThe play depicted the rivalry between two U.S. Marine Corps officers fighting in France during World War I.\n\nThe play was notable for its profanity, \"toot goddam sweet,\" etc., and for censorship efforts by military and religious groups. These efforts failed when the primary censorship authority, Rear Admiral Charles P. Plunkett, was revealed by columnist Heywood Broun to have written a far more vulgar series of letters to a General Chatelaine.\n\nThe play's success allowed Anderson to quit teaching and journalism, and start his long and successful career as a professional playwright. It was included in Burns Mantle's The Best Plays of 1924-1925.\n\nThe play was filmed in 1926 and 1952.\n\nReferences\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \nFull text of What Price Glory? at HathiTrust Digital Library\n\nPlays by Maxwell Anderson\n1924 plays\nPlays about World War I\nBroadway plays\nAmerican plays adapted into films"
] |
[
"Arthur Miller",
"Early career",
"What was his first play?",
"The Man Who Had All the Luck"
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | When did he write The Man Who Had All the Luck? | 2 | When did Arthur Miller write The Man Who Had All the Luck? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | 1940, | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American screenwriters
21st-century American short story writers
21st-century essayists
Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
American agnostics
American anti-capitalists
American autobiographers
20th-century American Jews
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male essayists
American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
American male screenwriters
American male short story writers
American memoirists
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American radio writers
Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
Deaths from cancer in Connecticut
Free speech activists
Hopwood Award winners
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Jewish agnostics
Jewish American dramatists and playwrights
Jewish novelists
Jewish writers
Marilyn Monroe
The Michigan Daily alumni
PEN International
People from Brooklyn Heights
People from Gravesend, Brooklyn
People from Midwood, Brooklyn
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | true | [
"A is a kami or god who inhabits a human being or his house to bring misery and poverty. Several Japanese folklores, essays, and rakugos refer to it. Concerning binbōgami's preference of baked miso, in Senba, Osaka, (:ja:船場 (大阪市)) the following story is told:\n\nThere used to be an event till about 1877 to send binbōgami away: At the end of each month, merchants in Senba made baked and plate-shaped miso, then a bantō (番頭, head clerk), with the plate-shaped miso in his hands, walked around till the air was filled with its appetizing smell. After a while, he bent the plate-shaped miso closed. The miso's smell makes binbōgamis come out of the houses they inhabit and traps them in it. The bantō dumps the miso into a river and washes the smell away before returning. According to poet Mitsuyuki Nakamura, binbōgami has an uchiwa to draw in and enjoy miso's smell.\n\nDescription\nGenerally, a binbōgami appears as a skinny, dirty old man, who wields both an uchiwa and a kendama in his hands and wears one broken geta on his foot.\n\nToen Shōsetsu (兎園小説), the mystery stories written by Kyokutei Bakin and others includes a story of kyūki (窮鬼):\n\nIn 1821, there was a bushi house with ever-present misery. One day, the man who served the house went to Sōka and came across a bonze. The man asked him where he came from. The bonze replied he came from the man's house. The man said that he had never seen the bonze before. \"I'm binbōgami,\" the bonze answered, \"and that's why so many people in the house caught an illness. That house has enough misery, so I shall go to another house. Your master will have better luck hereafter\" and the bonze disappeared. Just as the bonze said, people in the house experienced better luck gradually.\n\nBeing a kami, a binbōgami cannot be killed. A story in Niigata Prefecture describes how:\n\nIf you light an irori on an ōmisoka, irori's heat kicks binbōgami out and invites fukunokami (福の神, the kami of good luck) who likes the warmth of irori. There are many other superstitions which connect binbōgami with irori, including that of Tsushima, Ehime Prefecture: If an irori is lit too repeatedly, binbōgami appears.\n\nTankai (譚海), an essay collection by Souan Tsumura, includes a story about a binbōgami:\n\nDuring a nap, a man dreams of a ragged old man entering the room. Thereafter, everything the man did went wrong. Four years later, in another dream, the old man appears again. The old man says that he will leave the house and tells the man how to send a binbōgami away: Make some baked rice and baked miso, and place them on an oshiki (wooden board, with four bent edges to serve as a tray), and take it through the back door and dump them into the river. The old man also reveals how to avoid binbōgami thereafter: Not to make any baked miso, which is preferred by binbōgami, and to never eat any raw miso, which makes poverty too severe to light a fire to bake miso. The man did as he was told, and he never again experienced poverty.\n\nIt is also said that hospitality of the inhabited people may turn binbōgami into fukunokami. Ihara Saikaku's Nippon Eidaigura (日本永代蔵) includes the story (Inoru shirushi no kami no oshiki 祈る印の神の折敷 lit. oshiki as a praying sign) which tells\n\nAbout the man who deified a binbōgami. At the night of Jinjitsu (January 7 in the former Japanese calendar), a binbōgami appeared at the man's bedside and thanked him, \"I had a prepared dinner on a tray for the first time,\" and made the man a millionaire in return. And it is also said that a poor hatamoto (middle-class bushi), who thought binbōgami had brought him security as well as poverty, put sake and rice out to pray to binbōgami for a little bit of luck. And then, he received a little bit of luck. This binbōgami is now enshrined beside Kitano Shrine, in Bunkyō ward, Tokyo. If you pray at the small shrine to welcome binbōgami temporarily, and send him away 21 days later, it is said, you can avoid binbōgami thereafter.\n\nSee also\nJapanese mythology in popular culture\nList of legendary creatures from Japan\n\nReferences \n\nFortune gods\nJapanese legendary creatures",
"\"With a Little Bit of Luck\" is a popular song by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe, written for the 1956 Broadway play My Fair Lady.\n\nIt was sung by Stanley Holloway as Alfred P. Doolittle in both the original stage and film versions.\n\nIt is sung by Eliza's bin man father, Alfred P. Doolittle and is about a list of everyday situations which one finds themselves in, and a desire to take the easy way out as \"With a Little Bit of Luck\" one's fate might change, thus avoiding any responsibility. The song is traditionally sung in a deep Cockney accent.\n\nThe song occurs twice at Act 1 in the musicals. Both \"With a Little Bit of Luck\" scenes are at the same tenement in Tottenham Court Road, London in 1912. Firstly, Alfred P. Doolittle sings along with bin men Harry and Jamie who are his drinking companions after the scene Eliza's \"Wouldn't It Be Loverly?\" and secondly (reprise), three days later, with new verses to hear of Eliza he sings along with all the common people there (ensemble) after Prof. Higgins' \"I'm an Ordinary Man\". However in the Holloway's film version in 1964, this song occurred only after \"I'm an Ordinary Man\" and some verses were omitted.\n\nWhen Alfred P. Doolittle sang the other of his two songs \"Get Me to the Church on Time\" (Act 2), he was not an impoverished workingman but rich middle-class owing to Higgins' recommendation to an American millionaire, although Doolittle was a man who didn't want \"middle-class morality\". Clearly, \"With a Little Bit of Luck\" and \"Get Me to the Church on Time\" are related and similar to each other as music hall-style songs.\n\nRecordings in 1956 \nIn 1956, Jo Stafford released a cover version of \"With a Little Bit of Luck\". On Billboards review, she scored 78 out of 100 points and the review said: \"Stafford's reading of the “Fair Lady” tune sparkles with style and verve. A fine side for deejays.\"\n\nTo accept the requests from customers and radio stations, Columbia Records released \"The Rain in Spain\" backed with \"With a Little Bit of Luck\" in 1956 (Columbia 4-40696) from Percy Faith's My Fair Lady album (Columbia CL-895) as an instrumental single record of My Fair Lady music. Both of Faith's tunes were the first single versions. When the original cast album already sold more than 250,000 copies, Billboard anticipated the dollar volume from non original music including Faith's \"The Rain in Spain\" and \"With a Little Bit of Luck\". Billboard'''s review scored his \"With a Little Bit of Luck\" 76 out of 100 points and described: \"Another excellent Faith treatment of another tune from the “My Fair Lady” score. This one's a catchy little ditty with a folksy, lilting tempo.\"\n\n Various usage\n\nIn the US, the TV crime drama Magnum, P.I. season 6 episode 19 entitled \"A Little Bit of Luck... a Little Bit of Grief\" was named after \"With a Little Bit of Luck\".\n\nIn Netherlands, the TV situation comedy Zeg 'ns Aaas soundtrack \"\" was based on \"With a Little Bit of Luck\".\n\nIn Japan, \"With a Little Bit of Luck\" was adopted as the commercial song for an energy drink ZENA featuring George Tokoro singing the changed phrase , launched in the mid-1990s. On horse racing in Japan, Sonoda and Himeji racecourses have used Percy Faith's \"With a Little Bit of Luck\" and a disco style tune \"Summer Place '76\" (from the film A Summer Place, 1959) in their betting booths as BGM a few minutes before the end of the tickets sales of every races. The usage of these two Faith's tunes in Sonoda racecourse was referred in a horse racing web novel that appeared serially in a daily sports newspaper Tokyo Sports news site in 2014, as tunes that were popular among middle-aged men in Sonoda racecourse.\n\nSometimes My Fair Lady music is used for figure skating programs. The US ice dance team Meryl Davis & Charlie White used it for their short dance during the 2013–14 figure skating season, including the Sochi Olympics where they were ranked #1. They studied the 1964 film of My Fair Lady. Davis said: \"Our characters very much interact in a way that resembles Eliza Doolittle and Professor Higgins, but we've taken some liberties\". White said: \"The songs (\"I Could Have Danced All Night\" and \"With a Little Bit of Luck\") are recognizable and, obviously, there is singing. Meryl does such a great job of interpreting that, it sort of makes the program become more alive.\" Their version of \"With a Little Bit of Luck\" was some instrumental one and was played immediately in succession after \"Get Me to the Church on Time\" (instrumental) that started at the middle of their program, although their theme music \"I Could Have Danced All Night\" was with vocal version of 2001 London revival arranged. The other teams that used \"With a Little Bit of Luck\" were Marina Klimova & Sergei Ponomarenko during the 1989–90 season (free dance, instrumental), Ekaterina Riazanova & Ilia Tkachenko during the 2012–13 season (short dance, with vocal), and so forth.\n\nA one-man show \"With A Little Bit O' Luck\" was written and performed by Dave Sealey who was known as a member of a \"music hall\" type duo Cosmotheka along with his brother Al Sealey and had a son Dan Sealey who is the former bass guitarist for Ocean Colour Scene. Dave Sealey performed Stanley Holloway in this one-man show bringing Holloway story vividly to life. The Sealey's show was released as the album entitled With A Little Bit O' Luck in 2007, including the song \"With a Little Bit of Luck\" at the end of the tracks. Also, Joseph Sirola known by more than 10,000 commercials and 600 TV shows has a one-man show entitled \"With A Little Bit Of Luck\".\n\nSee also\nBlack Cats, an Iranian band which sang this song in Iranian.\n\n References \n\n Further reading \n \n\n External links \n\n , 2001 London revival , 2011-2012 National Broadway Tour of MY FAIR LADY (Big League Productions, Inc.)\n , Percy Faith & His Orchestra (instrumental)\n , Helmut Zacharias & His Orchestra'' (instrumental)\n\nSongs about luck\nSongs with music by Frederick Loewe\nSongs with lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner\nSongs from My Fair Lady\n1956 songs"
] |
[
"Arthur Miller",
"Early career",
"What was his first play?",
"The Man Who Had All the Luck",
"When did he write The Man Who Had All the Luck?",
"1940,"
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | What was the play about? | 3 | What was Arthur Miller's play The Man Who Had All the Luck about? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American screenwriters
21st-century American short story writers
21st-century essayists
Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
American agnostics
American anti-capitalists
American autobiographers
20th-century American Jews
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male essayists
American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
American male screenwriters
American male short story writers
American memoirists
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American radio writers
Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
Deaths from cancer in Connecticut
Free speech activists
Hopwood Award winners
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Jewish agnostics
Jewish American dramatists and playwrights
Jewish novelists
Jewish writers
Marilyn Monroe
The Michigan Daily alumni
PEN International
People from Brooklyn Heights
People from Gravesend, Brooklyn
People from Midwood, Brooklyn
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | false | [
"What Price Glory?, a 1924 comedy-drama written by Maxwell Anderson and critic/veteran Laurence Stallings was Anderson's first commercial success, with a long run on Broadway, starring Louis Wolheim.\n\nThe play depicted the rivalry between two U.S. Marine Corps officers fighting in France during World War I.\n\nThe play was notable for its profanity, \"toot goddam sweet,\" etc., and for censorship efforts by military and religious groups. These efforts failed when the primary censorship authority, Rear Admiral Charles P. Plunkett, was revealed by columnist Heywood Broun to have written a far more vulgar series of letters to a General Chatelaine.\n\nThe play's success allowed Anderson to quit teaching and journalism, and start his long and successful career as a professional playwright. It was included in Burns Mantle's The Best Plays of 1924-1925.\n\nThe play was filmed in 1926 and 1952.\n\nReferences\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \nFull text of What Price Glory? at HathiTrust Digital Library\n\nPlays by Maxwell Anderson\n1924 plays\nPlays about World War I\nBroadway plays\nAmerican plays adapted into films",
"Frozen Assets is a 1978 play by Barrie Keeffe, written for the Royal Shakespeare Company. The play is \"about what happens to a youth after he kills a prison guard\". A production of the play was put on by director Will MacAdam at the NY Theatre Ensemble in 1983. Clive Mantle starred in a radio adaption of it. A revival of the play was put on by the Shattered Globe Theatre of Chicago under Nick Bowling from January 1999. It was praised by the Chicago Sun-Times as \"hugely entertaining\", a \"marvelous blend of satire and social commentary and class-based screwball comedy\". In 1989 Frozen Assets was also staged at the Half Moon Theatre in Stepney, East London with Marc Tufano playing the lead role of Buddy Clark.\n\nReferences\n\n1978 plays\nBritish plays\nComedy plays\nBritish radio dramas"
] |
[
"Arthur Miller",
"Early career",
"What was his first play?",
"The Man Who Had All the Luck",
"When did he write The Man Who Had All the Luck?",
"1940,",
"What was the play about?",
"I don't know."
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | How did the play do? | 4 | How did Arthur Miller's play The Man Who Had All the Luck do? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | won the Theatre Guild's National Award. | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American screenwriters
21st-century American short story writers
21st-century essayists
Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
American agnostics
American anti-capitalists
American autobiographers
20th-century American Jews
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male essayists
American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
American male screenwriters
American male short story writers
American memoirists
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American radio writers
Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
Deaths from cancer in Connecticut
Free speech activists
Hopwood Award winners
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Jewish agnostics
Jewish American dramatists and playwrights
Jewish novelists
Jewish writers
Marilyn Monroe
The Michigan Daily alumni
PEN International
People from Brooklyn Heights
People from Gravesend, Brooklyn
People from Midwood, Brooklyn
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | true | [
"How to Play the Piano was a British television series which was aired in 1950 on BBC. In the programme, Sidney Harrison showed how to play the piano to a pupil, Edward Goodwin. Episode titles included \"how to practise\", \"how to play with expression\", and \"how do you play?\". It aired in a 30-minute time-slot.\n\nSee also\nPiano Lesson TV series\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nHow to Play the Piano on IMDb\nhow long does it take to learn piano\nHow to Learn How to Play Piano\n\n1950s British music television series\n1950 British television series debuts\n1950 British television series endings\nLost BBC episodes\nBBC Television shows\nBlack-and-white British television shows\nBritish live television series",
"How Did You Know is an extended play (EP) by Jamaican electronic dance musician Kurtis Mantronik. The EP was released in 2003 on the Southern Fried Records label, and features British singer Mim on vocals. \"How Did You Know (77 Strings)\" was released as a single from the EP, reaching number 16 on the UK Singles Chart and number three in Romania. The title track peaked atop the US Billboard Hot Dance Club Play chart in May 2004.\n\nTrack listing\n \"How Did You Know (Radio Edit)\" (Kurtis Mantronik, Miriam Grey - vocals) – 3:33 \n \"How Did You Know (Original Vocal)\" (Mantronik, Grey - vocals) – 6:35 \n \"How Did You Know (Tony Senghore Vocal)\" (Mantronik, Grey - vocals, Tony Senghore - remix) – 6:31 \n \"77 Strings (Original Instrumental)\" (Mantronik) – 7:57\n\nCharts\nThe following chart entries are for \"How Did You Know (77 Strings)\".\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n2003 EPs\n2003 singles\nAlbums produced by Kurtis Mantronik\nSouthern Fried Records albums"
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[
"Arthur Miller",
"Early career",
"What was his first play?",
"The Man Who Had All the Luck",
"When did he write The Man Who Had All the Luck?",
"1940,",
"What was the play about?",
"I don't know.",
"How did the play do?",
"won the Theatre Guild's National Award."
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | Did he do anything else in 1940? | 5 | Aside from The Man Who Had All the Luck, did Arthur Miller do anything else in 1940? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American screenwriters
21st-century American short story writers
21st-century essayists
Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
American agnostics
American anti-capitalists
American autobiographers
20th-century American Jews
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male essayists
American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
American male screenwriters
American male short story writers
American memoirists
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American radio writers
Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
Deaths from cancer in Connecticut
Free speech activists
Hopwood Award winners
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Jewish agnostics
Jewish American dramatists and playwrights
Jewish novelists
Jewish writers
Marilyn Monroe
The Michigan Daily alumni
PEN International
People from Brooklyn Heights
People from Gravesend, Brooklyn
People from Midwood, Brooklyn
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | true | [
"\"If You Can Do Anything Else\" is a song written by Billy Livsey and Don Schlitz, and recorded by American country music artist George Strait. It was released in February 2001 as the third and final single from his self-titled album. The song reached number 5 on the U.S. Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart in July 2001. It also peaked at number 51 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.\n\nContent\nThe song is about man who is giving his woman the option to leave him. He gives her many different options for all the things she can do. At the end he gives her the option to stay with him if she really can’t find anything else to do. He says he will be alright if she leaves, but really it seems he wants her to stay.\n\nChart performance\n\"If You Can Do Anything Else\" debuted at number 60 on the U.S. Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks for the week of March 3, 2001.\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences\n\n2001 singles\n2000 songs\nGeorge Strait songs\nSongs written by Billy Livsey\nSongs written by Don Schlitz\nSong recordings produced by Tony Brown (record producer)\nMCA Nashville Records singles",
"\"Do Anything\" is the debut single of American pop group Natural Selection. The song was written by group members Elliot Erickson and Frederick Thomas, who also produced the track, and the rap was written and performed by Ingrid Chavez. American actress and singer Niki Haris provides the song's spoken lyrics. A new jack swing and funk-pop song, it is the opening track on Natural Selection's self-titled, only studio album. Released as a single in 1991, \"Do Anything\" became a hit in the United States, where it reached the number-two position on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Worldwide, it became a top-10 hit in Australia and New Zealand while peaking at number 24 in Canada.\n\nCritical reception\nRolling Stone magazine featured the song on their list of \"18 Awesome Prince Rip-Offs\", comparing Frederick Thomas's vocals on the song to those of fellow American musician Prince. Music & Media magazine also compared the song to Prince's work, calling its chorus \"snappy\" and its melody \"asserted\", while Tom Breihan of Stereogum referred to the track as \"K-Mart-brand Prince\". Jeff Giles of pop culture website Popdose wrote that the song is \"deeply, deeply silly,\" commenting on its \"horrible\" lyrics, \"dated\" production, and \"painfully bad\" rap, but he noted that the song is difficult to hate overall. He went on to say that if Natural Selection had released this song and nothing else, its popularity would have persisted more, and he also predicted that if American rock band Fall Out Boy covered the song, it would become a summer hit. AllMusic reviewer Alex Henderson called the track \"likeable\" and appreciated that it was original compared to other urban contemporary songs released during the early 1990s.\n\nChart performance\n\"Do Anything\" debuted on the US Billboard Hot 100 at number 58, becoming the Hot Shot Debut of August 10, 1991. Ten issues later, the song reached its peak of number two, behind only \"Emotions by Mariah Carey. It spent its final week on the Hot 100 at number 27 on December 28, 1991, spending a total of 21 weeks on the listing. It was the United States' 32nd-most-succeful single of 1991. In Canada, after debuting at number 92 on October 5, 1991, the song rose up the chart until reaching number 24 on November 23. \"Do Anything\" was not as successful in Europe, peaking at number 48 on the Dutch Single Top 100 and number 69 on the UK Singles Chart, but in Sweden, it debuted and peaked at number 21 in November 1991. The single became a top-10 hit in both Australia and New Zealand, reaching number 10 in the former nation and number nine in the latter.\n\nTrack listings\n\nUS 12-inch vinyl\nA1. \"Do Anything\" (Justin Strauss Remix) – 6:00\nA2. \"Do Anything\" (Just Dubbin Dub) – 4:30\nB1. \"Do Anything\" (Just Right Mix) – 4:35\nB2. \"Do Anything\" (Just Right Dub) – 4:50\nB3. \"Do Anything\" (radio edit) – 3:55\n\nUS cassette single and European 7-inch single\n \"Do Anything\" (single mix) – 3:55\n \"Do Anything\" (raw mix) – 4:11\n\nUK and European 12-inch vinyl\nA1. \"Do Anything\" (Justin Strauss Remix) – 6:00\nA2. \"Do Anything\" (Just Dubbin Dub) – 4:30\nB1. \"Do Anything\" (Just Right Mix) – 4:35\nB2. \"Do Anything\" (Just Right Dub) – 4:50\n\nPersonnel\nCredits are taken from the US cassette single liner notes and cassette notes.\n Elliot Erickson – keyboards, drum programming, writer, producer, mixer, engineer\n Frederick Thomas – lead and background vocals, writer, producer\n Niki Haris – spoken vocals\n Ingrid Chavez – rap writer\n Brian Malouf – additional production and mixing\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences\n\n1991 debut singles\nAmerican pop songs\nEast West Records singles\nFunk songs\nNew jack swing songs"
] |
[
"Arthur Miller",
"Early career",
"What was his first play?",
"The Man Who Had All the Luck",
"When did he write The Man Who Had All the Luck?",
"1940,",
"What was the play about?",
"I don't know.",
"How did the play do?",
"won the Theatre Guild's National Award.",
"Did he do anything else in 1940?",
"In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery."
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | Did the couple have any children? | 6 | Did Arthur Miller and his wife Mary Grace Slattery have any children? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American screenwriters
21st-century American short story writers
21st-century essayists
Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
American agnostics
American anti-capitalists
American autobiographers
20th-century American Jews
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male essayists
American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
American male screenwriters
American male short story writers
American memoirists
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American radio writers
Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
Deaths from cancer in Connecticut
Free speech activists
Hopwood Award winners
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Jewish agnostics
Jewish American dramatists and playwrights
Jewish novelists
Jewish writers
Marilyn Monroe
The Michigan Daily alumni
PEN International
People from Brooklyn Heights
People from Gravesend, Brooklyn
People from Midwood, Brooklyn
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | false | [
"Jari Komulainen is a Finnish businessman. He became famous by being married to the Finnish President Mauno Koivisto’s daughter, Assi Koivisto.\n\nPersonal life\nJari Komulainen married Assi Koivisto, the daughter of President Mauno Koivisto in a lavish wedding in the Presidential summer palace, Kultaranta, in 1982. The couple divorced in the 1990s and did not have any children, which was speculated to be the cause to the divorce.\nKomulainen’s second marriage to Minna Brygger produced one child but did not last long, as he already married Anitra Ahtola in 1998. The couple got divorced in 2003. Anitra Ahtola is a Finnish model and the first runner up in 1996 Miss Finland competition. The couple has two children.\n\nBusiness\nKomulainen got into a Russian submarine business with Russian partners and purchased a in 1993, which he later chartered to the Intermedia Film Equities Ltd as a movie set of the K-19 Widowmaker movie starring Liam Neeson and Harrison Ford. The submarine was also used as a restaurant and Komulainen even held his own beauty pageant, Miss Submarine, on top of his K-77 in Helsinki. He later married the winner of the competition, Anitra Ahtola. In 2002, after the film wrapped up, the submarine was purchased by the USS Saratoga Museum Foundation, towed to Collier Point Park in Providence, Rhode Island, and opened to the public in August 2002.\nKomulainen’s company, Solo International ltd, used Sanil Europe ltd to import scooters and bicycles to the Finnish market. The company had a turnover of 4 million Euros a year, however Komulainen sold Solo International Ltd to Solifer Group during the summer 2006.\n\nReferences\n\nLiving people\nFinnish businesspeople\nYear of birth missing (living people)",
"For the analysis of income, Statistics Canada distinguishes between the following statistical units:\nHousehold: \"a person or group of persons who occupy the same dwelling\"\nEconomic families: \"two or more persons who live in the same dwelling and are related to each other by blood, marriage, common-law union, adoption or a foster relationship (a couple may be of opposite or same sex)\"\nCensus families: \"a married couple and the children, if any, of either and/or both spouses; a couple living common law and the children, if any, of either and/or both partners; or a lone parent of any marital status with at least one child living in the same dwelling and that child or those children (all members of a particular census family live in the same dwelling; a couple may be of opposite or same sex)\"\n\nTherefore, a person living alone constitutes a household, but not an economic or census family. Two couples sharing a dwelling constitute a single household, but two economic or census families. A couple living with its children and one spouse's parents constitutes a single household or economic family, but two census families.\n\nIncome statistics by census metropolitan area (CMA) are published:\nevery 5 years for households (data from the Census of Population)\nannually for economic families, for select CMAs (data from the Canadian Income Survey)\nannually for census families (data from the T1 Family File)\n\nThe income concept for this article is total income.\n\nMedian Household and Family Income by Census Metropolitan Area\n\nReferences\n\nDemographics of Canada\nCanada economy-related lists\nCanada"
] |
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"Arthur Miller",
"Early career",
"What was his first play?",
"The Man Who Had All the Luck",
"When did he write The Man Who Had All the Luck?",
"1940,",
"What was the play about?",
"I don't know.",
"How did the play do?",
"won the Theatre Guild's National Award.",
"Did he do anything else in 1940?",
"In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery.",
"Did the couple have any children?",
"The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947)."
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | Are they identical twins? | 7 | Are Arthur Miller and Mary Grace Slattery's children Jane and Robert identical twins? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
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Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
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20th-century American Jews
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American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
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American male short story writers
American memoirists
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Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
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Marilyn Monroe
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PEN International
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People from Gravesend, Brooklyn
People from Midwood, Brooklyn
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | false | [
"In developmental biology, choriogenesis is the formation of the chorion, an outer membrane of the placenta that eventually forms chorionic villi that allow the transfer of blood and nutrients from mother to fetus.\n\nInfluence on monozygotic twins\n\nIdentical twins have identical genomes in the immediate aftermath of twinning. Two-thirds of monozygotic twins share the same placenta, arising by cleavage before the fourth day of development; the other third have separate placentas because cleavage has taken place after the fourth day after choriogenesis has begun.\n\nPlacentas vary with respect to the transport of nutrients and hormones, a variance that may influence epigenesis. For example, the pattern of X chromosome inactivation is affected by placental status. There is some evidence that it affects the variance in IQ test findings among identical twins, that is, monochorionic identical twins display less IQ variance one from another than do dichorionic identical twins. There is weak evidence that monozygotic twins sharing a placenta have a higher concordance rate for schizophrenia than monozygotic twins with separate placentas. Sharing a placenta increases the risk for infection, and infection in pregnancy has been shown to be a risk factor for schizophrenia. Equally striking is evidence for increasing difference in genomic expression between identical twins as they are once again implicating environmental intercession.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nEmbryology\nHuman genetics",
"Nicola and Teena Collins (identical twins, born c.1974) are English-born filmmakers currently living in Los Angeles. Formerly models then actresses, they are perhaps most well known for their portrayals of Alex and Susi, the twin daughters of Doug \"The Head\" Denovitz in the film Snatch.\n\nIn 2009 they made their filmmaking debut with The End, a documentary featuring interviews with former East End gangsters, one of which is the twins' father Les Falco. The film was directed by Nicola, who also conducted the interviews. Teena was the film's producer.\n\nThe twins' next film venture is Do As You Likey, a documentary about British gypsy culture.\n\nActing filmography\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Nicola Collins Official website\n \n \n\n1970s births\nLiving people\nEnglish documentary filmmakers\nEnglish film actresses\nIdentical twins\nIdentical twin actresses\nSibling filmmakers\nSibling duos\nTwin people from England\nBritish emigrants to the United States\nWomen documentary filmmakers"
] |
[
"Arthur Miller",
"Early career",
"What was his first play?",
"The Man Who Had All the Luck",
"When did he write The Man Who Had All the Luck?",
"1940,",
"What was the play about?",
"I don't know.",
"How did the play do?",
"won the Theatre Guild's National Award.",
"Did he do anything else in 1940?",
"In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery.",
"Did the couple have any children?",
"The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947).",
"Are they identical twins?",
"I don't know."
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | What other plays did he make in his early career? | 8 | In addition to The Man Who Had All the Luck, what other plays did Arthur Miller make in his early career? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | All My Sons, | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American screenwriters
21st-century American short story writers
21st-century essayists
Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
American agnostics
American anti-capitalists
American autobiographers
20th-century American Jews
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male essayists
American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
American male screenwriters
American male short story writers
American memoirists
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American radio writers
Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
Deaths from cancer in Connecticut
Free speech activists
Hopwood Award winners
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Jewish agnostics
Jewish American dramatists and playwrights
Jewish novelists
Jewish writers
Marilyn Monroe
The Michigan Daily alumni
PEN International
People from Brooklyn Heights
People from Gravesend, Brooklyn
People from Midwood, Brooklyn
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | true | [
"is a Japanese international rugby union player who plays in the lock position. He currently plays for the in Super Rugby and Canon Eagles in Japan's domestic Top League.\n\nEarly / Provincial Career\n\nUsami has played all of his senior club rugby in Japan with the Canon Eagles who he joined in 2014.\n\nSuper Rugby Career\n\nUsami was selected as a member of the first ever Sunwolves squad ahead of the 2016 Super Rugby season, however he did not make any appearances.\n\nInternational\n\nUsami made his senior international debut for Japan in a match against South Korea on April 18, 2015. He has largely featured in matches against other Asian nations such as Korea and Hong Kong, but he did play as a starter against in Vancouver during the 2016 mid-year rugby union internationals series.\n\nSuper Rugby Statistics\n\nReferences\n\n1992 births\nLiving people\nJapanese rugby union players\nJapan international rugby union players\nRugby union locks\nYokohama Canon Eagles players\nSunwolves players\nSportspeople from Ehime Prefecture\nRitsumeikan University alumni",
"John Price (6 July 1908 – March 1995) was an English first-class cricketer who played 11 matches for Worcestershire in the late 1920s. He had the unwanted distinction of never playing in a winning side in his entire first-class career.\n\nHe made his debut against the New Zealanders in early June 1927, dismissing opener Jack Mills in both innings. In three County Championship games later that season, he took a further four wickets, all in two matches against Somerset, with a career-best return of 2-35 in the first of these. (Worcestershire lost both games by an innings, however.)\n\nIn 1928 Price played three times, all in the Championship, but could manage only two wickets, although he did make his best score of 33 against Derbyshire in early August. The following year he had another two outings, but again managed only a pair of wickets, his last victim in first-class cricket being Hampshire's Jack Newman, the only man other than Mills he dismissed twice in his career.\n\nPrice was born in the Shrub Hill region of Worcester; he died aged 86 in the same city.\n\nHis uncle Ted Arnold also played for Worcestershire and appeared in ten Tests for England, while his brother William played once for Worcestershire in 1923.\n\nHis granddaughter, Claire Price, is the actress who plays DS Siobhan Clarke in ITV's Rebus.\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1908 births\n1995 deaths\nEnglish cricketers\nWorcestershire cricketers"
] |
[
"Arthur Miller",
"Early career",
"What was his first play?",
"The Man Who Had All the Luck",
"When did he write The Man Who Had All the Luck?",
"1940,",
"What was the play about?",
"I don't know.",
"How did the play do?",
"won the Theatre Guild's National Award.",
"Did he do anything else in 1940?",
"In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery.",
"Did the couple have any children?",
"The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947).",
"Are they identical twins?",
"I don't know.",
"What other plays did he make in his early career?",
"All My Sons,"
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | How did the play do? | 9 | How did Arthur Miller's play All My Sons Do? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | won the Theatre Guild's National Award. | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American screenwriters
21st-century American short story writers
21st-century essayists
Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
American agnostics
American anti-capitalists
American autobiographers
20th-century American Jews
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male essayists
American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
American male screenwriters
American male short story writers
American memoirists
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American radio writers
Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
Deaths from cancer in Connecticut
Free speech activists
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The Michigan Daily alumni
PEN International
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Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | true | [
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[
"Arthur Miller",
"Early career",
"What was his first play?",
"The Man Who Had All the Luck",
"When did he write The Man Who Had All the Luck?",
"1940,",
"What was the play about?",
"I don't know.",
"How did the play do?",
"won the Theatre Guild's National Award.",
"Did he do anything else in 1940?",
"In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery.",
"Did the couple have any children?",
"The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947).",
"Are they identical twins?",
"I don't know.",
"What other plays did he make in his early career?",
"All My Sons,",
"How did the play do?",
"was a success on Broadway"
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | Did he win any awards for his work? | 10 | Did Arthur Miller win any awards for his play All My Sons? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American screenwriters
21st-century American short story writers
21st-century essayists
Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
American agnostics
American anti-capitalists
American autobiographers
20th-century American Jews
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male essayists
American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
American male screenwriters
American male short story writers
American memoirists
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American radio writers
Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
Deaths from cancer in Connecticut
Free speech activists
Hopwood Award winners
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Jewish agnostics
Jewish American dramatists and playwrights
Jewish novelists
Jewish writers
Marilyn Monroe
The Michigan Daily alumni
PEN International
People from Brooklyn Heights
People from Gravesend, Brooklyn
People from Midwood, Brooklyn
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | true | [
"This is a list of awards and nominations for composer Alan Menken. Menken has been recognized with multiple awards and nominations for his work in film, theatre, television, and music.\n\nFor his work in film he earned 19 Academy Award nominations winning 8 Oscars for The Little Mermaid (1989), Beauty and the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), Pocahontas (1995). He also earned 16 Golden Globe Award nominations winning 7 awards. He has earned two British Academy Film Award nominations, and five Critics' Choice Movie Award nominations. For his work in theatre he received five Tony Award nominations winning once, and 2 Laurence Olivier Awards winning once. He also received 24 Grammy Awards winning 11 awards. For his work in television he has earned two Emmy Awards.\n\nMajor associations\n\nAcademy Awards\n 8 wins out of 19 nominations\n\nEmmy Awards\n\nGrammy Awards \n 11 wins out of 24 nominations\n\nTony Awards \n1 win out of 5 nominations\n\nFilm awards\n\nBritish Academy Film Awards\n\nCritics' Choice Awards\n\nGolden Globe Awards\n 7 wins out of 16 nominations\n\nTheater work\n\nDrama Desk Awards \n 1 win out of 6 nominations\n\nDrama League Awards\n\nEvening Standard Award\n\nLaurence Olivier Awards\n1 win out of 2 nominations\n\nNew York Drama Critic Circle Awards\n\nOuter Critics Circle Awards \n3 wins out of 4 nominations\n\nMiscellaenous awards\n\nAnnie Awards\n 1 win out of 4 nominations\n\nBMI Film/TV Awards\n 8 wins out of 8 nominations + Richard Kirk Career Achievement Award\n\nGeorgia Film Critics Association Awards\n\nGolden Raspberry Award \n\nMenken officially accepted this Razzie and has spoken proudly of it in interviews since.\n\nHouston Film Critics Society Awards\n\nInternational Film Music Critics Awards\n1 win out of 3 nominations\n\nOnline Film and Television Awards\n\nPhoenix Film Critics Society Awards\n\nSaturn Awards\n 2 wins out of 5 nominations\n\nSierra Awards\n\nFrench Mickey d'Or \n3 wins out of 9 nominations\n\nSpecial honors\n\n 1993 – Distinguished Alumni Award (given by New York University Association)\n 1998 – Kol Zimrah Award (given by Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion)\n 1998 – Colleen Dewhurst Awards: \"in recognition for outstanding contribution to the arts\" (given by Northern Westchester Center for the Arts)\n 2000 – Presidential Medal (given by New York University)\n 2001 – Disney Legend Award\n 2008 – Inductee: NYU Musical Theatre Hall of Fame\n 2008 – Inductee: Songwriter's Hall of Fame\n 2009 – Lifetime Achievement Award (given during the Musical Awards)\n 2010 – Hollywood Walk of Fame Star\n 2011 – Maestro Award (given by Billboard/The Hollywood Reporter Film and TV Conference)\n 2012 – Honors: \"for extraordinary life achievement\" (given by Encompass New Opera Theatre)\n 2013 – The Oscar Hammerstein Award (given by York Theatre Company)\n 2013 – Broadway Junior Honors: \"in recognition for his contribution towards the advancement of musical theatre for young people\"\n 2013 – Freddie G. Award for Musical Achievement (given during Junior Theatre Festival)\n\nReferences\n\nAwards\nMenken, Alan",
"Sheena Napier is a British costume designer who was nominated at the 65th Academy Awards for her work on the film Enchanted April, for which she was nominated for Best Costumes.\n\nIn addition she did win at the BAFTA Television Awards for the TV film Parade's End, which she was also nominated for an Emmy for.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nBritish costume designers\nLiving people\nBAFTA winners (people)\nWomen costume designers\nYear of birth missing (living people)"
] |
[
"Arthur Miller",
"Early career",
"What was his first play?",
"The Man Who Had All the Luck",
"When did he write The Man Who Had All the Luck?",
"1940,",
"What was the play about?",
"I don't know.",
"How did the play do?",
"won the Theatre Guild's National Award.",
"Did he do anything else in 1940?",
"In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery.",
"Did the couple have any children?",
"The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947).",
"Are they identical twins?",
"I don't know.",
"What other plays did he make in his early career?",
"All My Sons,",
"How did the play do?",
"was a success on Broadway",
"Did he win any awards for his work?",
"earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author"
] | C_ef5da6fe5a014fff8d1a0d9953019076_1 | What play earned him his first Tony Award? | 11 | What Play earned Arthur Miller his first Tony Award? | Arthur Miller | In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap. That same year his first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews. In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure. In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times. In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred. CANNOTANSWER | All My Sons, | Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are All My Sons (1947), Death of a Salesman (1949), The Crucible (1953), and A View from the Bridge (1955, revised 1956). He wrote several screenplays and was most noted for his work on The Misfits (1961). The drama Death of a Salesman has been numbered on the short list of finest American plays in the 20th century.
Miller was often in the public eye, particularly during the late 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s. During this time, he was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Drama, testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee, and married Marilyn Monroe. In 1980, Miller received the St. Louis Literary Award from the Saint Louis University Library Associates. He received the Praemium Imperiale prize in 2001, Prince of Asturias Award in 2002, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2003, as well as the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize in 1999.
Biography
Early life
Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in Harlem, in the New York City borough of Manhattan, and published an account of his early years under the title "A Boy Grew in Brooklyn"; the second of three children of Augusta (Barnett) and Isidore Miller. Miller was Jewish and of Polish-Jewish descent. His father was born in Radomyśl Wielki, Galicia (then part of Austria-Hungary, now Poland), and his mother was a native of New York whose parents also arrived from that town. Isidore owned a women's clothing manufacturing business employing 400 people. He became a wealthy and respected man in the community. The family, including Miller's younger sister Joan Copeland, lived on West 110th Street in Manhattan, owned a summer house in Far Rockaway, Queens, and employed a chauffeur. In the Wall Street Crash of 1929, the family lost almost everything and moved to Gravesend, Brooklyn. (One source says they moved to Midwood.) As a teenager, Miller delivered bread every morning before school to help the family. After graduating in 1932 from Abraham Lincoln High School, he worked at several menial jobs to pay for his college tuition at the University of Michigan. After graduation (circa 1936), he began to work as a psychiatric aide and also a copywriter before accepting faculty posts at New York University and University of New Hampshire. On May 1, 1935, Miller joined the League of American Writers (1935–1943), whose members included Alexander Trachtenberg of International Publishers, Franklin Folsom, Louis Untermeyer, I. F. Stone, Myra Page, Millen Brand, Lillian Hellman, and Dashiell Hammett. (Members were largely either Communist Party members or fellow travelers.)
At the University of Michigan, Miller first majored in journalism and worked for the student newspaper, The Michigan Daily, as well as the satirical Gargoyle Humor Magazine. It was during this time that he wrote his first play, No Villain. Miller switched his major to English, and subsequently won the Avery Hopwood Award for No Villain. The award brought him his first recognition and led him to begin to consider that he could have a career as a playwright. Miller enrolled in a playwriting seminar taught by the influential Professor Kenneth Rowe, who instructed him in his early forays into playwriting; Rowe emphasized how a play is built in order to achieve its intended effect, or what Miller called "the dynamics of play construction". Rowe provided realistic feedback along with much-needed encouragement, and became a lifelong friend. Miller retained strong ties to his alma mater throughout the rest of his life, establishing the university's Arthur Miller Award in 1985 and Arthur Miller Award for Dramatic Writing in 1999, and lending his name to the Arthur Miller Theatre in 2000. In 1937, Miller wrote Honors at Dawn, which also received the Avery Hopwood Award.
After his graduation in 1938, he joined the Federal Theatre Project, a New Deal agency established to provide jobs in the theater. He chose the theater project despite the more lucrative offer to work as a scriptwriter for 20th Century Fox. However, Congress, worried about possible Communist infiltration, closed the project in 1939. Miller began working in the Brooklyn Navy Yard while continuing to write radio plays, some of which were broadcast on CBS.
Early career
In 1940, Miller married Mary Grace Slattery. The couple had two children, Jane (born September 7, 1944) and Robert (born May 31, 1947). Miller was exempted from military service during World War II because of a high school football injury to his left kneecap.
In 1944 Miller's first play was produced; The Man Who Had All the Luck and won the Theatre Guild's National Award. The play closed after four performances with disastrous reviews.
In 1947, Miller's play All My Sons, the writing of which had commenced in 1941, was a success on Broadway (earning him his first Tony Award, for Best Author) and his reputation as a playwright was established. Years later, in a 1994 interview with Ron Rifkin, Miller said that most contemporary critics regarded All My Sons as "a very depressing play in a time of great optimism" and that positive reviews from Brooks Atkinson of The New York Times had saved it from failure.
In 1948, Miller built a small studio in Roxbury, Connecticut. There, in less than a day, he wrote Act I of Death of a Salesman. Within six weeks, he completed the rest of the play, one of the classics of world theater. Death of a Salesman premiered on Broadway on February 10, 1949, at the Morosco Theatre, directed by Elia Kazan, and starring Lee J. Cobb as Willy Loman, Mildred Dunnock as Linda, Arthur Kennedy as Biff, and Cameron Mitchell as Happy. The play was commercially successful and critically acclaimed, winning a Tony Award for Best Author, the New York Drama Circle Critics' Award, and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It was the first play to win all three of these major awards. The play was performed 742 times.
In 1949, Miller exchanged letters with Eugene O'Neill regarding Miller's production of All My Sons. O'Neill had sent Miller a congratulatory telegram; in response, he wrote a letter that consisted of a few paragraphs detailing his gratitude for the telegram, apologizing for not responding earlier, and inviting Eugene to the opening of Death of a Salesman. O'Neill replied, accepting the apology, but declining the invitation, explaining that his Parkinson's disease made it difficult to travel. He ended the letter with an invitation to Boston, a trip that never occurred.
Critical years
In 1955, a one-act version of Miller's verse drama A View from the Bridge opened on Broadway in a joint bill with one of Miller's lesser-known plays, A Memory of Two Mondays. The following year, Miller revised A View from the Bridge as a two-act prose drama, which Peter Brook directed in London. A French-Italian co-production Vu du pont, based on the play, was released in 1962.
Marriages and family
In June 1956, Miller left his first wife, Mary Slattery, whom he had married in 1940, and wed film star Marilyn Monroe. They had met in 1951, had a brief affair, and remained in contact since. Monroe had just turned 30 when they married; she never had a real family of her own and was eager to join the family of her new husband.
Monroe began to reconsider her career and the fact that trying to manage it made her feel helpless. She admitted to Miller, "I hate Hollywood. I don't want it any more. I want to live quietly in the country and just be there when you need me. I can't fight for myself any more."
Monroe converted to Judaism to "express her loyalty and get close to both Miller and his parents", writes biographer Jeffrey Meyers. She told her close friend, Susan Strasberg: "I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do, like me." Soon after Monroe converted, Egypt banned all of her movies.
Away from Hollywood and the culture of celebrity, Monroe's life became more normal; she began cooking, keeping house and giving Miller more attention and affection than he had been used to.
Later that year, Miller was subpoenaed by the HCUA, and Monroe accompanied him. In her personal notes, she wrote about her worries during this period:
Miller began work on writing the screenplay for The Misfits in 1960, directed by John Huston and starring Monroe but it was during the filming that Miller and Monroe's relationship hit difficulties, and he later said that the filming was one of the lowest points in his life. Monroe was taking drugs to help her sleep and more drugs to help her wake up, which caused her to arrive on the set late and then have trouble remembering her lines. Huston was unaware that Miller and Monroe were having problems in their private life. He recalled later, "I was impertinent enough to say to Arthur that to allow her to take drugs of any kind was criminal and utterly irresponsible. Shortly after that I realized that she wouldn't listen to Arthur at all; he had no say over her actions."
Shortly before the film's premiere in 1961, Miller and Monroe divorced after five years of marriage. Nineteen months later, on August 5, 1962, Monroe died of a likely drug overdose. Huston, who had also directed her in her first major role in The Asphalt Jungle in 1950, and who had seen her rise to stardom, put the blame for her death on her doctors as opposed to the stresses of being a star: "The girl was an addict of sleeping pills and she was made so by the God-damn doctors. It had nothing to do with the Hollywood set-up."
Miller married photographer Inge Morath in February 1962. She had worked as a photographer documenting the production of The Misfits. The first of their two children, Rebecca, was born September 15, 1962. Their son, Daniel, was born with Down syndrome in November 1966. Against his wife's wishes, Miller had him institutionalized, first at a home for infants in New York City, and then at the Southbury Training School in Connecticut. Though Morath visited Daniel often, Miller never visited him at the school and rarely spoke of him. Miller and Inge remained together until her death in 2002. Arthur Miller's son-in-law, actor Daniel Day-Lewis, is said to have visited Daniel frequently, and to have persuaded Arthur Miller to meet with him.
HUAC controversy and The Crucible
In 1952, Elia Kazan appeared before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Kazan named eight members of the Group Theatre, including Clifford Odets, Paula Strasberg, Lillian Hellman, J. Edward Bromberg, and John Garfield, who in recent years had been fellow members of the Communist Party. Miller and Kazan were close friends throughout the late 1940s and early 1950s, but after Kazan's testimony to the HUAC, the pair's friendship ended. After speaking with Kazan about his testimony, Miller traveled to Salem, Massachusetts, to research the witch trials of 1692. He and Kazan did not speak to each other for the next ten years. Kazan later defended his own actions through his film On the Waterfront, in which a dockworker heroically testifies against a corrupt union boss. Miller would retaliate to Kazan's work by writing A View from the Bridge, a play where a longshoreman outs his co-workers motivated only by jealousy and greed. He sent a copy of the initial script to Kazan and when the director asked in jest to direct the movie, Miller replied "I only sent you the script to let you know what I think of Stool-Pigeons."
In The Crucible, Miller likened the situation with the House Un-American Activities Committee to the witch hunt in Salem in 1692. The play opened at the Martin Beck Theatre on Broadway on January 22, 1953. Though widely considered only somewhat successful at the time of its release, today The Crucible is Miller's most frequently produced work throughout the world. It was adapted into an opera by Robert Ward in 1961.
The HUAC took an interest in Miller himself not long after The Crucible opened, denying him a passport to attend the play's London opening in 1954. When Miller applied in 1956 for a routine renewal of his passport, the House Un-American Activities Committee used this opportunity to subpoena him to appear before the committee. Before appearing, Miller asked the committee not to ask him to name names, to which the chairman, Francis E. Walter (D-PA) agreed. When Miller attended the hearing, to which Monroe accompanied him, risking her own career, he gave the committee a detailed account of his political activities. Reneging on the chairman's promise, the committee demanded the names of friends and colleagues who had participated in similar activities. Miller refused to comply, saying "I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him." As a result, a judge found Miller guilty of contempt of Congress in May 1957. Miller was sentenced to a fine and a prison sentence, blacklisted, and disallowed a US passport. In August 1958, his conviction was overturned by the court of appeals, which ruled that Miller had been misled by the chairman of the HUAC.
Miller's experience with the HUAC affected him throughout his life. In the late 1970s, he joined other celebrities (including William Styron and Mike Nichols) who were brought together by the journalist Joan Barthel. Barthel's coverage of the highly publicized Barbara Gibbons murder case helped raise bail for Gibbons' son Peter Reilly, who had been convicted of his mother's murder based on what many felt was a coerced confession and little other evidence. Barthel documented the case in her book A Death in Canaan, which was made as a television film of the same name and broadcast in 1978. City Confidential, an A&E Network series, produced an episode about the murder, postulating that part of the reason Miller took such an active interest (including supporting Reilly's defense and using his own celebrity to bring attention to Reilly's plight) was because he had felt similarly persecuted in his run-ins with the HUAC. He sympathized with Reilly, whom he firmly believed to be innocent and to have been railroaded by the Connecticut State Police and the Attorney General who had initially prosecuted the case.
Later career
In 1964, After the Fall was produced, and is said to be a deeply personal view of Miller's experiences during his marriage to Monroe. The play reunited Miller with his former friend Kazan: they collaborated on both the script and the direction. After the Fall opened on January 23, 1964, at the ANTA Theatre in Washington Square Park amid a flurry of publicity and outrage at putting a Monroe-like character, called Maggie, on stage. Robert Brustein, in a review in the New Republic, called After the Fall "a three and one half hour breach of taste, a confessional autobiography of embarrassing explicitness ... there is a misogynistic strain in the play which the author does not seem to recognize. ... He has created a shameless piece of tabloid gossip, an act of exhibitionism which makes us all voyeurs, ... a wretched piece of dramatic writing." That same year, Miller produced Incident at Vichy. In 1965, Miller was elected the first American president of PEN International, a position which he held for four years. A year later, Miller organized the 1966 PEN congress in New York City. Miller also wrote the penetrating family drama, The Price, produced in 1968. It was Miller's most successful play since Death of a Salesman.
In 1968, Miller attended the Democratic National Convention as a delegate for Eugene McCarthy. In 1969, Miller's works were banned in the Soviet Union after he campaigned for the freedom of dissident writers. Throughout the 1970s, Miller spent much of his time experimenting with the theatre, producing one-act plays such as Fame and The Reason Why, and traveling with his wife, producing In the Country and Chinese Encounters with her. Both his 1972 comedy The Creation of the World and Other Business and its musical adaptation, Up from Paradise, were critical and commercial failures.
Miller was an unusually articulate commentator on his own work. In 1978 he published a collection of his Theater Essays, edited by Robert A. Martin and with a foreword by Miller. Highlights of the collection included Miller's introduction to his Collected Plays, his reflections on the theory of tragedy, comments on the McCarthy Era, and pieces arguing for a publicly supported theater. Reviewing this collection in the Chicago Tribune, Studs Terkel remarked, "in reading [the Theater Essays]...you are exhilaratingly aware of a social critic, as well as a playwright, who knows what he's talking about."
In 1983, Miller traveled to China to produce and direct Death of a Salesman at the People's Art Theatre in Beijing. The play was a success in China and in 1984, Salesman in Beijing, a book about Miller's experiences in Beijing, was published. Around the same time, Death of a Salesman was made into a TV movie starring Dustin Hoffman as Willy Loman. Shown on CBS, it attracted 25 million viewers. In late 1987, Miller's autobiographical work,
Timebends, was published. Before it was published, it was well known that Miller would not talk about Monroe in interviews; in Timebends Miller talks about his experiences with Monroe in detail.
During the early-mid 1990s, Miller wrote three new plays: The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1992), and Broken Glass (1994). In 1996, a film of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Paul Scofield, Bruce Davison, and Winona Ryder opened. Miller spent much of 1996 working on the screenplay for the film.
Mr. Peters' Connections was staged Off-Broadway in 1998, and Death of a Salesman was revived on Broadway in 1999 to celebrate its fiftieth anniversary. The play, once again, was a large critical success, winning a Tony Award for best revival of a play.
In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts. Miller was honored with the PEN/Laura Pels Theater Award for a Master American Dramatist in 1998. In 2001 the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) selected Miller for the Jefferson Lecture, the U.S. federal government's highest honor for achievement in the humanities. Miller's lecture was entitled "On Politics and the Art of Acting." Miller's lecture analyzed political events (including the U.S. presidential election of 2000)
in terms of the "arts of performance", and it drew attacks from some conservatives such as Jay Nordlinger, who called it "a disgrace", and George Will, who argued that Miller was not legitimately a "scholar".
In 1999, Miller was awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, one of the richest prizes in the arts, given annually to "a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind's enjoyment and understanding of life." In 2001, Miller received the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. On May 1, 2002, Miller was awarded Spain's Principe de Asturias Prize for Literature as "the undisputed master of modern drama". Later that year, Ingeborg Morath died of lymphatic cancer at the age of 78. The following year Miller won the Jerusalem Prize.
In December 2004, 89-year-old Miller announced that he had been in love with 34-year-old minimalist painter Agnes Barley and had been living with her at his Connecticut farm since 2002, and that they intended to marry. Within hours of her father's death, Rebecca Miller ordered Barley to vacate the premises because she had consistently been opposed to the relationship. Miller's final play, Finishing the Picture, opened at the Goodman Theatre, Chicago, in the fall of 2004, with one character said to be based on Barley. It was reported to be based on his experience during the filming of The Misfits, though Miller insisted the play is a work of fiction with independent characters that were no more than composite shadows of history.
Death
Miller died on the evening of February 10, 2005 (the 56th anniversary of the Broadway debut of Death of a Salesman) at age 89 of bladder cancer and heart failure, at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. He had been in hospice care at his sister's apartment in New York since his release from hospital the previous month. He was surrounded by Barley, family and friends. His body was interred at Roxbury Center Cemetery in Roxbury.
Legacy
Miller's career as a writer spanned over seven decades, and at the time of his death, Miller was considered to be one of the greatest dramatists of the twentieth century. After his death, many respected actors, directors, and producers paid tribute to Miller, some calling him the last great practitioner of the American stage, and Broadway theatres darkened their lights in a show of respect.
Miller's alma mater, the University of Michigan, opened the Arthur Miller Theatre in March 2007. As per his express wish, it is the only theatre in the world that bears Miller's name.
Other notable arrangements for Miller's legacy are that his letters, notes, drafts and other papers are housed at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at The University of Texas at Austin.
Miller is also a member of the American Theater Hall of Fame. He was inducted in 1979.
In 1993, he received the Four Freedoms Award for Freedom of Speech.
In 2017, his daughter, Rebecca Miller, a writer and filmmaker, completed a documentary about her father's life, under the title Arthur Miller: Writer.
Minor planet 3769 Arthurmiller is named after him.
Foundation
The Arthur Miller Foundation was founded to honor the legacy of Miller and his New York City Public School Education. The mission of the foundation is: "Promoting increased access and equity to theater arts education in our schools and increasing the number of students receiving theater arts education as an integral part of their academic curriculum." Other initiatives include certification of new theater teachers and their placement in public schools; increasing the number of theater teachers in the system from the current estimate of 180 teachers in 1800 schools; supporting professional development of all certified theater teachers; providing teaching artists, cultural partners, physical spaces, and theater ticket allocations for students. The foundation's primary purpose is to provide arts education in the New York City school system. The current chancellor of the foundation is Carmen Farina, a large proponent of the Common Core State Standards Initiative. The Master Arts Council includes, among others, Alec Baldwin, Ellen Barkin, Bradley Cooper, Dustin Hoffman, Scarlett Johansson, Tony Kushner, Julianne Moore, Michael Moore, Liam Neeson, David O. Russell, and Liev Schreiber. His son-in-law Daniel Day-Lewis, serves on the current board of directors since 2016.
The foundation celebrated Miller's 100th birthday with a one-night-only performance of Miller's seminal works in November 2015.
The Arthur Miller Foundation currently supports a pilot program in theater and film at the public school Quest to Learn in partnership with the Institute of Play. The model is being used as an in-school elective theater class and lab. The objective is to create a sustainable theater education model to disseminate to teachers at professional development workshops.
Archive
Miller donated thirteen boxes of his earliest manuscripts to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 1961 and 1962. This collection included the original handwritten notebooks and early typed drafts for Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, and other works. In January, 2018, the Ransom Center announced the acquisition of the remainder of the Miller archive totaling over 200 boxes. The full archive opened in November, 2019.
Literary and public criticism
Christopher Bigsby wrote Arthur Miller: The Definitive Biography based on boxes of papers Miller made available to him before his death in 2005. The book was published in November 2008, and is reported to reveal unpublished works in which Miller "bitterly attack[ed] the injustices of American racism long before it was taken up by the civil rights movement".
In his book Trinity of Passion, author Alan M. Wald conjectures that Miller was "a member of a writer's unit of the Communist Party around 1946," using the pseudonym Matt Wayne, and editing a drama column in the magazine The New Masses.
In 1999 the writer Christopher Hitchens attacked Miller for comparing the Monica Lewinsky investigation to the Salem witch hunt. Miller had asserted a parallel between the examination of physical evidence on Lewinsky's dress and the examinations of women's bodies for signs of the "Devil's Marks" in Salem. Hitchens scathingly disputed the parallel. In his memoir, Hitch-22, Hitchens bitterly noted that Miller, despite his prominence as a left-wing intellectual, had failed to support author Salman Rushdie during the Iranian fatwa involving The Satanic Verses.
Works
Stage plays
No Villain (1936)
They Too Arise (1937, based on No Villain)
Honors at Dawn (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Grass Still Grows (1938, based on They Too Arise)
The Great Disobedience (1938)
Listen My Children (1939, with Norman Rosten)
The Golden Years (1940)
The Half-Bridge (1943)
The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944)
All My Sons (1947)
Death of a Salesman (1949)
An Enemy of the People (1950, based on Henrik Ibsen's play An Enemy of the People)
The Crucible (1953)
A View from the Bridge (1955)
A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
After the Fall (1964)
Incident at Vichy (1964)
The Price (1968)
The Reason Why (1970)
Fame (one-act, 1970; revised for television 1978)
The Creation of the World and Other Business (1972)
Up from Paradise (1974)
The Archbishop's Ceiling (1977)
The American Clock (1980)
Playing for Time (television play, 1980)
Elegy for a Lady (short play, 1982, first part of Two Way Mirror)
Some Kind of Love Story (short play, 1982, second part of Two Way Mirror)
I Think About You a Great Deal (1986)
Playing for Time (stage version, 1985)
I Can't Remember Anything (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
Clara (1987, collected in Danger: Memory!)
The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991)
The Last Yankee (1993)
Broken Glass (1994)
Mr. Peters' Connections (1998)
Resurrection Blues (2002)
Finishing the Picture (2004)
Radio plays
The Pussycat and the Expert Plumber Who Was a Man (1941)
Joel Chandler Harris (1941)
The Battle of the Ovens (1942)
Thunder from the Mountains (1942)
I Was Married in Bataan (1942)
That They May Win (1943)
Listen for the Sound of Wings (1943)
Bernardine (1944)
I Love You (1944)
Grandpa and the Statue (1944)
The Philippines Never Surrendered (1944)
The Guardsman (1944, based on Ferenc Molnár's play)
The Story of Gus (1947)
Screenplays
The Hook (1947)
All My Sons (1948)
Let's Make Love (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Death of a Salesman (1985)
Everybody Wins (1990)
The Crucible (1996)
Assorted fiction
Focus (novel, 1945)
"The Misfits" (short story, published in Esquire, October 1957)
I Don't Need You Anymore (short stories, 1967)
Homely Girl: A Life (short story, 1992, published in UK as "Plain Girl: A Life" 1995)
"The Performance" (short story)
Presence: Stories (2007) (short stories include The Bare Manuscript, Beavers, The Performance, and Bulldog)
Non-fiction
Situation Normal (1944) is based on his experiences researching the war correspondence of Ernie Pyle.
In Russia (1969), the first of three books created with his photographer wife Inge Morath, offers Miller's impressions of Russia and Russian society.
In the Country (1977), with photographs by Morath and text by Miller, provides insight into how Miller spent his time in Roxbury, Connecticut, and profiles of his various neighbors.
Chinese Encounters (1979) is a travel journal with photographs by Morath. It depicts the Chinese society in the state of flux which followed the end of the Cultural Revolution. Miller discusses the hardships of many writers, professors, and artists as they try to regain the sense of freedom and place they lost during Mao Zedong's regime.
Salesman in Beijing (1984) details Miller's experiences with the 1983 Beijing People's Theatre production of Death of a Salesman. He describes the idiosyncrasies, understandings, and insights encountered in directing a Chinese cast in a decidedly American play.
Timebends: A Life, Methuen London (1987) . Like Death of a Salesman, the book follows the structure of memory itself, each passage linked to and triggered by the one before.
Collections
Abbotson, Susan C. W. (ed.), Arthur Miller: Collected Essays, Penguin 2016
Centola, Steven R. ed. Echoes Down the Corridor: Arthur Miller, Collected Essays 1944–2000, Viking Penguin (US)/Methuen (UK), 2000
Kushner, Tony, ed. Arthur Miller, Collected Plays 1944–1961 (Library of America, 2006) .
Martin, Robert A. (ed.), "The theater essays of Arthur Miller", foreword by Arthur Miller. NY: Viking Press, 1978
References
Bibliography
Bigsby, Christopher (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller, Cambridge 1997
Gottfried, Martin, Arthur Miller, A Life, Da Capo Press (US)/Faber and Faber (UK), 2003
Koorey, Stefani, Arthur Miller's Life and Literature, Scarecrow, 2000
Moss, Leonard. Arthur Miller, Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1980.
Further reading
Critical Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (2007)
Student Companion to Arthur Miller, Susan C. W. Abbotson, Facts on File (2000)
File on Miller, Christopher Bigsby (1988)
Arthur Miller & Company, Christopher Bigsby, editor (1990)
Arthur Miller: A Critical Study, Christopher Bigsby (2005)
Remembering Arthur Miller, Christopher Bigsby, editor (2005)
Arthur Miller 1915–1962, Christopher Bigsby (2008, U.K.; 2009, U.S.)
The Cambridge Companion to Arthur Miller (Cambridge Companions to Literature), Christopher Bigsby, editor (1998, updated and republished 2010)
Arthur Miller 1962–2005, Christopher Bigsby (2011)
Arthur Miller: Critical Insights, Brenda Murphy, editor, Salem (2011)
Understanding Death of a Salesman, Brenda Murphy and Susan C. W. Abbotson, Greenwood (1999)
Critical articles
Arthur Miller Journal, published biannually by Penn State UP. Vol. 1.1 (2006)
Radavich, David. "Arthur Miller's Sojourn in the Heartland". American Drama 16:2 (Summer 2007): 28–45.
External links
Organizations
Arthur Miller official website
Arthur Miller Society
The Arthur Miller Foundation
Archive
Arthur Miller Papers at the Harry Ransom Center
"Playwright Arthur Miller's archive comes to the Harry Ransom Center"
Finding aid to Arthur Miller papers at Columbia University. Rare Book & Manuscript Library.
Databases
Websites
A Visit With Castro – Miller's article in The Nation, January 12, 2004
Joyce Carol Oates on Arthur Miller
Arthur Miller Biography
Arthur Miller and Mccarthyism
Interviews
Miller interview, Humanities, March–April 2001
Obituaries
The New York Times Obituary
NPR obituary
CNN obituary
1915 births
2005 deaths
University of Michigan alumni
Kennedy Center honorees
Laurence Olivier Award winners
Primetime Emmy Award winners
Pulitzer Prize for Drama winners
Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale
Tony Award winners
20th-century American dramatists and playwrights
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American novelists
20th-century American screenwriters
20th-century American short story writers
20th-century essayists
21st-century American dramatists and playwrights
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American screenwriters
21st-century American short story writers
21st-century essayists
Abraham Lincoln High School (Brooklyn) alumni
American agnostics
American anti-capitalists
American autobiographers
20th-century American Jews
American male dramatists and playwrights
American male essayists
American male non-fiction writers
American male novelists
American male screenwriters
American male short story writers
American memoirists
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American radio writers
Analysands of Rudolph Lowenstein
Cultural critics
Deaths from bladder cancer
Deaths from cancer in Connecticut
Free speech activists
Hopwood Award winners
Jerusalem Prize recipients
Jewish agnostics
Jewish American dramatists and playwrights
Jewish novelists
Jewish writers
Marilyn Monroe
The Michigan Daily alumni
PEN International
People from Brooklyn Heights
People from Gravesend, Brooklyn
People from Midwood, Brooklyn
People from Roxbury, Connecticut
Postmodern writers
Recipients of the Four Freedoms Award
American social commentators
Social critics
Special Tony Award recipients
Writers about activism and social change
Writers about communism
Writers from Brooklyn
Writers from Connecticut
21st-century American Jews | true | [
"Roger Lacey Stevens (March 12, 1910 – February 2, 1998) was an American theatrical producer, arts administrator, and real estate executive. He was the founding Chairman of both the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts (1961) and the National Endowment for the Arts (1965).\n\nBiography\nBorn in Detroit, Michigan, Stevens was educated at The Choate School (now Choate Rosemary Hall) in Wallingford, Connecticut. He was about to enter Harvard University but his father's financial difficulties ended his plan. He attended the University of Michigan for a year before dropping out. He then worked on a Ford assembly line and at a gas station during the Depression. \n\nIn 1934, he joined a Detroit real estate firm. By 1937, before he was 30, his real estate work had made him a small fortune of about $50,000. He led a syndicate (along with Ben Tobin and Alfred R. Glancy Jr.) that bought the Empire State Building in 1951 for $51 million, then a titanic sum; he more than doubled his investment when he sold his interest in the building three years later.\n\nIn 1953, together with Alfred R. Glancy Jr., Ben Tobin, and H. Adams Ashforth, he founded Unico Properties to develop a 10-acre University of Washington site in central Seattle.\n\nIn politics, he made a mark as chairman of the Democratic Party's finance committee in 1956.\n\nHe produced more than 100 plays and musicals over his career, including West Side Story, Bus Stop, and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. In 1971, he received Special Tony Award for his body of work. He became known for introducing plays by such adventurous writers as Harold Pinter, Arthur Kopit and Tom Stoppard.\n\nStevens was the General Administrator of the Actors Studio as well as one of the producers of the Playwrights Company, a member of the board of the American National Theatre and Academy (ANTA), and one of the members of a Broadway producing company he founded in 1953 with Robert Whitehead, and Robert Dowling. In 1961, he was asked by President John F. Kennedy to help establish a National Cultural Center, and became Chairman of Board of Trustees of what was eventually named the Kennedy Center from 1961 to 1988.\n\nIn 1965, he received an appointment from President Lyndon Johnson as first Chairman of the National Council on the Arts later named the National Endowment for the Arts.\n\nIn 1986, Stevens was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.\n\nOn January 13, 1988, Stevens was presented with the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Ronald Reagan. In 1988, he was also awarded the National Medal of Arts.\n\nPersonal life\n\nStevens was married to Christine Gesell Stevens, founder of the Animal Welfare Institute in 1951. He served as the organization's treasurer until his death in 1998. They had a daughter, Christabel. \n\nHe had his first heart attack in 1970. In 1993, he suffered strokes that left him partly paralyzed and deprived him of much of his speech.\n\nRoger Stevens died of pneumonia on February 2, 1998 at Georgetown University Medical Center in Washington, D.C. He was 87.\n\nStage productions\nBroken Glass (1994) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nThe Kentucky Cycle (1993) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nShe Loves Me (1993) Tony Award nominee, Best Revival of a Musical\nShadowlands (1990) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nDeath of a Salesman (1984) Tony Award winner, Best Reproduction\nOn Your Toes (1983) Tony Award winner, Best Reproduction (Play or Musical)\nBedroom Farce (1979) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nDeathtrap (1978) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nOld Times (1971) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nIndians (1969) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nHalf a Sixpence (1965) Tony Award nominee, Best Musical\nSlow Dance On the Killing Ground (1964) Tony Award nominee, Best Producer of a Play\nStrange Interlude (1963) Tony Award nominee, Best Producer of a Play\nA Man for All Seasons (1962) Tony Award winner, Best Play and Best Producer of a Play\nThe Caretaker (1961) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nThe Visit (1958) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nA Touch of the Poet (1958) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nWest Side Story (1957) (by arrangement) Tony Award nominee, Best Musical\nTime Remembered (1957) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nThe Rope Dancers (1957) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nSeparate Tables (1956) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nThe Waltz of the Toreadors (1956) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nBus Stop (1955) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\nCat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955) Tony Award nominee, Best Play\n\nReferences\n \n\n \nThe American Presidency Project\nLifetime Honors - National Medal of Arts\n\nExternal links\n\n \n \nThe Library of Congress exhibit\nPublic Leadership in the Arts Awards listing, 1998\n\n1910 births\n1998 deaths\nBusinesspeople from Detroit\nPeople from Wallingford, Connecticut\nAmerican theatre managers and producers\nKennedy Center honorees\nChoate Rosemary Hall alumni\nUniversity of Michigan alumni\n20th-century American businesspeople\nPresidential Medal of Freedom recipients\nSpecial Tony Award recipients",
"David Merrick (born David Lee Margoulis; November 27, 1911 – April 25, 2000) was a prolific Tony Award-winning American theatrical producer.\n\nLife and career\nBorn David Lee Margulois to Jewish parents in St. Louis, Missouri, Merrick graduated from Washington University, then studied law at the Jesuit-run Saint Louis University School of Law. In 1940 he left his legal career to become a successful theatrical producer.\n\nHis first seven productions were hits, starting with Clutterbuck in 1949, which he produced in partnership with Irving Jacobs, and he set a precedent in 1958 of having four productions on Broadway simultaneously; all hits: Look Back in Anger, Romanoff and Juliet, Jamaica and The Entertainer. He often was his own competition for the Tony Award, and he frequently won multiple nominations and/or wins in the same season.\n\nMerrick was known for his love of publicity stunts. In 1949, his comedy Clutterbuck was running out of steam, but along with discount tickets, he paged hotel bars and restaurants around Manhattan during cocktail hour for a \"fictive Mr. Clutterbuck\" as a way of generating name recognition for his production, and it helped his show keep alive for another few months. Another famous stunt promoted the poorly reviewed 1961 musical Subways Are For Sleeping. Merrick found seven New Yorkers who had the same names as the city's seven leading theater critics: Howard Taubman, Walter Kerr, John Chapman, John McClain, Richard Watts, Jr., Norman Nadel, and Robert Coleman. Merrick invited the seven namesakes to the musical and secured their permission to use their names and pictures in an advertisement alongside quotes such as \"One of the few great musical comedies of the last thirty years\" and \"A fabulous musical. I love it.\" Merrick then prepared a newspaper ad featuring the namesakes' rave reviews under the heading 7 Out of 7 Are Ecstatically Unanimous About Subways Are For Sleeping. Only one newspaper, the New York Herald Tribune, published the ad, and only in one edition; however, the publicity that the ad garnered helped the musical remain open for 205 performances (almost six months). Merrick later revealed that he had conceived the ad several years previously, but had not been able to execute it until Brooks Atkinson retired as The New York Times theater critic in 1960 since he could not find anyone with the same name. Merrick joined The Lambs in 1950.\n\nMerrick joined the board of directors of the Riviera, a hotel and casino on the Las Vegas Strip in Las Vegas, Nevada, alongside Harvey Silbert and Harry A. Goodman in 1968. He also worked with director and choreographer Gower Champion, who directed Merrick's production of 42nd Street. But on the morning of August 25, 1980, Champion died of a rare blood cancer, and Merrick announced the news himself to both the cast and the audience at the opening night curtain call.\n\nMerrick suffered a stroke in 1983, after which he spent most of his time in a wheelchair. He established the David Merrick Arts Foundation in 1998 to support the development of American musicals.\n\nPersonal life \nMerrick was married six times, to Lenore Beck, Jeanne Gibson, Etan Aronson (twice), Karen Prunczik, and Natalie Lloyd. He was married to Lloyd at the time of his death on April 25, 2000, in London; all of his previous marriages had ended in divorce. He had two daughters according to Peter Filichia, writing in the Newark Star-Ledger on April 27, two days after Merrick's death.\n\nHonours \nIn 1965, Merrick received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement.\n\nIn 2001, Merrick was inducted into the St. Louis Walk of Fame.\n\nBiography \nAn unauthorized biography by Howard Kissel is titled David Merrick: The Abominable Showman ().\n\nCultural references\nIn \"What Does A Naked Lady Say to You?\", a first-season episode of The Odd Couple, the director of the nude off-Broadway play Bathtub (itself based on Oh! Calcutta!) complains after police officer Murray Greschler (Al Molinaro) busts the production for indecency, \"Murray, you wouldn't do this to me if I was David Merrick!\"\n\nIn \"We Closed in Minneapolis,\" a first-season episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Mary's character comments to the mailroom guy upon seeing his delivery to Murray's desk of what she assumes to be a rejection letter, \"Oh, poor Murray. He's been writing this play for three years. You'd think Broadway producers would be sensitive enough to do more than just stick mimeographed rejection slips in when they send it back. You know, something like a nice, handwritten note saying, \"Good work, Murray. Nice try. Love, David Merrick.\"\n\nQuotes\n \"It's not enough that I should succeed, others should fail.\" (This statement has also been attributed to François de La Rochefoucauld, Gore Vidal, and Genghis Khan.)\n\nAwards and nominations\n\n 1986 Tony Award for Best Reproduction (Loot, nominee)\n 1986 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Revival (Loot, nominee)\n 1981 Tony Award for Best Musical (42nd Street, winner)\n 1981 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Musical (42nd Street, nominee)\n 1976 Tony Award for Best Play (Travesties, winner)\n 1976 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Revival (Very Good Eddie, nominee)\n 1975 Tony Award for Best Musical (Mack & Mabel, nominee)\n 1973 Tony Award for Best Musical (Sugar, nominee)\n 1972 Tony Award for Best Play (Vivat! Vivat Regina!, nominee)\n 1971 Tony Award for Best Play (The Philanthropist, nominee)\n 1970 Tony Award for Best Play (Child's Play, nominee)\n 1969 Tony Award for Best Musical (Promises, Promises, nominee)\n 1968 Tony Award for Best Musical (How Now, Dow Jones, nominee)\n 1968 Tony Award for Best Musical (The Happy Time, nominee)\n 1968 Tony Award for Best Play (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, winner)\n 1968 Tony Award for Best Producer of a Play (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, winner)\n 1968 Special Tony Award (winner)\n 1967 Tony Award for Best Musical (I Do! I Do!, nominee)\n 1966 Tony Award for Best Play (Marat/Sade, winner)\n 1966 Tony Award for Best Play (Philadelphia, Here I Come!, nominee)\n 1966 Tony Award for Best Play (Inadmissible Evidence, nominee)\n 1965 Tony Award for Best Musical (Oh, What a Lovely War!, nominee)\n 1965 Tony Award for Best Producer of a Musical (The Roar of the Greasepaint – The Smell of the Crowd, nominee)\n 1964 Tony Award for Best Musical (Hello, Dolly!, winner)\n 1964 Tony Award for Best Play (Luther, winner)\n 1964 Tony Award for Best Producer (Musical) (Hello, Dolly!, winner)\n 1963 Tony Award for Best Musical (Stop the World – I Want to Get Off, nominee)\n 1963 Tony Award for Best Musical (Oliver!, nominee)\n 1963 Tony Award for Best Producer of a Musical (Oliver!, nominee)\n 1962 Tony Award for Best Musical (Carnival, nominee)\n 1962 Tony Award for Best Producer of a Musical (Carnival, nominee)\n 1962 Tony Award for Best Producer of a Play (Ross, nominee)\n 1961 Tony Award for Best Musical (Irma La Douce, nominee)\n 1961 Tony Award for Best Musical (Do Re Mi, nominee)\n 1961 Tony Award for Best Play (Becket, winner)\n 1961 Special Tony Award (winner)\n 1960 Tony Award for Best Musical (Take Me Along, nominee)\n 1959 Tony Award for Best Musical (La Plume de Ma Tante, nominee)\n 1959 Tony Award for Best Play (Epitaph for George Dillon, nominee)\n 1958 Tony Award for Best Musical (Jamaica, nominee)\n 1958 Tony Award for Best Play (Look Back in Anger, nominee)\n 1958 Tony Award for Best Play (Romanoff and Juliet, nominee)\n\nAdditional notable stage productions\n\n Clutterbuck (1949)\n Fanny (1954)\n The Matchmaker (1955)\n Look Back in Anger (1957)\n Romanoff and Juliet (1957)\n Jamaica (1957)\n The Entertainer (1958)\n The World of Suzie Wong (1958)\n La Plume de Ma Tante (1958)\n Destry Rides Again (1959)\n Gypsy (1959)\n Take Me Along (1959)\n Irma La Douce (1960)\n A Taste of Honey (1960)\n Becket (1960)\n Do Re Mi (1960)\n Carnival! (1961)\n Subways Are For Sleeping (1961)\n I Can Get It for You Wholesale (1962)\n Stop the World – I Want to Get Off (1962)\n Oliver! (1963)\n Luther (1963)\n 110 in the Shade (1963)\n One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1963)\n The Milk Train Doesn't Stop Here Anymore (1964)\n Hello, Dolly! (1964)\n Foxy (1964)\n Oh! What a Lovely War (1964)\n The Roar of the Greasepaint – The Smell of the Crowd (1965)\n Pickwick (1965)\n Cactus Flower (1965)\n Marat/Sade (1965)\n Don't Drink the Water (1966)\n I Do! I Do! (1966)\n Breakfast at Tiffany's (1966)\n Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead (1967)\n How Now, Dow Jones (1967)\n The Seven Descents of Myrtle (1968)\n The Happy Time (1968)\n Promises, Promises (1968)\n Forty Carats (1968)\n Play It Again, Sam (1969)\n Private Lives (1969)\n Mack and Mabel (1974)\n Very Good Eddie (1975)\n State Fair (1996)\n\n Film productions \n\nMerrick produced four films:\n\n Child's Play (1972)\n The Great Gatsby (1974)\n Semi-Tough (1977)\n Rough Cut'' (1980)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n The New York Times obituary\n \n \nDavid Merrick Paper s at the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research\n St. Louis Walk of Fame\n \n\n1911 births\n2000 deaths\n20th-century American Jews\nAmerican theatre directors\nAmerican theatre managers and producers\nAmerican entertainment industry businesspeople\nBroadway theatre producers\nBusinesspeople from St. Louis\nMissouri Democrats\nNew York (state) Democrats\nTony Award winners\nWashington University in St. Louis alumni\nSaint Louis University School of Law alumni\n20th-century American businesspeople\nAmerican casino industry businesspeople\nAmerican corporate directors\nSpecial Tony Award recipients"
] |
[
"Nobuo Uematsu",
"Freelancer (2004-present)"
] | C_59b891ce14894c439acb4b0e4e20610e_0 | What did Uematsu do as a freelancer/ | 1 | What did Nobuo Uematsu do as a freelancer? | Nobuo Uematsu | Uematsu left Square Enix in 2004 and formed his own production company, Smile Please. He later founded the music production company and record label Dog Ear Records in 2006. The reason for Uematsu's departure was that the company moved their office from Meguro to Shinjuku, Tokyo, and he was not comfortable with the new location. Also, he cites the fact that he had reached an age where he should gradually take his life into his own hands. He does, however, continue to compose music as a freelancer for Square Enix. In 2005, Uematsu and several members of The Black Mages created the score for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII (2006); he was originally offered the job of creating the full score, but Sakimoto was eventually assigned as the main composer instead. Uematsu was also initially going to create the theme song for Final Fantasy XIII (2010). However, after being assigned the task of creating the entire score of Final Fantasy XIV, Uematsu decided to hand the job over to the main Final Fantasy XIII composer, Hamauzu. Uematsu also works closely with Sakaguchi's development studio Mistwalker, and has composed for Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008); The Last Story (2011); and Terra Battle (2014). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. Uematsu created the main theme for the multi-composer game Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008. He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. Uematsu recently contributed music and storyline to an e-book titled called "Blik-0 1946". He is currently working on soundtracks for multiple games, including Project Phoenix. Uematsu appeared five times in the top 20 of the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame. In 2012, "Aerith's Theme", written by Uematsu for Final Fantasy VII, was voted into the number 16 position in the annual Classic FM (UK) "Hall of Fame" top 300 chart. It was the first time that a piece of music written for a video game had appeared in the chart. In 2013, music from the Final Fantasy series received even greater support and was voted into the third position on the Classic FM Hall of Fame. Uematsu and his Final Fantasy music subsequently appeared at number seven in 2014, number nine in 2015, and number 17 in 2016. CANNOTANSWER | created the score | is a Japanese composer and keyboardist best known for his contributions to the Final Fantasy video game series by Square Enix. A self-taught musician, he began playing the piano at the age of twelve, with English singer-songwriter Elton John as one of his biggest influences. Uematsu joined Square in 1986, where he first met Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. The two later worked together on many games at the company, most notably in the Final Fantasy series. After nearly two decades with Square, Uematsu left in 2004 to create his own production company and music label, Dog Ear Records. He has since composed music as a freelancer for other games, including ones developed by Square Enix and Sakaguchi's development studio, Mistwalker.
Many soundtracks and arranged albums of Uematsu's game scores have been released. Pieces from his video game works have been performed in various Final Fantasy concerts, where he has worked with Grammy Award–winning conductor Arnie Roth on several of these performances. In the 2000s, he was the keyboardist in the hard rock band The Black Mages, along with Square Enix colleagues Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito. The band played various arranged rock versions of Uematsu's Final Fantasy compositions. He has since performed with Earthbound Papas, which he formed as the successor to The Black Mages in 2011. He is sometimes referred to as the Beethoven of video game music and has made several appearances in the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame.
Biography
Early life
Uematsu was born in Kōchi, Kōchi Prefecture, Japan. A self-taught musician, he began to play the piano when he was between the ages of eleven and twelve years old, and he did not take any formal piano lessons. He has an older sister who also played the piano. After graduating from Kanagawa University with a degree in English, Uematsu played the keyboard in several amateur bands and composed music for television commercials. When Uematsu was working at a music rental shop in Tokyo, a Square employee asked if he would be interested in creating music for some of the titles they were working on. Although he agreed, Uematsu at the time considered it a side job, and he did not think it would become a full-time career. He said it was a way to make some money on the side, while also keeping his part-time job at the music rental shop.
Square (1985–2004)
Uematsu joined Square in 1985, and composed his soundtrack with Cruise Chaser Blassty in 1986. Shortly after, he met Hironobu Sakaguchi, who asked him if he wanted to create music for some of his games, to which Uematsu agreed. For the next year, he created music for a number of games which did not achieve widespread success, such as King's Knight, 3-D WorldRunner, and Rad Racer. In 1987, Uematsu and Sakaguchi collaborated on what was originally to be Sakaguchi's last contribution for Square, Final Fantasy. Final Fantasy popularity sparked Uematsu's career in video game music, and he would go on to compose music for over 30 titles, most prominently the subsequent games in the Final Fantasy series. He scored the first installment in the SaGa series, The Final Fantasy Legend, in 1989. For the second game in the series, Final Fantasy Legend II he was assisted by Kenji Ito. In late 1994, Uematsu was asked to finish the soundtrack for Chrono Trigger after Yasunori Mitsuda contracted peptic ulcers. In 1996, he co-composed the soundtrack to Front Mission: Gun Hazard, and created the entire score for DynamiTracer. He also created music for three of the games in the Hanjuku Hero series.
Outside of video games, he has composed the main theme for the 2000 animated film Ah! My Goddess: The Movie and co-composed the anime Final Fantasy: Unlimited (2001) with Final Fantasy orchestrator Shirō Hamaguchi. He also inspired the Ten Plants concept albums, and released a solo album in 1994, titled Phantasmagoria. Feeling gradually more dissatisfied and uninspired, Uematsu requested the assistance of composers Masashi Hamauzu and Junya Nakano for the score to Final Fantasy X in 2001. This marked the first time that Uematsu did not compose an entire main-series Final Fantasy soundtrack. For Final Fantasy XI from 2002, he was joined by Naoshi Mizuta, who composed the majority of the soundtrack, and Kumi Tanioka; Uematsu was responsible for only eleven tracks. In 2002, fellow Square colleagues Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito asked Uematsu to join them in forming a rock band that focused on reinterpreting and expanding on Uematsu's compositions. He declined their offer at first because he was too busy with work; however, after agreeing to perform with Fukui and Sekito in a live performance as a keyboardist, he decided to join them in making a band. Another employee at Square, Mr. Matsushita, chose the name The Black Mages for their band. In 2003, Keiji Kawamori, Arata Hanyuda, and Michio Okamiya also joined the band. The Black Mages released three studio albums and performed at several concerts.
Freelancer (2004–present)
Uematsu left Square Enix in 2004 and formed his own production company, Smile Please. He later founded the music production company and record label Dog Ear Records in 2006. The reason for Uematsu's departure was that the company moved their office from Meguro to Shinjuku, Tokyo and he was not comfortable with the new location. He also stated that he had reached an age where he should gradually take his life into his own hands. He does, however, continue to compose music as a freelancer for Square Enix. In 2005, Uematsu and several members of The Black Mages created the score for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII (2006); he was originally offered the job of creating the full score, but Hitoshi Sakimoto was eventually assigned as the main composer instead. Uematsu was also initially going to create the theme song for Final Fantasy XIII (2010). However, after being assigned the task of creating the entire score of Final Fantasy XIV, Uematsu decided to hand the job over to Hamauzu.
Uematsu also works closely with Sakaguchi's development studio Mistwalker, and has composed for Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008); The Last Story (2011); and Terra Battle (2014). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. Uematsu created the main theme for Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008. He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. Uematsu has contributed music and story to e-books, such as "Blik-0 1946".
Uematsu appeared five times in the top 20 of the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame. In 2012, "Aerith's Theme", written by Uematsu for Final Fantasy VII, was voted into the number 16 position in the annual Classic FM (UK) "Hall of Fame" top 300 chart. It was the first time that a piece of music written for a video game had appeared in the chart. In 2013, music from the Final Fantasy series received even greater support and was voted into the third position on the Classic FM Hall of Fame. Uematsu and his Final Fantasy music subsequently appeared at number seven in 2014, number nine in 2015, and number 17 in 2016.
In September 2018, Uematsu announced that he would take the remainder of the year off from touring and postponed his projects in order to recover from an unspecified illness. Uematsu returned to compose the main theme for Final Fantasy VII Remake in 2020. Sakaguchi said that Uematsu's work on 2021's Fantasian could be his last major game score due to health issues.
Personal life
Uematsu currently resides in Tokyo, Japan with his wife, Reiko, whom he met during college, and their beagle, Pao. They have a summer cabin in Yamanakako, Yamanashi. In his spare time, he enjoys watching professional wrestling, drinking beer, and bicycling. Uematsu has said he originally wanted to become a professional wrestler, mentioning it was a career dream when he was younger.
Concerts
Uematsu's video game compositions have been performed in numerous concerts, and various Final Fantasy concerts have also been held. Outside Japan, Uematsu's Final Fantasy music was performed live for the first time at the first event of the 2003 Symphonic Game Music Concert in Leipzig, Germany. Other events of the Symphonic Game Music Concerts featuring Final Fantasy music were held in 2004, 2006, and 2007. The concert in 2004 featured a world premiere of Those Who Fight from Final Fantasy VII. Japanese pianist Seiji Honda was invited to perform the arrangement together with the orchestra. Another world premiere was "Dancing Mad" from Final Fantasy VI, performed by orchestra, choir, and pipe organ. The event in 2007 included "Distant Worlds" from Final Fantasy XI, performed by Japanese opera soprano Izumi Masuda.
A series of successful concert performances were held in Japan, including a Final Fantasy concert series titled Tour de Japon. The first stateside concert, Dear Friends – Music from Final Fantasy, took place on May 10, 2004, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California, and was performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra and the Los Angeles Master Chorale. It was conducted by Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra director Miguel Harth-Bedoya. Due to a positive reception, a concert series for North America followed. On May 16, 2005, a follow-up concert called More Friends: Music from Final Fantasy was performed in Los Angeles at the Gibson Amphitheatre; the concert was conducted by Grammy Award-winning Arnie Roth.
Uematsu also made a guest appearance at A Night in Fantasia 2004 performed by the Eminence Symphony Orchestra's debut concert in October 2004 which coincided with his last day employed at Square Enix.
Uematsu's Final Fantasy music was presented in the concert Voices – Music from Final Fantasy, which took place on February 18, 2006 at the Pacifico Yokohama convention center. Star guests included Emiko Shiratori, Rikki, Izumi Masuda, and Angela Aki. The concert focused on the songs from the Final Fantasy series and was conducted by Arnie Roth. Uematsu and several of his fellow composers were in attendance at the world premiere of Play! A Video Game Symphony in Chicago on May 27, 2006; he composed the opening fanfare for the concert. He also attended the European debut in Stockholm, Sweden on June 14, 2006, the performance in Toronto on September 30, 2006, and in Florence, Italy, on October 10, 2007. The world tour Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy was held in Stockholm, and was performed by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by Arnie Roth on December 4, 2007. The second concert of the tour was held at the Rosemont Theatre near Chicago on March 1, 2008. The tour has continued, with a recent concert in Houston on July 24, 2010.
Music from Final Fantasy made up one fourth of the music in the Symphonic Fantasies concerts in Cologne in September 2009 which were produced by the creators of the Symphonic Game Music Concert series and conducted by Arnie Roth.
In February 2010, it was announced that Uematsu would appear at Anime Boston, one of the largest anime conventions on the East Coast. Uematsu did not only show up at Anime Boston, he made a surprise appearance and played with the Video Game Orchestra for the track "One Winged Angel". On top of this, he made a short visit to the prestigious Berklee College of Music for a brief Q & A session at the request of VGO founder and Berklee alumni Shota Nakama. In January 2012, Uematsu performed with his band Earthbound Papas at MAGFest X in National Harbor, MD. On November 24, 2012, Uematsu performed in a Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concert with Arnie Roth conducting the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Adelaide Philharmonia Chorus and soloists at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre. On June 14 and 15, 2013, Uematsu performed in a Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concert with Arnie Roth conducting the Vienna Volksoper Orchestra and Vienna Chamber Chorus at Konzerthaus, Vienna.
On August 18, 2013, while headlining the Fantasy Rock Festival in Kawasaki, Japan with the Earthbound Papas, he revealed to the audience that he had originally intended to name their second album "Dancing Mad" after the Final Fantasy VI track which also appears on the album. However, referring to Square Enix indirectly, he told the audience that "a certain company 'S'" had phoned and informed him that he "could not use the name". Consequently, instead of backing down he decided to name the album "Dancing Dad", as a nod to the band's name. He also told the audience that he wanted to make an album of wholly original songs, but lamented that "it's just that if there are no game songs on it, it probably wouldn't sell!"
Musical style and influences
The style of Uematsu's compositions is diverse, ranging from stately classical symphonic pieces and heavy metal to new-age and hyper-percussive techno-electronica. For example, in Lost Odyssey, the score ranges from classical orchestral arrangements to contemporary jazz and techno tracks. Uematsu has stated that he is a big fan of Celtic and Irish music, and some of his work contains elements from these musical styles. Uematsu's Final Fantasy scores vary from upbeat, to dark and angry, to melancholic in nature. For instance, the music of Final Fantasy VIII is dark and gloomy, while the soundtrack to Final Fantasy IX is more carefree and upbeat. His Final Fantasy music has been described as being able to convey the true emotion of a scene; an example is "Aerith's Theme" from Final Fantasy VII. In an interview with the Nichi Bei Times, Uematsu said "I don't really self-consciously compose music for Japan or for the world, but I do think there is something in my more melancholy pieces that has a distinctly Japanese quality." He has been named one of the "Innovators" in Time "Time 100: The Next Wave — Music" feature. He has also been called the "John Williams of the video game world" and been credited for "increasing the appreciation and awareness" of video game music.
Many of Uematsu's musical influences come from the United Kingdom and the United States. He cites Elton John as his biggest musical influence, and he has stated that he wanted to be like him. Other major inspirations include The Beatles, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Simon & Garfunkel, and progressive rock bands. In the classical genre, he cites Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky as a great influence. Uematsu has said that 1970s bands, such as Pink Floyd and King Crimson, influenced his Final Fantasy compositions. The intro to the piece "One-Winged Angel" from Final Fantasy VII was inspired by the Jimi Hendrix song "Purple Haze"; the lyrics were taken from the medieval poetry on which Carl Orff based his cantata Carmina Burana, specifically the songs "Estuans Interius", "O Fortuna", "Veni, Veni, Venias" and "Ave Formosissima". In turn, Nobuo Uematsu has had a major influence on video game music and beyond the video game industry as well. For example, "Liberi Fatali" from Final Fantasy VIII was played during the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens during the women's synchronized swimming event. From the same game, "Eyes on Me", featuring Chinese pop singer Faye Wong, sold a record 400,000 copies and was the first song from a video game to win an award at the Japan Gold Disc Awards, where it won "Song of the Year (International)" in 2000. In a 2010 interview, Uematsu said that he gets more inspiration from walking his dog than from listening to other music.
Works
All works listed below were solely composed by Uematsu unless otherwise noted.
References
External links
1959 births
Anime composers
Freelance musicians
Japanese composers
Japanese film score composers
Japanese male composers
Japanese male film score composers
Japanese rock keyboardists
Kanagawa University alumni
Living people
Musicians from Kōchi Prefecture
People from Kōchi, Kōchi
Progressive rock keyboardists
Progressive rock musicians
Square Enix people
Symphonic rock musicians
Video game composers | true | [
"is a Japanese retired professional wrestler, better known by the ring name . Best known as a tag team wrestler, Yu-Yu held the JWP Tag Team Championship a record seven times, the Daily Sports Women's Tag Team Championship three times, the AAAW Tag Team Championship and the Oz Academy Tag Team Championship twice each and the International Ribbon Tag Team Championship and Wave Tag Team Championship once each, but also excelled in singles competition, most notably winning the JWP and Oz Academy Openweight Championships. She finished her 18-year career on December 9, 2012.\n\nProfessional wrestling career\nMiyaguchi started her professional wrestling career in 1994, working under her real name in JWP Joshi Puroresu. She made her debut on December 4, 1994, in a match against Rieko Amano. Originally working as a \"junior\" wrestler in not only JWP, but also All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling (AJW) and Gaea Japan, Miyaguchi went on to win the Junior Championships in both JWP and AJW. After the end of her junior days, Miyaguchi adopted the new ring name Ran Yu-Yu, which she held for the rest of her career. Under her new ring name, Yu-Yu went on to win the JWP Openweight Championship in 1999. She remained affiliated with JWP until October 2002, when she officially joined Gaea Japan full-time.\n\nIn Gaea Japan, Yu-Yu formed the highly successful Uematsu☆Ran tag team with Toshie Uematsu. The two remained together for ten years, winning Gaea Japan's AAAW Tag Team Championship twice, JWP's Daily Sports Women's Tag Team Championship twice, the JWP Tag Team Championship four times, and the Wave Tag Team Championship once, while also winning JWP's Tag League the Best tournament in 2012. On April 30, 2012, Yu-Yu and Uematsu defeated Moeka Haruhi and Shuu Shibutani in Uematsu's retirement match.\n\nFollowing the folding of Gaea Japan in 2005, Yu-Yu began working as a freelancer though effectively making Oz Academy her new home promotion. In Oz Academy, Yu-Yu became a two-time Tag Team Champion with Akino, with the two representing Aja Kong's Jungle Jack 21 stable. On April 29, 2011, Yu-Yu defeated Kong to win the Oz Academy Openweight Championship. After a three-month reign, she lost the title to Dynamite Kansai. Shortly after her longtime tag team partner Toshie Uematsu had announced her retirement, Yu-Yu followed suit and announced that she would retire before the end of 2012. On November 11, Oz Academy founder Mayumi Ozaki was announced as Yu-Yu's opponent for her retirement match on December 9. Having quit Jungle Jack 21 and joined the villainous Seikigun stable on September 23, 2011, in order to get another shot at the Oz Academy Openweight Championship, Yu-Yu reunited with her old stablemates for her final self-produced event, titled Starlight's Regret, on December 2, 2012, which saw Yu-Yu, Aja Kong, Akino, Hiroyo Matsumoto and Tomoka Nakagawa defeat Carlos Amano, Chikayo Nagashima, Meiko Satomura, Sonoko Kato and Tsubasa Kuragaki in a ten-woman tag team match that lasted over an hour. On December 6, Yu-Yu wrestled her final matches for her original home promotion, JWP. First she wrestled Arisa Nakajima to a fifteen-minute time limit draw and then won a twelve-woman main event battle royal, where all participants were dressed as her, scoring the last elimination over Kazuki. On December 9, Yu-Yu was defeated by Ozaki in her advertised retirement match, following interference from Ozaki's Seikigun stable. However, immediately afterwards, Yu-Yu teamed with Carlos Amano to defeat Ozaki and Dynamite Kansai, pinning Ozaki for the win in the final match of her career.\n\nChampionships and accomplishments\nAll Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling\nAJW Junior Championship (1 time)\nGaea Japan\nAAAW Tag Team Championship (2 times) – with Toshie Uematsu\nIce Ribbon\nInternational Ribbon Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Azumi Hyuga\nJWP Joshi Puroresu\nDaily Sports Women's Tag Team Championship (3 times) – with Toshie Uematsu (2), and Azumi Hyuga (1)\nJWP Junior Championship (1 time)\nJWP Openweight Championship (1 time)\nJWP Tag Team Championship (7 times) – with Misae Genki (1), Azumi Hyuga (2), and Toshie Uematsu (4)\nJWP Tag League the Best (2012) – with Toshie Uematsu\nBest Bout Award (2002) vs. Azumi Hyuga, May 19\nSpecial Award (2001)\nM's Style\nOne Day Tag Tournament (2005) – with Toshie Uematsu\nNikkan Sports\nJoshi Tag Team Award (2006, 2008)\nOz Academy\nOz Academy Openweight Championship (1 time)\nOz Academy Tag Team Championship (2 times) – with Akino\nBest Singles Match Award (2012) vs. Aja Kong on October 14\nSpecial Award (2012)\nPro Wrestling Wave\nWave Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Toshie Uematsu\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nOz Academy profile \n\n1975 births\nLiving people\nJapanese female professional wrestlers\nSportspeople from Osaka Prefecture\nPeople from Sennan, Osaka",
"is a female Japanese retired professional wrestler best known for her popularity in the 1990s and 2000s. She was one of the members of the first class of wrestlers trained by Chigusa Nagayo when Nagayo formed the GAEA Japan promotion. Uematsu finished her career in 2012, working for the Pro Wrestling Wave promotion. After her retirement, Uematsu continued working as a trainer for Pro Wrestling Wave.\n\nCareer\nToshie Uematsu debuted at the age of 21 on April 15, 1995 at Memorial First Gong, the first show of the GAEA Japan joshi puroresu promotion. In 1997, several GAEA wrestlers, including Uematsu, appeared in World Championship Wrestling (WCW). Uematsu was entered in the inaugural tournament for the newly created women's cruiserweight title. She won the tournament, defeating Malia Hosaka on April 7, 1997 in Hunstville, Alabama to become the first holder of the WCW Women's Cruiserweight Championship. Uematsu lost the belt to Yoshiko Tamura on July 19, 1997 and the belt was abandoned soon afterwards. On February 17, 2004, Uematsu and her partner, Ran Yu-Yu won the AAAW Tag Team Championship for the first time when they beat Chikayo Nagashima and Meiko Satomura by countout (in Japan, a title can change hands on a countout). Uematsu and Yu-Yu were a cunning combo, winning most of their matches by countout after luring their opponents as far away from the ring as they could. They won the belts for the second time on April 3, 2005, defeating Manami Toyota and Carlos Amano. The championship was retired one week later when the GAEA promotion closed; Uematsu and Yu-Yu lost to Sugar Sato and Chikayo Nagashima in a non-title match on the final card. Uematsu has stayed busy since, wrestling as a free-lancer for several joshi promotions. Uematsu returned to the United States on March 12, 2011, when she defeated Madison Eagles at an event promoted by the Chikara promotion. The following day she was defeated by Sara Del Rey at another Chikara event. Uematsu returned to Chikara on December 2, 2011, to take part in the special JoshiMania weekend, losing to Manami Toyota on night one. The following day, Uematsu teamed with GAMI to defeat Cherry and Sawako Shimono in a tag team match. On the third and final night of the tour, Uematsu teamed with The Batiri (Kobald, Kodama and Obariyon) to defeat Cherry and The Colony (Fire Ant, Green Ant and Soldier Ant) in an eight-person tag team match. On April 30, 2012, Uematsu wrestled her retirement match at a Pro Wrestling Wave event, where she and Ran Yu-Yu defeated Moeka Haruhi and Shuu Shibutani in a tag team match. Uematsu made a one-night return to the ring on December 30, 2013, taking part in Gami's retirement match, a 70-person battle royal. Uematsu made another return on March 22, 2014, when she took part in Kaoru's return match at an event produced by Chigusa Nagayo.\n\nChampionships and accomplishments\nDramatic Dream Team\nIronman Heavymetalweight Championship (4 times)\n\nGAEA Japan\nAAAW Tag Team Championship (2 times) - with Ran Yu-Yu\n\nJWP Joshi Puroresu\nDaily Sports Women's Tag Team Championship (3 time) - with Ran Yu-Yu (2) and Kazuki (1)\nJWP Tag Team Championship (5 times) - with Ran Yu-Yu (4) and Kazuki (1)\nJWP Tag League the Best (2012) - with Ran Yu-Yu\n\nM's Style\nOne Day Tag Tournament (2005) – with Ran Yu-Yu\n\nNikkan Sports\nJoshi Tag Team Award (2006, 2008) with Ran Yu-Yu\nJoshi Technique Award (2005, 2006, 2008)\nPro Wrestling Wave\nWave Tag Team Championship (1 time) - with Ran Yu-Yu\n\nWorld Championship Wrestling\nWCW Women's Cruiserweight Championship (1 time)\nWCW Women's Cruiserweight Championship Tournament (1997)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nToshie Uematsu's blog (in Japanese)\nPro Wrestling Wave profile\nJames Phillips' Toshie Uematsu page (not updated since 2003)\n\nJapanese female professional wrestlers\n1974 births\nLiving people\nPeople from Fujinomiya, Shizuoka\nSportspeople from Shizuoka Prefecture\nProfessional wrestling trainers"
] |
[
"Nobuo Uematsu",
"Freelancer (2004-present)",
"What did Uematsu do as a freelancer/",
"created the score"
] | C_59b891ce14894c439acb4b0e4e20610e_0 | How is this significant? | 2 | How is Nobuo Uematsu creating a score significant? | Nobuo Uematsu | Uematsu left Square Enix in 2004 and formed his own production company, Smile Please. He later founded the music production company and record label Dog Ear Records in 2006. The reason for Uematsu's departure was that the company moved their office from Meguro to Shinjuku, Tokyo, and he was not comfortable with the new location. Also, he cites the fact that he had reached an age where he should gradually take his life into his own hands. He does, however, continue to compose music as a freelancer for Square Enix. In 2005, Uematsu and several members of The Black Mages created the score for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII (2006); he was originally offered the job of creating the full score, but Sakimoto was eventually assigned as the main composer instead. Uematsu was also initially going to create the theme song for Final Fantasy XIII (2010). However, after being assigned the task of creating the entire score of Final Fantasy XIV, Uematsu decided to hand the job over to the main Final Fantasy XIII composer, Hamauzu. Uematsu also works closely with Sakaguchi's development studio Mistwalker, and has composed for Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008); The Last Story (2011); and Terra Battle (2014). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. Uematsu created the main theme for the multi-composer game Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008. He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. Uematsu recently contributed music and storyline to an e-book titled called "Blik-0 1946". He is currently working on soundtracks for multiple games, including Project Phoenix. Uematsu appeared five times in the top 20 of the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame. In 2012, "Aerith's Theme", written by Uematsu for Final Fantasy VII, was voted into the number 16 position in the annual Classic FM (UK) "Hall of Fame" top 300 chart. It was the first time that a piece of music written for a video game had appeared in the chart. In 2013, music from the Final Fantasy series received even greater support and was voted into the third position on the Classic FM Hall of Fame. Uematsu and his Final Fantasy music subsequently appeared at number seven in 2014, number nine in 2015, and number 17 in 2016. CANNOTANSWER | Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII | is a Japanese composer and keyboardist best known for his contributions to the Final Fantasy video game series by Square Enix. A self-taught musician, he began playing the piano at the age of twelve, with English singer-songwriter Elton John as one of his biggest influences. Uematsu joined Square in 1986, where he first met Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. The two later worked together on many games at the company, most notably in the Final Fantasy series. After nearly two decades with Square, Uematsu left in 2004 to create his own production company and music label, Dog Ear Records. He has since composed music as a freelancer for other games, including ones developed by Square Enix and Sakaguchi's development studio, Mistwalker.
Many soundtracks and arranged albums of Uematsu's game scores have been released. Pieces from his video game works have been performed in various Final Fantasy concerts, where he has worked with Grammy Award–winning conductor Arnie Roth on several of these performances. In the 2000s, he was the keyboardist in the hard rock band The Black Mages, along with Square Enix colleagues Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito. The band played various arranged rock versions of Uematsu's Final Fantasy compositions. He has since performed with Earthbound Papas, which he formed as the successor to The Black Mages in 2011. He is sometimes referred to as the Beethoven of video game music and has made several appearances in the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame.
Biography
Early life
Uematsu was born in Kōchi, Kōchi Prefecture, Japan. A self-taught musician, he began to play the piano when he was between the ages of eleven and twelve years old, and he did not take any formal piano lessons. He has an older sister who also played the piano. After graduating from Kanagawa University with a degree in English, Uematsu played the keyboard in several amateur bands and composed music for television commercials. When Uematsu was working at a music rental shop in Tokyo, a Square employee asked if he would be interested in creating music for some of the titles they were working on. Although he agreed, Uematsu at the time considered it a side job, and he did not think it would become a full-time career. He said it was a way to make some money on the side, while also keeping his part-time job at the music rental shop.
Square (1985–2004)
Uematsu joined Square in 1985, and composed his soundtrack with Cruise Chaser Blassty in 1986. Shortly after, he met Hironobu Sakaguchi, who asked him if he wanted to create music for some of his games, to which Uematsu agreed. For the next year, he created music for a number of games which did not achieve widespread success, such as King's Knight, 3-D WorldRunner, and Rad Racer. In 1987, Uematsu and Sakaguchi collaborated on what was originally to be Sakaguchi's last contribution for Square, Final Fantasy. Final Fantasy popularity sparked Uematsu's career in video game music, and he would go on to compose music for over 30 titles, most prominently the subsequent games in the Final Fantasy series. He scored the first installment in the SaGa series, The Final Fantasy Legend, in 1989. For the second game in the series, Final Fantasy Legend II he was assisted by Kenji Ito. In late 1994, Uematsu was asked to finish the soundtrack for Chrono Trigger after Yasunori Mitsuda contracted peptic ulcers. In 1996, he co-composed the soundtrack to Front Mission: Gun Hazard, and created the entire score for DynamiTracer. He also created music for three of the games in the Hanjuku Hero series.
Outside of video games, he has composed the main theme for the 2000 animated film Ah! My Goddess: The Movie and co-composed the anime Final Fantasy: Unlimited (2001) with Final Fantasy orchestrator Shirō Hamaguchi. He also inspired the Ten Plants concept albums, and released a solo album in 1994, titled Phantasmagoria. Feeling gradually more dissatisfied and uninspired, Uematsu requested the assistance of composers Masashi Hamauzu and Junya Nakano for the score to Final Fantasy X in 2001. This marked the first time that Uematsu did not compose an entire main-series Final Fantasy soundtrack. For Final Fantasy XI from 2002, he was joined by Naoshi Mizuta, who composed the majority of the soundtrack, and Kumi Tanioka; Uematsu was responsible for only eleven tracks. In 2002, fellow Square colleagues Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito asked Uematsu to join them in forming a rock band that focused on reinterpreting and expanding on Uematsu's compositions. He declined their offer at first because he was too busy with work; however, after agreeing to perform with Fukui and Sekito in a live performance as a keyboardist, he decided to join them in making a band. Another employee at Square, Mr. Matsushita, chose the name The Black Mages for their band. In 2003, Keiji Kawamori, Arata Hanyuda, and Michio Okamiya also joined the band. The Black Mages released three studio albums and performed at several concerts.
Freelancer (2004–present)
Uematsu left Square Enix in 2004 and formed his own production company, Smile Please. He later founded the music production company and record label Dog Ear Records in 2006. The reason for Uematsu's departure was that the company moved their office from Meguro to Shinjuku, Tokyo and he was not comfortable with the new location. He also stated that he had reached an age where he should gradually take his life into his own hands. He does, however, continue to compose music as a freelancer for Square Enix. In 2005, Uematsu and several members of The Black Mages created the score for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII (2006); he was originally offered the job of creating the full score, but Hitoshi Sakimoto was eventually assigned as the main composer instead. Uematsu was also initially going to create the theme song for Final Fantasy XIII (2010). However, after being assigned the task of creating the entire score of Final Fantasy XIV, Uematsu decided to hand the job over to Hamauzu.
Uematsu also works closely with Sakaguchi's development studio Mistwalker, and has composed for Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008); The Last Story (2011); and Terra Battle (2014). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. Uematsu created the main theme for Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008. He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. Uematsu has contributed music and story to e-books, such as "Blik-0 1946".
Uematsu appeared five times in the top 20 of the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame. In 2012, "Aerith's Theme", written by Uematsu for Final Fantasy VII, was voted into the number 16 position in the annual Classic FM (UK) "Hall of Fame" top 300 chart. It was the first time that a piece of music written for a video game had appeared in the chart. In 2013, music from the Final Fantasy series received even greater support and was voted into the third position on the Classic FM Hall of Fame. Uematsu and his Final Fantasy music subsequently appeared at number seven in 2014, number nine in 2015, and number 17 in 2016.
In September 2018, Uematsu announced that he would take the remainder of the year off from touring and postponed his projects in order to recover from an unspecified illness. Uematsu returned to compose the main theme for Final Fantasy VII Remake in 2020. Sakaguchi said that Uematsu's work on 2021's Fantasian could be his last major game score due to health issues.
Personal life
Uematsu currently resides in Tokyo, Japan with his wife, Reiko, whom he met during college, and their beagle, Pao. They have a summer cabin in Yamanakako, Yamanashi. In his spare time, he enjoys watching professional wrestling, drinking beer, and bicycling. Uematsu has said he originally wanted to become a professional wrestler, mentioning it was a career dream when he was younger.
Concerts
Uematsu's video game compositions have been performed in numerous concerts, and various Final Fantasy concerts have also been held. Outside Japan, Uematsu's Final Fantasy music was performed live for the first time at the first event of the 2003 Symphonic Game Music Concert in Leipzig, Germany. Other events of the Symphonic Game Music Concerts featuring Final Fantasy music were held in 2004, 2006, and 2007. The concert in 2004 featured a world premiere of Those Who Fight from Final Fantasy VII. Japanese pianist Seiji Honda was invited to perform the arrangement together with the orchestra. Another world premiere was "Dancing Mad" from Final Fantasy VI, performed by orchestra, choir, and pipe organ. The event in 2007 included "Distant Worlds" from Final Fantasy XI, performed by Japanese opera soprano Izumi Masuda.
A series of successful concert performances were held in Japan, including a Final Fantasy concert series titled Tour de Japon. The first stateside concert, Dear Friends – Music from Final Fantasy, took place on May 10, 2004, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California, and was performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra and the Los Angeles Master Chorale. It was conducted by Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra director Miguel Harth-Bedoya. Due to a positive reception, a concert series for North America followed. On May 16, 2005, a follow-up concert called More Friends: Music from Final Fantasy was performed in Los Angeles at the Gibson Amphitheatre; the concert was conducted by Grammy Award-winning Arnie Roth.
Uematsu also made a guest appearance at A Night in Fantasia 2004 performed by the Eminence Symphony Orchestra's debut concert in October 2004 which coincided with his last day employed at Square Enix.
Uematsu's Final Fantasy music was presented in the concert Voices – Music from Final Fantasy, which took place on February 18, 2006 at the Pacifico Yokohama convention center. Star guests included Emiko Shiratori, Rikki, Izumi Masuda, and Angela Aki. The concert focused on the songs from the Final Fantasy series and was conducted by Arnie Roth. Uematsu and several of his fellow composers were in attendance at the world premiere of Play! A Video Game Symphony in Chicago on May 27, 2006; he composed the opening fanfare for the concert. He also attended the European debut in Stockholm, Sweden on June 14, 2006, the performance in Toronto on September 30, 2006, and in Florence, Italy, on October 10, 2007. The world tour Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy was held in Stockholm, and was performed by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by Arnie Roth on December 4, 2007. The second concert of the tour was held at the Rosemont Theatre near Chicago on March 1, 2008. The tour has continued, with a recent concert in Houston on July 24, 2010.
Music from Final Fantasy made up one fourth of the music in the Symphonic Fantasies concerts in Cologne in September 2009 which were produced by the creators of the Symphonic Game Music Concert series and conducted by Arnie Roth.
In February 2010, it was announced that Uematsu would appear at Anime Boston, one of the largest anime conventions on the East Coast. Uematsu did not only show up at Anime Boston, he made a surprise appearance and played with the Video Game Orchestra for the track "One Winged Angel". On top of this, he made a short visit to the prestigious Berklee College of Music for a brief Q & A session at the request of VGO founder and Berklee alumni Shota Nakama. In January 2012, Uematsu performed with his band Earthbound Papas at MAGFest X in National Harbor, MD. On November 24, 2012, Uematsu performed in a Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concert with Arnie Roth conducting the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Adelaide Philharmonia Chorus and soloists at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre. On June 14 and 15, 2013, Uematsu performed in a Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concert with Arnie Roth conducting the Vienna Volksoper Orchestra and Vienna Chamber Chorus at Konzerthaus, Vienna.
On August 18, 2013, while headlining the Fantasy Rock Festival in Kawasaki, Japan with the Earthbound Papas, he revealed to the audience that he had originally intended to name their second album "Dancing Mad" after the Final Fantasy VI track which also appears on the album. However, referring to Square Enix indirectly, he told the audience that "a certain company 'S'" had phoned and informed him that he "could not use the name". Consequently, instead of backing down he decided to name the album "Dancing Dad", as a nod to the band's name. He also told the audience that he wanted to make an album of wholly original songs, but lamented that "it's just that if there are no game songs on it, it probably wouldn't sell!"
Musical style and influences
The style of Uematsu's compositions is diverse, ranging from stately classical symphonic pieces and heavy metal to new-age and hyper-percussive techno-electronica. For example, in Lost Odyssey, the score ranges from classical orchestral arrangements to contemporary jazz and techno tracks. Uematsu has stated that he is a big fan of Celtic and Irish music, and some of his work contains elements from these musical styles. Uematsu's Final Fantasy scores vary from upbeat, to dark and angry, to melancholic in nature. For instance, the music of Final Fantasy VIII is dark and gloomy, while the soundtrack to Final Fantasy IX is more carefree and upbeat. His Final Fantasy music has been described as being able to convey the true emotion of a scene; an example is "Aerith's Theme" from Final Fantasy VII. In an interview with the Nichi Bei Times, Uematsu said "I don't really self-consciously compose music for Japan or for the world, but I do think there is something in my more melancholy pieces that has a distinctly Japanese quality." He has been named one of the "Innovators" in Time "Time 100: The Next Wave — Music" feature. He has also been called the "John Williams of the video game world" and been credited for "increasing the appreciation and awareness" of video game music.
Many of Uematsu's musical influences come from the United Kingdom and the United States. He cites Elton John as his biggest musical influence, and he has stated that he wanted to be like him. Other major inspirations include The Beatles, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Simon & Garfunkel, and progressive rock bands. In the classical genre, he cites Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky as a great influence. Uematsu has said that 1970s bands, such as Pink Floyd and King Crimson, influenced his Final Fantasy compositions. The intro to the piece "One-Winged Angel" from Final Fantasy VII was inspired by the Jimi Hendrix song "Purple Haze"; the lyrics were taken from the medieval poetry on which Carl Orff based his cantata Carmina Burana, specifically the songs "Estuans Interius", "O Fortuna", "Veni, Veni, Venias" and "Ave Formosissima". In turn, Nobuo Uematsu has had a major influence on video game music and beyond the video game industry as well. For example, "Liberi Fatali" from Final Fantasy VIII was played during the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens during the women's synchronized swimming event. From the same game, "Eyes on Me", featuring Chinese pop singer Faye Wong, sold a record 400,000 copies and was the first song from a video game to win an award at the Japan Gold Disc Awards, where it won "Song of the Year (International)" in 2000. In a 2010 interview, Uematsu said that he gets more inspiration from walking his dog than from listening to other music.
Works
All works listed below were solely composed by Uematsu unless otherwise noted.
References
External links
1959 births
Anime composers
Freelance musicians
Japanese composers
Japanese film score composers
Japanese male composers
Japanese male film score composers
Japanese rock keyboardists
Kanagawa University alumni
Living people
Musicians from Kōchi Prefecture
People from Kōchi, Kōchi
Progressive rock keyboardists
Progressive rock musicians
Square Enix people
Symphonic rock musicians
Video game composers | true | [
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"In computing, bit numbering is the convention used to identify the bit positions in a binary number.\n\nBit significance and indexing\n\nIn computing, the least significant bit (LSB) is the bit position in a binary integer representing the binary 1s place of the integer. Similarly, the most significant bit (MSB) represents the highest-order place of the binary integer. The LSB is sometimes referred to as the low-order bit or right-most bit, due to the convention in positional notation of writing less significant digits further to the right. The MSB is similarly referred to as the high-order bit or left-most bit. In both cases, the LSB and MSB correlate directly to the least significant digit and most significant digit of a decimal integer.\n\nBit indexing correlates to the positional notation of the value in base 2. For this reason, bit index is not affected by how the value is stored on the device, such as the value's byte order. Rather, it is a property of the numeric value in binary itself. This is often utilized in programming via bit shifting: A value of 1 << n corresponds to the nth bit of a binary integer (with a value of 2n).\n\nLeast significant bit in digital steganography \n\nIn digital steganography, sensitive messages may be concealed by manipulating and storing information in the least significant bits of an image or a sound file. The user may later recover this information by extracting the least significant bits of the manipulated pixels to recover the original message. This allows the storage or transfer of digital information to remain concealed.\n\nUnsigned integer example \nThis table illustrates an example of decimal value of 149 and the location of LSB. In this particular example, the position of unit value (decimal 1 or 0) is located in bit position 0 (n = 0). MSB stands for most significant bit, while LSB stands for least significant bit.\n\nMost- vs least-significant bit first \nThe expressions most significant bit first and least significant bit at last are indications on the ordering of the sequence of the bits in the bytes sent over a wire in a serial transmission protocol or in a stream (e.g. an audio stream).\n\nMost significant bit first means that the most significant bit will arrive first: hence e.g. the hexadecimal number 0x12, 00010010 in binary representation, will arrive as the sequence 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 .\n\nLeast significant bit first means that the least significant bit will arrive first: hence e.g. the same hexadecimal number 0x12, again 00010010 in binary representation, will arrive as the (reversed) sequence 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0.\n\nLSB 0 bit numbering\n\nWhen the bit numbering starts at zero for the least significant bit (LSB) the numbering scheme is called LSB 0. This bit numbering method has the advantage that for any unsigned number the value of the number can be calculated by using exponentiation with the bit number and a base of 2. The value of an unsigned binary integer is therefore\n\nwhere bi denotes the value of the bit with number i, and N denotes the number of bits in total.\n\nMSB 0 bit numbering\n\nWhen the bit numbering starts at zero for the most significant bit (MSB) the numbering scheme is called MSB 0.\n\nThe value of an unsigned binary integer is therefore\n\nOther \nALGOL 68's elem operator is effectively \"MSB 1 bit numbering\" as the bits are numbered from left to right, with the first bit (bits elem 1) being the \"most significant bit\", and the expression (bits elem bits width) giving the \"least significant bit\". Similarly, when bits are coerced (typecast) to an array of Boolean ([ ]bool bits), the first element of this array (bits[lwb bits]) is again the \"most significant bit\".\n\nFor MSB 1 numbering, the value of an unsigned binary integer is\n\nPL/I numbers strings starting with 1 for the leftmost bit.\n\nThe Fortran function uses LSB 0 numbering.\n\nSee also\nARINC 429\nBinary numeral system\nSigned number representations\nTwo's complement\nEndianness\nBinary logarithm\nUnit in the last place (ULP)\nFind first set\nMAC address: Bit-reversed notation\n\nReferences\n\nBinary arithmetic\nAssembly languages"
] |
[
"Nobuo Uematsu",
"Freelancer (2004-present)",
"What did Uematsu do as a freelancer/",
"created the score",
"How is this significant?",
"Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII"
] | C_59b891ce14894c439acb4b0e4e20610e_0 | What else did he do? | 3 | Besides composing the main theme for Final Fantasy XII, what else did Nobuo Uematsu do? | Nobuo Uematsu | Uematsu left Square Enix in 2004 and formed his own production company, Smile Please. He later founded the music production company and record label Dog Ear Records in 2006. The reason for Uematsu's departure was that the company moved their office from Meguro to Shinjuku, Tokyo, and he was not comfortable with the new location. Also, he cites the fact that he had reached an age where he should gradually take his life into his own hands. He does, however, continue to compose music as a freelancer for Square Enix. In 2005, Uematsu and several members of The Black Mages created the score for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII (2006); he was originally offered the job of creating the full score, but Sakimoto was eventually assigned as the main composer instead. Uematsu was also initially going to create the theme song for Final Fantasy XIII (2010). However, after being assigned the task of creating the entire score of Final Fantasy XIV, Uematsu decided to hand the job over to the main Final Fantasy XIII composer, Hamauzu. Uematsu also works closely with Sakaguchi's development studio Mistwalker, and has composed for Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008); The Last Story (2011); and Terra Battle (2014). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. Uematsu created the main theme for the multi-composer game Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008. He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. Uematsu recently contributed music and storyline to an e-book titled called "Blik-0 1946". He is currently working on soundtracks for multiple games, including Project Phoenix. Uematsu appeared five times in the top 20 of the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame. In 2012, "Aerith's Theme", written by Uematsu for Final Fantasy VII, was voted into the number 16 position in the annual Classic FM (UK) "Hall of Fame" top 300 chart. It was the first time that a piece of music written for a video game had appeared in the chart. In 2013, music from the Final Fantasy series received even greater support and was voted into the third position on the Classic FM Hall of Fame. Uematsu and his Final Fantasy music subsequently appeared at number seven in 2014, number nine in 2015, and number 17 in 2016. CANNOTANSWER | Uematsu created the main theme for the multi-composer game Super Smash Bros. | is a Japanese composer and keyboardist best known for his contributions to the Final Fantasy video game series by Square Enix. A self-taught musician, he began playing the piano at the age of twelve, with English singer-songwriter Elton John as one of his biggest influences. Uematsu joined Square in 1986, where he first met Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. The two later worked together on many games at the company, most notably in the Final Fantasy series. After nearly two decades with Square, Uematsu left in 2004 to create his own production company and music label, Dog Ear Records. He has since composed music as a freelancer for other games, including ones developed by Square Enix and Sakaguchi's development studio, Mistwalker.
Many soundtracks and arranged albums of Uematsu's game scores have been released. Pieces from his video game works have been performed in various Final Fantasy concerts, where he has worked with Grammy Award–winning conductor Arnie Roth on several of these performances. In the 2000s, he was the keyboardist in the hard rock band The Black Mages, along with Square Enix colleagues Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito. The band played various arranged rock versions of Uematsu's Final Fantasy compositions. He has since performed with Earthbound Papas, which he formed as the successor to The Black Mages in 2011. He is sometimes referred to as the Beethoven of video game music and has made several appearances in the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame.
Biography
Early life
Uematsu was born in Kōchi, Kōchi Prefecture, Japan. A self-taught musician, he began to play the piano when he was between the ages of eleven and twelve years old, and he did not take any formal piano lessons. He has an older sister who also played the piano. After graduating from Kanagawa University with a degree in English, Uematsu played the keyboard in several amateur bands and composed music for television commercials. When Uematsu was working at a music rental shop in Tokyo, a Square employee asked if he would be interested in creating music for some of the titles they were working on. Although he agreed, Uematsu at the time considered it a side job, and he did not think it would become a full-time career. He said it was a way to make some money on the side, while also keeping his part-time job at the music rental shop.
Square (1985–2004)
Uematsu joined Square in 1985, and composed his soundtrack with Cruise Chaser Blassty in 1986. Shortly after, he met Hironobu Sakaguchi, who asked him if he wanted to create music for some of his games, to which Uematsu agreed. For the next year, he created music for a number of games which did not achieve widespread success, such as King's Knight, 3-D WorldRunner, and Rad Racer. In 1987, Uematsu and Sakaguchi collaborated on what was originally to be Sakaguchi's last contribution for Square, Final Fantasy. Final Fantasy popularity sparked Uematsu's career in video game music, and he would go on to compose music for over 30 titles, most prominently the subsequent games in the Final Fantasy series. He scored the first installment in the SaGa series, The Final Fantasy Legend, in 1989. For the second game in the series, Final Fantasy Legend II he was assisted by Kenji Ito. In late 1994, Uematsu was asked to finish the soundtrack for Chrono Trigger after Yasunori Mitsuda contracted peptic ulcers. In 1996, he co-composed the soundtrack to Front Mission: Gun Hazard, and created the entire score for DynamiTracer. He also created music for three of the games in the Hanjuku Hero series.
Outside of video games, he has composed the main theme for the 2000 animated film Ah! My Goddess: The Movie and co-composed the anime Final Fantasy: Unlimited (2001) with Final Fantasy orchestrator Shirō Hamaguchi. He also inspired the Ten Plants concept albums, and released a solo album in 1994, titled Phantasmagoria. Feeling gradually more dissatisfied and uninspired, Uematsu requested the assistance of composers Masashi Hamauzu and Junya Nakano for the score to Final Fantasy X in 2001. This marked the first time that Uematsu did not compose an entire main-series Final Fantasy soundtrack. For Final Fantasy XI from 2002, he was joined by Naoshi Mizuta, who composed the majority of the soundtrack, and Kumi Tanioka; Uematsu was responsible for only eleven tracks. In 2002, fellow Square colleagues Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito asked Uematsu to join them in forming a rock band that focused on reinterpreting and expanding on Uematsu's compositions. He declined their offer at first because he was too busy with work; however, after agreeing to perform with Fukui and Sekito in a live performance as a keyboardist, he decided to join them in making a band. Another employee at Square, Mr. Matsushita, chose the name The Black Mages for their band. In 2003, Keiji Kawamori, Arata Hanyuda, and Michio Okamiya also joined the band. The Black Mages released three studio albums and performed at several concerts.
Freelancer (2004–present)
Uematsu left Square Enix in 2004 and formed his own production company, Smile Please. He later founded the music production company and record label Dog Ear Records in 2006. The reason for Uematsu's departure was that the company moved their office from Meguro to Shinjuku, Tokyo and he was not comfortable with the new location. He also stated that he had reached an age where he should gradually take his life into his own hands. He does, however, continue to compose music as a freelancer for Square Enix. In 2005, Uematsu and several members of The Black Mages created the score for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII (2006); he was originally offered the job of creating the full score, but Hitoshi Sakimoto was eventually assigned as the main composer instead. Uematsu was also initially going to create the theme song for Final Fantasy XIII (2010). However, after being assigned the task of creating the entire score of Final Fantasy XIV, Uematsu decided to hand the job over to Hamauzu.
Uematsu also works closely with Sakaguchi's development studio Mistwalker, and has composed for Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008); The Last Story (2011); and Terra Battle (2014). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. Uematsu created the main theme for Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008. He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. Uematsu has contributed music and story to e-books, such as "Blik-0 1946".
Uematsu appeared five times in the top 20 of the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame. In 2012, "Aerith's Theme", written by Uematsu for Final Fantasy VII, was voted into the number 16 position in the annual Classic FM (UK) "Hall of Fame" top 300 chart. It was the first time that a piece of music written for a video game had appeared in the chart. In 2013, music from the Final Fantasy series received even greater support and was voted into the third position on the Classic FM Hall of Fame. Uematsu and his Final Fantasy music subsequently appeared at number seven in 2014, number nine in 2015, and number 17 in 2016.
In September 2018, Uematsu announced that he would take the remainder of the year off from touring and postponed his projects in order to recover from an unspecified illness. Uematsu returned to compose the main theme for Final Fantasy VII Remake in 2020. Sakaguchi said that Uematsu's work on 2021's Fantasian could be his last major game score due to health issues.
Personal life
Uematsu currently resides in Tokyo, Japan with his wife, Reiko, whom he met during college, and their beagle, Pao. They have a summer cabin in Yamanakako, Yamanashi. In his spare time, he enjoys watching professional wrestling, drinking beer, and bicycling. Uematsu has said he originally wanted to become a professional wrestler, mentioning it was a career dream when he was younger.
Concerts
Uematsu's video game compositions have been performed in numerous concerts, and various Final Fantasy concerts have also been held. Outside Japan, Uematsu's Final Fantasy music was performed live for the first time at the first event of the 2003 Symphonic Game Music Concert in Leipzig, Germany. Other events of the Symphonic Game Music Concerts featuring Final Fantasy music were held in 2004, 2006, and 2007. The concert in 2004 featured a world premiere of Those Who Fight from Final Fantasy VII. Japanese pianist Seiji Honda was invited to perform the arrangement together with the orchestra. Another world premiere was "Dancing Mad" from Final Fantasy VI, performed by orchestra, choir, and pipe organ. The event in 2007 included "Distant Worlds" from Final Fantasy XI, performed by Japanese opera soprano Izumi Masuda.
A series of successful concert performances were held in Japan, including a Final Fantasy concert series titled Tour de Japon. The first stateside concert, Dear Friends – Music from Final Fantasy, took place on May 10, 2004, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California, and was performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra and the Los Angeles Master Chorale. It was conducted by Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra director Miguel Harth-Bedoya. Due to a positive reception, a concert series for North America followed. On May 16, 2005, a follow-up concert called More Friends: Music from Final Fantasy was performed in Los Angeles at the Gibson Amphitheatre; the concert was conducted by Grammy Award-winning Arnie Roth.
Uematsu also made a guest appearance at A Night in Fantasia 2004 performed by the Eminence Symphony Orchestra's debut concert in October 2004 which coincided with his last day employed at Square Enix.
Uematsu's Final Fantasy music was presented in the concert Voices – Music from Final Fantasy, which took place on February 18, 2006 at the Pacifico Yokohama convention center. Star guests included Emiko Shiratori, Rikki, Izumi Masuda, and Angela Aki. The concert focused on the songs from the Final Fantasy series and was conducted by Arnie Roth. Uematsu and several of his fellow composers were in attendance at the world premiere of Play! A Video Game Symphony in Chicago on May 27, 2006; he composed the opening fanfare for the concert. He also attended the European debut in Stockholm, Sweden on June 14, 2006, the performance in Toronto on September 30, 2006, and in Florence, Italy, on October 10, 2007. The world tour Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy was held in Stockholm, and was performed by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by Arnie Roth on December 4, 2007. The second concert of the tour was held at the Rosemont Theatre near Chicago on March 1, 2008. The tour has continued, with a recent concert in Houston on July 24, 2010.
Music from Final Fantasy made up one fourth of the music in the Symphonic Fantasies concerts in Cologne in September 2009 which were produced by the creators of the Symphonic Game Music Concert series and conducted by Arnie Roth.
In February 2010, it was announced that Uematsu would appear at Anime Boston, one of the largest anime conventions on the East Coast. Uematsu did not only show up at Anime Boston, he made a surprise appearance and played with the Video Game Orchestra for the track "One Winged Angel". On top of this, he made a short visit to the prestigious Berklee College of Music for a brief Q & A session at the request of VGO founder and Berklee alumni Shota Nakama. In January 2012, Uematsu performed with his band Earthbound Papas at MAGFest X in National Harbor, MD. On November 24, 2012, Uematsu performed in a Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concert with Arnie Roth conducting the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Adelaide Philharmonia Chorus and soloists at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre. On June 14 and 15, 2013, Uematsu performed in a Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concert with Arnie Roth conducting the Vienna Volksoper Orchestra and Vienna Chamber Chorus at Konzerthaus, Vienna.
On August 18, 2013, while headlining the Fantasy Rock Festival in Kawasaki, Japan with the Earthbound Papas, he revealed to the audience that he had originally intended to name their second album "Dancing Mad" after the Final Fantasy VI track which also appears on the album. However, referring to Square Enix indirectly, he told the audience that "a certain company 'S'" had phoned and informed him that he "could not use the name". Consequently, instead of backing down he decided to name the album "Dancing Dad", as a nod to the band's name. He also told the audience that he wanted to make an album of wholly original songs, but lamented that "it's just that if there are no game songs on it, it probably wouldn't sell!"
Musical style and influences
The style of Uematsu's compositions is diverse, ranging from stately classical symphonic pieces and heavy metal to new-age and hyper-percussive techno-electronica. For example, in Lost Odyssey, the score ranges from classical orchestral arrangements to contemporary jazz and techno tracks. Uematsu has stated that he is a big fan of Celtic and Irish music, and some of his work contains elements from these musical styles. Uematsu's Final Fantasy scores vary from upbeat, to dark and angry, to melancholic in nature. For instance, the music of Final Fantasy VIII is dark and gloomy, while the soundtrack to Final Fantasy IX is more carefree and upbeat. His Final Fantasy music has been described as being able to convey the true emotion of a scene; an example is "Aerith's Theme" from Final Fantasy VII. In an interview with the Nichi Bei Times, Uematsu said "I don't really self-consciously compose music for Japan or for the world, but I do think there is something in my more melancholy pieces that has a distinctly Japanese quality." He has been named one of the "Innovators" in Time "Time 100: The Next Wave — Music" feature. He has also been called the "John Williams of the video game world" and been credited for "increasing the appreciation and awareness" of video game music.
Many of Uematsu's musical influences come from the United Kingdom and the United States. He cites Elton John as his biggest musical influence, and he has stated that he wanted to be like him. Other major inspirations include The Beatles, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Simon & Garfunkel, and progressive rock bands. In the classical genre, he cites Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky as a great influence. Uematsu has said that 1970s bands, such as Pink Floyd and King Crimson, influenced his Final Fantasy compositions. The intro to the piece "One-Winged Angel" from Final Fantasy VII was inspired by the Jimi Hendrix song "Purple Haze"; the lyrics were taken from the medieval poetry on which Carl Orff based his cantata Carmina Burana, specifically the songs "Estuans Interius", "O Fortuna", "Veni, Veni, Venias" and "Ave Formosissima". In turn, Nobuo Uematsu has had a major influence on video game music and beyond the video game industry as well. For example, "Liberi Fatali" from Final Fantasy VIII was played during the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens during the women's synchronized swimming event. From the same game, "Eyes on Me", featuring Chinese pop singer Faye Wong, sold a record 400,000 copies and was the first song from a video game to win an award at the Japan Gold Disc Awards, where it won "Song of the Year (International)" in 2000. In a 2010 interview, Uematsu said that he gets more inspiration from walking his dog than from listening to other music.
Works
All works listed below were solely composed by Uematsu unless otherwise noted.
References
External links
1959 births
Anime composers
Freelance musicians
Japanese composers
Japanese film score composers
Japanese male composers
Japanese male film score composers
Japanese rock keyboardists
Kanagawa University alumni
Living people
Musicians from Kōchi Prefecture
People from Kōchi, Kōchi
Progressive rock keyboardists
Progressive rock musicians
Square Enix people
Symphonic rock musicians
Video game composers | false | [
"What Else Do You Do? (A Compilation of Quiet Music) is a various artists compilation album, released in 1990 by Shimmy Disc.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel \nAdapted from the What Else Do You Do? (A Compilation of Quiet Music) liner notes.\n Kramer – production, engineering\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n \n\n1990 compilation albums\nAlbums produced by Kramer (musician)\nShimmy Disc compilation albums",
"Do You Know What I'm Going To Do Next Saturday? is a 1963 children's book published by Beginner Books and written by Helen Palmer Geisel, the first wife of Theodor Seuss Geisel (Dr. Seuss). Unlike most of the Beginner Books, Do You Know What I'm Going To Do Next Saturday? did not follow the format of text with inline drawings, being illustrated with black-and-white photographs by Lynn Fayman, featuring a boy named Rawli Davis. It is sometimes misattributed to Dr. Seuss himself. The book's cover features a photograph of a young boy sitting at a breakfast table with a huge pile of pancakes.\n\nActivities mentioned in the book include bowling, water skiing, marching, boxing, and shooting guns with the United States Marines, and eating more spaghetti \"than anyone else has eaten before.\n\nHelen Palmer's photograph-based children's books did not prove to be as popular as the more traditional text-and-illustrations format; however, Do You Know What I'm Going To Do Next Saturday received positive reviews and was listed by The New York Times as one of the best children's books of 1963. The book is currently out of print.\n\nReferences\n\n1963 children's books\nAmerican picture books"
] |
[
"Nobuo Uematsu",
"Freelancer (2004-present)",
"What did Uematsu do as a freelancer/",
"created the score",
"How is this significant?",
"Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII",
"What else did he do?",
"Uematsu created the main theme for the multi-composer game Super Smash Bros."
] | C_59b891ce14894c439acb4b0e4e20610e_0 | Did he create anything else? | 4 | Besides the main themes for Final Fantasy XII and Super Smash Bros, did Nobuo Uematsu create anything else? | Nobuo Uematsu | Uematsu left Square Enix in 2004 and formed his own production company, Smile Please. He later founded the music production company and record label Dog Ear Records in 2006. The reason for Uematsu's departure was that the company moved their office from Meguro to Shinjuku, Tokyo, and he was not comfortable with the new location. Also, he cites the fact that he had reached an age where he should gradually take his life into his own hands. He does, however, continue to compose music as a freelancer for Square Enix. In 2005, Uematsu and several members of The Black Mages created the score for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII (2006); he was originally offered the job of creating the full score, but Sakimoto was eventually assigned as the main composer instead. Uematsu was also initially going to create the theme song for Final Fantasy XIII (2010). However, after being assigned the task of creating the entire score of Final Fantasy XIV, Uematsu decided to hand the job over to the main Final Fantasy XIII composer, Hamauzu. Uematsu also works closely with Sakaguchi's development studio Mistwalker, and has composed for Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008); The Last Story (2011); and Terra Battle (2014). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. Uematsu created the main theme for the multi-composer game Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008. He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. Uematsu recently contributed music and storyline to an e-book titled called "Blik-0 1946". He is currently working on soundtracks for multiple games, including Project Phoenix. Uematsu appeared five times in the top 20 of the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame. In 2012, "Aerith's Theme", written by Uematsu for Final Fantasy VII, was voted into the number 16 position in the annual Classic FM (UK) "Hall of Fame" top 300 chart. It was the first time that a piece of music written for a video game had appeared in the chart. In 2013, music from the Final Fantasy series received even greater support and was voted into the third position on the Classic FM Hall of Fame. Uematsu and his Final Fantasy music subsequently appeared at number seven in 2014, number nine in 2015, and number 17 in 2016. CANNOTANSWER | ). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. | is a Japanese composer and keyboardist best known for his contributions to the Final Fantasy video game series by Square Enix. A self-taught musician, he began playing the piano at the age of twelve, with English singer-songwriter Elton John as one of his biggest influences. Uematsu joined Square in 1986, where he first met Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. The two later worked together on many games at the company, most notably in the Final Fantasy series. After nearly two decades with Square, Uematsu left in 2004 to create his own production company and music label, Dog Ear Records. He has since composed music as a freelancer for other games, including ones developed by Square Enix and Sakaguchi's development studio, Mistwalker.
Many soundtracks and arranged albums of Uematsu's game scores have been released. Pieces from his video game works have been performed in various Final Fantasy concerts, where he has worked with Grammy Award–winning conductor Arnie Roth on several of these performances. In the 2000s, he was the keyboardist in the hard rock band The Black Mages, along with Square Enix colleagues Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito. The band played various arranged rock versions of Uematsu's Final Fantasy compositions. He has since performed with Earthbound Papas, which he formed as the successor to The Black Mages in 2011. He is sometimes referred to as the Beethoven of video game music and has made several appearances in the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame.
Biography
Early life
Uematsu was born in Kōchi, Kōchi Prefecture, Japan. A self-taught musician, he began to play the piano when he was between the ages of eleven and twelve years old, and he did not take any formal piano lessons. He has an older sister who also played the piano. After graduating from Kanagawa University with a degree in English, Uematsu played the keyboard in several amateur bands and composed music for television commercials. When Uematsu was working at a music rental shop in Tokyo, a Square employee asked if he would be interested in creating music for some of the titles they were working on. Although he agreed, Uematsu at the time considered it a side job, and he did not think it would become a full-time career. He said it was a way to make some money on the side, while also keeping his part-time job at the music rental shop.
Square (1985–2004)
Uematsu joined Square in 1985, and composed his soundtrack with Cruise Chaser Blassty in 1986. Shortly after, he met Hironobu Sakaguchi, who asked him if he wanted to create music for some of his games, to which Uematsu agreed. For the next year, he created music for a number of games which did not achieve widespread success, such as King's Knight, 3-D WorldRunner, and Rad Racer. In 1987, Uematsu and Sakaguchi collaborated on what was originally to be Sakaguchi's last contribution for Square, Final Fantasy. Final Fantasy popularity sparked Uematsu's career in video game music, and he would go on to compose music for over 30 titles, most prominently the subsequent games in the Final Fantasy series. He scored the first installment in the SaGa series, The Final Fantasy Legend, in 1989. For the second game in the series, Final Fantasy Legend II he was assisted by Kenji Ito. In late 1994, Uematsu was asked to finish the soundtrack for Chrono Trigger after Yasunori Mitsuda contracted peptic ulcers. In 1996, he co-composed the soundtrack to Front Mission: Gun Hazard, and created the entire score for DynamiTracer. He also created music for three of the games in the Hanjuku Hero series.
Outside of video games, he has composed the main theme for the 2000 animated film Ah! My Goddess: The Movie and co-composed the anime Final Fantasy: Unlimited (2001) with Final Fantasy orchestrator Shirō Hamaguchi. He also inspired the Ten Plants concept albums, and released a solo album in 1994, titled Phantasmagoria. Feeling gradually more dissatisfied and uninspired, Uematsu requested the assistance of composers Masashi Hamauzu and Junya Nakano for the score to Final Fantasy X in 2001. This marked the first time that Uematsu did not compose an entire main-series Final Fantasy soundtrack. For Final Fantasy XI from 2002, he was joined by Naoshi Mizuta, who composed the majority of the soundtrack, and Kumi Tanioka; Uematsu was responsible for only eleven tracks. In 2002, fellow Square colleagues Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito asked Uematsu to join them in forming a rock band that focused on reinterpreting and expanding on Uematsu's compositions. He declined their offer at first because he was too busy with work; however, after agreeing to perform with Fukui and Sekito in a live performance as a keyboardist, he decided to join them in making a band. Another employee at Square, Mr. Matsushita, chose the name The Black Mages for their band. In 2003, Keiji Kawamori, Arata Hanyuda, and Michio Okamiya also joined the band. The Black Mages released three studio albums and performed at several concerts.
Freelancer (2004–present)
Uematsu left Square Enix in 2004 and formed his own production company, Smile Please. He later founded the music production company and record label Dog Ear Records in 2006. The reason for Uematsu's departure was that the company moved their office from Meguro to Shinjuku, Tokyo and he was not comfortable with the new location. He also stated that he had reached an age where he should gradually take his life into his own hands. He does, however, continue to compose music as a freelancer for Square Enix. In 2005, Uematsu and several members of The Black Mages created the score for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII (2006); he was originally offered the job of creating the full score, but Hitoshi Sakimoto was eventually assigned as the main composer instead. Uematsu was also initially going to create the theme song for Final Fantasy XIII (2010). However, after being assigned the task of creating the entire score of Final Fantasy XIV, Uematsu decided to hand the job over to Hamauzu.
Uematsu also works closely with Sakaguchi's development studio Mistwalker, and has composed for Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008); The Last Story (2011); and Terra Battle (2014). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. Uematsu created the main theme for Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008. He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. Uematsu has contributed music and story to e-books, such as "Blik-0 1946".
Uematsu appeared five times in the top 20 of the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame. In 2012, "Aerith's Theme", written by Uematsu for Final Fantasy VII, was voted into the number 16 position in the annual Classic FM (UK) "Hall of Fame" top 300 chart. It was the first time that a piece of music written for a video game had appeared in the chart. In 2013, music from the Final Fantasy series received even greater support and was voted into the third position on the Classic FM Hall of Fame. Uematsu and his Final Fantasy music subsequently appeared at number seven in 2014, number nine in 2015, and number 17 in 2016.
In September 2018, Uematsu announced that he would take the remainder of the year off from touring and postponed his projects in order to recover from an unspecified illness. Uematsu returned to compose the main theme for Final Fantasy VII Remake in 2020. Sakaguchi said that Uematsu's work on 2021's Fantasian could be his last major game score due to health issues.
Personal life
Uematsu currently resides in Tokyo, Japan with his wife, Reiko, whom he met during college, and their beagle, Pao. They have a summer cabin in Yamanakako, Yamanashi. In his spare time, he enjoys watching professional wrestling, drinking beer, and bicycling. Uematsu has said he originally wanted to become a professional wrestler, mentioning it was a career dream when he was younger.
Concerts
Uematsu's video game compositions have been performed in numerous concerts, and various Final Fantasy concerts have also been held. Outside Japan, Uematsu's Final Fantasy music was performed live for the first time at the first event of the 2003 Symphonic Game Music Concert in Leipzig, Germany. Other events of the Symphonic Game Music Concerts featuring Final Fantasy music were held in 2004, 2006, and 2007. The concert in 2004 featured a world premiere of Those Who Fight from Final Fantasy VII. Japanese pianist Seiji Honda was invited to perform the arrangement together with the orchestra. Another world premiere was "Dancing Mad" from Final Fantasy VI, performed by orchestra, choir, and pipe organ. The event in 2007 included "Distant Worlds" from Final Fantasy XI, performed by Japanese opera soprano Izumi Masuda.
A series of successful concert performances were held in Japan, including a Final Fantasy concert series titled Tour de Japon. The first stateside concert, Dear Friends – Music from Final Fantasy, took place on May 10, 2004, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California, and was performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra and the Los Angeles Master Chorale. It was conducted by Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra director Miguel Harth-Bedoya. Due to a positive reception, a concert series for North America followed. On May 16, 2005, a follow-up concert called More Friends: Music from Final Fantasy was performed in Los Angeles at the Gibson Amphitheatre; the concert was conducted by Grammy Award-winning Arnie Roth.
Uematsu also made a guest appearance at A Night in Fantasia 2004 performed by the Eminence Symphony Orchestra's debut concert in October 2004 which coincided with his last day employed at Square Enix.
Uematsu's Final Fantasy music was presented in the concert Voices – Music from Final Fantasy, which took place on February 18, 2006 at the Pacifico Yokohama convention center. Star guests included Emiko Shiratori, Rikki, Izumi Masuda, and Angela Aki. The concert focused on the songs from the Final Fantasy series and was conducted by Arnie Roth. Uematsu and several of his fellow composers were in attendance at the world premiere of Play! A Video Game Symphony in Chicago on May 27, 2006; he composed the opening fanfare for the concert. He also attended the European debut in Stockholm, Sweden on June 14, 2006, the performance in Toronto on September 30, 2006, and in Florence, Italy, on October 10, 2007. The world tour Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy was held in Stockholm, and was performed by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by Arnie Roth on December 4, 2007. The second concert of the tour was held at the Rosemont Theatre near Chicago on March 1, 2008. The tour has continued, with a recent concert in Houston on July 24, 2010.
Music from Final Fantasy made up one fourth of the music in the Symphonic Fantasies concerts in Cologne in September 2009 which were produced by the creators of the Symphonic Game Music Concert series and conducted by Arnie Roth.
In February 2010, it was announced that Uematsu would appear at Anime Boston, one of the largest anime conventions on the East Coast. Uematsu did not only show up at Anime Boston, he made a surprise appearance and played with the Video Game Orchestra for the track "One Winged Angel". On top of this, he made a short visit to the prestigious Berklee College of Music for a brief Q & A session at the request of VGO founder and Berklee alumni Shota Nakama. In January 2012, Uematsu performed with his band Earthbound Papas at MAGFest X in National Harbor, MD. On November 24, 2012, Uematsu performed in a Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concert with Arnie Roth conducting the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Adelaide Philharmonia Chorus and soloists at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre. On June 14 and 15, 2013, Uematsu performed in a Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concert with Arnie Roth conducting the Vienna Volksoper Orchestra and Vienna Chamber Chorus at Konzerthaus, Vienna.
On August 18, 2013, while headlining the Fantasy Rock Festival in Kawasaki, Japan with the Earthbound Papas, he revealed to the audience that he had originally intended to name their second album "Dancing Mad" after the Final Fantasy VI track which also appears on the album. However, referring to Square Enix indirectly, he told the audience that "a certain company 'S'" had phoned and informed him that he "could not use the name". Consequently, instead of backing down he decided to name the album "Dancing Dad", as a nod to the band's name. He also told the audience that he wanted to make an album of wholly original songs, but lamented that "it's just that if there are no game songs on it, it probably wouldn't sell!"
Musical style and influences
The style of Uematsu's compositions is diverse, ranging from stately classical symphonic pieces and heavy metal to new-age and hyper-percussive techno-electronica. For example, in Lost Odyssey, the score ranges from classical orchestral arrangements to contemporary jazz and techno tracks. Uematsu has stated that he is a big fan of Celtic and Irish music, and some of his work contains elements from these musical styles. Uematsu's Final Fantasy scores vary from upbeat, to dark and angry, to melancholic in nature. For instance, the music of Final Fantasy VIII is dark and gloomy, while the soundtrack to Final Fantasy IX is more carefree and upbeat. His Final Fantasy music has been described as being able to convey the true emotion of a scene; an example is "Aerith's Theme" from Final Fantasy VII. In an interview with the Nichi Bei Times, Uematsu said "I don't really self-consciously compose music for Japan or for the world, but I do think there is something in my more melancholy pieces that has a distinctly Japanese quality." He has been named one of the "Innovators" in Time "Time 100: The Next Wave — Music" feature. He has also been called the "John Williams of the video game world" and been credited for "increasing the appreciation and awareness" of video game music.
Many of Uematsu's musical influences come from the United Kingdom and the United States. He cites Elton John as his biggest musical influence, and he has stated that he wanted to be like him. Other major inspirations include The Beatles, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Simon & Garfunkel, and progressive rock bands. In the classical genre, he cites Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky as a great influence. Uematsu has said that 1970s bands, such as Pink Floyd and King Crimson, influenced his Final Fantasy compositions. The intro to the piece "One-Winged Angel" from Final Fantasy VII was inspired by the Jimi Hendrix song "Purple Haze"; the lyrics were taken from the medieval poetry on which Carl Orff based his cantata Carmina Burana, specifically the songs "Estuans Interius", "O Fortuna", "Veni, Veni, Venias" and "Ave Formosissima". In turn, Nobuo Uematsu has had a major influence on video game music and beyond the video game industry as well. For example, "Liberi Fatali" from Final Fantasy VIII was played during the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens during the women's synchronized swimming event. From the same game, "Eyes on Me", featuring Chinese pop singer Faye Wong, sold a record 400,000 copies and was the first song from a video game to win an award at the Japan Gold Disc Awards, where it won "Song of the Year (International)" in 2000. In a 2010 interview, Uematsu said that he gets more inspiration from walking his dog than from listening to other music.
Works
All works listed below were solely composed by Uematsu unless otherwise noted.
References
External links
1959 births
Anime composers
Freelance musicians
Japanese composers
Japanese film score composers
Japanese male composers
Japanese male film score composers
Japanese rock keyboardists
Kanagawa University alumni
Living people
Musicians from Kōchi Prefecture
People from Kōchi, Kōchi
Progressive rock keyboardists
Progressive rock musicians
Square Enix people
Symphonic rock musicians
Video game composers | true | [
"\"If You Can Do Anything Else\" is a song written by Billy Livsey and Don Schlitz, and recorded by American country music artist George Strait. It was released in February 2001 as the third and final single from his self-titled album. The song reached number 5 on the U.S. Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart in July 2001. It also peaked at number 51 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.\n\nContent\nThe song is about man who is giving his woman the option to leave him. He gives her many different options for all the things she can do. At the end he gives her the option to stay with him if she really can’t find anything else to do. He says he will be alright if she leaves, but really it seems he wants her to stay.\n\nChart performance\n\"If You Can Do Anything Else\" debuted at number 60 on the U.S. Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks for the week of March 3, 2001.\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences\n\n2001 singles\n2000 songs\nGeorge Strait songs\nSongs written by Billy Livsey\nSongs written by Don Schlitz\nSong recordings produced by Tony Brown (record producer)\nMCA Nashville Records singles",
"Ben Baker is a Republican politician who has served as a member of the Missouri House of Representatives from the 160th district since 2020.\n\nBiography\nBaker is a graduate and former dean of students at Ozark Bible Institute, and a former mayor and councilmember in Neosho, Missouri. He was first elected to the Missouri House in 2018, where he sits on committees for administrative rules, elementary and secondary education, downsizing state government and economic development.\n\nIn 2020, Baker proposed House Bill 2044 to \"require libraries to create review boards to regulate library events and anything else in the library considered age-inappropriate sexual material\".\n\nReferences\n\nLiving people\nMembers of the Missouri House of Representatives\nMissouri Republicans\nYear of birth missing (living people)\nOzark Christian College alumni\n21st-century American politicians"
] |
[
"Nobuo Uematsu",
"Freelancer (2004-present)",
"What did Uematsu do as a freelancer/",
"created the score",
"How is this significant?",
"Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII",
"What else did he do?",
"Uematsu created the main theme for the multi-composer game Super Smash Bros.",
"Did he create anything else?",
"). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On."
] | C_59b891ce14894c439acb4b0e4e20610e_0 | Did he have any other accomplishments? | 5 | Besides the main themes for Final Fantasy XII and Super Smash Bros, and the music for Cry On, did Nobuo Uematsu have any other accomplishments? | Nobuo Uematsu | Uematsu left Square Enix in 2004 and formed his own production company, Smile Please. He later founded the music production company and record label Dog Ear Records in 2006. The reason for Uematsu's departure was that the company moved their office from Meguro to Shinjuku, Tokyo, and he was not comfortable with the new location. Also, he cites the fact that he had reached an age where he should gradually take his life into his own hands. He does, however, continue to compose music as a freelancer for Square Enix. In 2005, Uematsu and several members of The Black Mages created the score for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII (2006); he was originally offered the job of creating the full score, but Sakimoto was eventually assigned as the main composer instead. Uematsu was also initially going to create the theme song for Final Fantasy XIII (2010). However, after being assigned the task of creating the entire score of Final Fantasy XIV, Uematsu decided to hand the job over to the main Final Fantasy XIII composer, Hamauzu. Uematsu also works closely with Sakaguchi's development studio Mistwalker, and has composed for Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008); The Last Story (2011); and Terra Battle (2014). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. Uematsu created the main theme for the multi-composer game Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008. He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. Uematsu recently contributed music and storyline to an e-book titled called "Blik-0 1946". He is currently working on soundtracks for multiple games, including Project Phoenix. Uematsu appeared five times in the top 20 of the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame. In 2012, "Aerith's Theme", written by Uematsu for Final Fantasy VII, was voted into the number 16 position in the annual Classic FM (UK) "Hall of Fame" top 300 chart. It was the first time that a piece of music written for a video game had appeared in the chart. In 2013, music from the Final Fantasy series received even greater support and was voted into the third position on the Classic FM Hall of Fame. Uematsu and his Final Fantasy music subsequently appeared at number seven in 2014, number nine in 2015, and number 17 in 2016. CANNOTANSWER | He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. | is a Japanese composer and keyboardist best known for his contributions to the Final Fantasy video game series by Square Enix. A self-taught musician, he began playing the piano at the age of twelve, with English singer-songwriter Elton John as one of his biggest influences. Uematsu joined Square in 1986, where he first met Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. The two later worked together on many games at the company, most notably in the Final Fantasy series. After nearly two decades with Square, Uematsu left in 2004 to create his own production company and music label, Dog Ear Records. He has since composed music as a freelancer for other games, including ones developed by Square Enix and Sakaguchi's development studio, Mistwalker.
Many soundtracks and arranged albums of Uematsu's game scores have been released. Pieces from his video game works have been performed in various Final Fantasy concerts, where he has worked with Grammy Award–winning conductor Arnie Roth on several of these performances. In the 2000s, he was the keyboardist in the hard rock band The Black Mages, along with Square Enix colleagues Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito. The band played various arranged rock versions of Uematsu's Final Fantasy compositions. He has since performed with Earthbound Papas, which he formed as the successor to The Black Mages in 2011. He is sometimes referred to as the Beethoven of video game music and has made several appearances in the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame.
Biography
Early life
Uematsu was born in Kōchi, Kōchi Prefecture, Japan. A self-taught musician, he began to play the piano when he was between the ages of eleven and twelve years old, and he did not take any formal piano lessons. He has an older sister who also played the piano. After graduating from Kanagawa University with a degree in English, Uematsu played the keyboard in several amateur bands and composed music for television commercials. When Uematsu was working at a music rental shop in Tokyo, a Square employee asked if he would be interested in creating music for some of the titles they were working on. Although he agreed, Uematsu at the time considered it a side job, and he did not think it would become a full-time career. He said it was a way to make some money on the side, while also keeping his part-time job at the music rental shop.
Square (1985–2004)
Uematsu joined Square in 1985, and composed his soundtrack with Cruise Chaser Blassty in 1986. Shortly after, he met Hironobu Sakaguchi, who asked him if he wanted to create music for some of his games, to which Uematsu agreed. For the next year, he created music for a number of games which did not achieve widespread success, such as King's Knight, 3-D WorldRunner, and Rad Racer. In 1987, Uematsu and Sakaguchi collaborated on what was originally to be Sakaguchi's last contribution for Square, Final Fantasy. Final Fantasy popularity sparked Uematsu's career in video game music, and he would go on to compose music for over 30 titles, most prominently the subsequent games in the Final Fantasy series. He scored the first installment in the SaGa series, The Final Fantasy Legend, in 1989. For the second game in the series, Final Fantasy Legend II he was assisted by Kenji Ito. In late 1994, Uematsu was asked to finish the soundtrack for Chrono Trigger after Yasunori Mitsuda contracted peptic ulcers. In 1996, he co-composed the soundtrack to Front Mission: Gun Hazard, and created the entire score for DynamiTracer. He also created music for three of the games in the Hanjuku Hero series.
Outside of video games, he has composed the main theme for the 2000 animated film Ah! My Goddess: The Movie and co-composed the anime Final Fantasy: Unlimited (2001) with Final Fantasy orchestrator Shirō Hamaguchi. He also inspired the Ten Plants concept albums, and released a solo album in 1994, titled Phantasmagoria. Feeling gradually more dissatisfied and uninspired, Uematsu requested the assistance of composers Masashi Hamauzu and Junya Nakano for the score to Final Fantasy X in 2001. This marked the first time that Uematsu did not compose an entire main-series Final Fantasy soundtrack. For Final Fantasy XI from 2002, he was joined by Naoshi Mizuta, who composed the majority of the soundtrack, and Kumi Tanioka; Uematsu was responsible for only eleven tracks. In 2002, fellow Square colleagues Kenichiro Fukui and Tsuyoshi Sekito asked Uematsu to join them in forming a rock band that focused on reinterpreting and expanding on Uematsu's compositions. He declined their offer at first because he was too busy with work; however, after agreeing to perform with Fukui and Sekito in a live performance as a keyboardist, he decided to join them in making a band. Another employee at Square, Mr. Matsushita, chose the name The Black Mages for their band. In 2003, Keiji Kawamori, Arata Hanyuda, and Michio Okamiya also joined the band. The Black Mages released three studio albums and performed at several concerts.
Freelancer (2004–present)
Uematsu left Square Enix in 2004 and formed his own production company, Smile Please. He later founded the music production company and record label Dog Ear Records in 2006. The reason for Uematsu's departure was that the company moved their office from Meguro to Shinjuku, Tokyo and he was not comfortable with the new location. He also stated that he had reached an age where he should gradually take his life into his own hands. He does, however, continue to compose music as a freelancer for Square Enix. In 2005, Uematsu and several members of The Black Mages created the score for the CGI film Final Fantasy VII Advent Children. Uematsu composed only the main theme for Final Fantasy XII (2006); he was originally offered the job of creating the full score, but Hitoshi Sakimoto was eventually assigned as the main composer instead. Uematsu was also initially going to create the theme song for Final Fantasy XIII (2010). However, after being assigned the task of creating the entire score of Final Fantasy XIV, Uematsu decided to hand the job over to Hamauzu.
Uematsu also works closely with Sakaguchi's development studio Mistwalker, and has composed for Blue Dragon (2006), Lost Odyssey (2007), Away: Shuffle Dungeon (2008); The Last Story (2011); and Terra Battle (2014). He also wrote music for the cancelled game Cry On. Uematsu created the main theme for Super Smash Bros. Brawl in 2008. He then composed the music for the 2009 anime Guin Saga; this marked the first time he provided a full score for an animated series. Uematsu has contributed music and story to e-books, such as "Blik-0 1946".
Uematsu appeared five times in the top 20 of the annual Classic FM Hall of Fame. In 2012, "Aerith's Theme", written by Uematsu for Final Fantasy VII, was voted into the number 16 position in the annual Classic FM (UK) "Hall of Fame" top 300 chart. It was the first time that a piece of music written for a video game had appeared in the chart. In 2013, music from the Final Fantasy series received even greater support and was voted into the third position on the Classic FM Hall of Fame. Uematsu and his Final Fantasy music subsequently appeared at number seven in 2014, number nine in 2015, and number 17 in 2016.
In September 2018, Uematsu announced that he would take the remainder of the year off from touring and postponed his projects in order to recover from an unspecified illness. Uematsu returned to compose the main theme for Final Fantasy VII Remake in 2020. Sakaguchi said that Uematsu's work on 2021's Fantasian could be his last major game score due to health issues.
Personal life
Uematsu currently resides in Tokyo, Japan with his wife, Reiko, whom he met during college, and their beagle, Pao. They have a summer cabin in Yamanakako, Yamanashi. In his spare time, he enjoys watching professional wrestling, drinking beer, and bicycling. Uematsu has said he originally wanted to become a professional wrestler, mentioning it was a career dream when he was younger.
Concerts
Uematsu's video game compositions have been performed in numerous concerts, and various Final Fantasy concerts have also been held. Outside Japan, Uematsu's Final Fantasy music was performed live for the first time at the first event of the 2003 Symphonic Game Music Concert in Leipzig, Germany. Other events of the Symphonic Game Music Concerts featuring Final Fantasy music were held in 2004, 2006, and 2007. The concert in 2004 featured a world premiere of Those Who Fight from Final Fantasy VII. Japanese pianist Seiji Honda was invited to perform the arrangement together with the orchestra. Another world premiere was "Dancing Mad" from Final Fantasy VI, performed by orchestra, choir, and pipe organ. The event in 2007 included "Distant Worlds" from Final Fantasy XI, performed by Japanese opera soprano Izumi Masuda.
A series of successful concert performances were held in Japan, including a Final Fantasy concert series titled Tour de Japon. The first stateside concert, Dear Friends – Music from Final Fantasy, took place on May 10, 2004, at the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California, and was performed by the Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra and the Los Angeles Master Chorale. It was conducted by Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra director Miguel Harth-Bedoya. Due to a positive reception, a concert series for North America followed. On May 16, 2005, a follow-up concert called More Friends: Music from Final Fantasy was performed in Los Angeles at the Gibson Amphitheatre; the concert was conducted by Grammy Award-winning Arnie Roth.
Uematsu also made a guest appearance at A Night in Fantasia 2004 performed by the Eminence Symphony Orchestra's debut concert in October 2004 which coincided with his last day employed at Square Enix.
Uematsu's Final Fantasy music was presented in the concert Voices – Music from Final Fantasy, which took place on February 18, 2006 at the Pacifico Yokohama convention center. Star guests included Emiko Shiratori, Rikki, Izumi Masuda, and Angela Aki. The concert focused on the songs from the Final Fantasy series and was conducted by Arnie Roth. Uematsu and several of his fellow composers were in attendance at the world premiere of Play! A Video Game Symphony in Chicago on May 27, 2006; he composed the opening fanfare for the concert. He also attended the European debut in Stockholm, Sweden on June 14, 2006, the performance in Toronto on September 30, 2006, and in Florence, Italy, on October 10, 2007. The world tour Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy was held in Stockholm, and was performed by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and conducted by Arnie Roth on December 4, 2007. The second concert of the tour was held at the Rosemont Theatre near Chicago on March 1, 2008. The tour has continued, with a recent concert in Houston on July 24, 2010.
Music from Final Fantasy made up one fourth of the music in the Symphonic Fantasies concerts in Cologne in September 2009 which were produced by the creators of the Symphonic Game Music Concert series and conducted by Arnie Roth.
In February 2010, it was announced that Uematsu would appear at Anime Boston, one of the largest anime conventions on the East Coast. Uematsu did not only show up at Anime Boston, he made a surprise appearance and played with the Video Game Orchestra for the track "One Winged Angel". On top of this, he made a short visit to the prestigious Berklee College of Music for a brief Q & A session at the request of VGO founder and Berklee alumni Shota Nakama. In January 2012, Uematsu performed with his band Earthbound Papas at MAGFest X in National Harbor, MD. On November 24, 2012, Uematsu performed in a Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concert with Arnie Roth conducting the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Adelaide Philharmonia Chorus and soloists at the Adelaide Entertainment Centre. On June 14 and 15, 2013, Uematsu performed in a Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concert with Arnie Roth conducting the Vienna Volksoper Orchestra and Vienna Chamber Chorus at Konzerthaus, Vienna.
On August 18, 2013, while headlining the Fantasy Rock Festival in Kawasaki, Japan with the Earthbound Papas, he revealed to the audience that he had originally intended to name their second album "Dancing Mad" after the Final Fantasy VI track which also appears on the album. However, referring to Square Enix indirectly, he told the audience that "a certain company 'S'" had phoned and informed him that he "could not use the name". Consequently, instead of backing down he decided to name the album "Dancing Dad", as a nod to the band's name. He also told the audience that he wanted to make an album of wholly original songs, but lamented that "it's just that if there are no game songs on it, it probably wouldn't sell!"
Musical style and influences
The style of Uematsu's compositions is diverse, ranging from stately classical symphonic pieces and heavy metal to new-age and hyper-percussive techno-electronica. For example, in Lost Odyssey, the score ranges from classical orchestral arrangements to contemporary jazz and techno tracks. Uematsu has stated that he is a big fan of Celtic and Irish music, and some of his work contains elements from these musical styles. Uematsu's Final Fantasy scores vary from upbeat, to dark and angry, to melancholic in nature. For instance, the music of Final Fantasy VIII is dark and gloomy, while the soundtrack to Final Fantasy IX is more carefree and upbeat. His Final Fantasy music has been described as being able to convey the true emotion of a scene; an example is "Aerith's Theme" from Final Fantasy VII. In an interview with the Nichi Bei Times, Uematsu said "I don't really self-consciously compose music for Japan or for the world, but I do think there is something in my more melancholy pieces that has a distinctly Japanese quality." He has been named one of the "Innovators" in Time "Time 100: The Next Wave — Music" feature. He has also been called the "John Williams of the video game world" and been credited for "increasing the appreciation and awareness" of video game music.
Many of Uematsu's musical influences come from the United Kingdom and the United States. He cites Elton John as his biggest musical influence, and he has stated that he wanted to be like him. Other major inspirations include The Beatles, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Simon & Garfunkel, and progressive rock bands. In the classical genre, he cites Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky as a great influence. Uematsu has said that 1970s bands, such as Pink Floyd and King Crimson, influenced his Final Fantasy compositions. The intro to the piece "One-Winged Angel" from Final Fantasy VII was inspired by the Jimi Hendrix song "Purple Haze"; the lyrics were taken from the medieval poetry on which Carl Orff based his cantata Carmina Burana, specifically the songs "Estuans Interius", "O Fortuna", "Veni, Veni, Venias" and "Ave Formosissima". In turn, Nobuo Uematsu has had a major influence on video game music and beyond the video game industry as well. For example, "Liberi Fatali" from Final Fantasy VIII was played during the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens during the women's synchronized swimming event. From the same game, "Eyes on Me", featuring Chinese pop singer Faye Wong, sold a record 400,000 copies and was the first song from a video game to win an award at the Japan Gold Disc Awards, where it won "Song of the Year (International)" in 2000. In a 2010 interview, Uematsu said that he gets more inspiration from walking his dog than from listening to other music.
Works
All works listed below were solely composed by Uematsu unless otherwise noted.
References
External links
1959 births
Anime composers
Freelance musicians
Japanese composers
Japanese film score composers
Japanese male composers
Japanese male film score composers
Japanese rock keyboardists
Kanagawa University alumni
Living people
Musicians from Kōchi Prefecture
People from Kōchi, Kōchi
Progressive rock keyboardists
Progressive rock musicians
Square Enix people
Symphonic rock musicians
Video game composers | true | [
"The Anoa'i family, originating from American Samoa, is a family of professional wrestlers. Family members have comprised several tag teams and stables within a variety of promotions. Famous members of the family include Rosey, WWE Hall of Famer Rikishi, Umaga, WWE Hall of Famer Yokozuna, Roman Reigns, The Usos, and WWE Hall of Fame brothers Afa and Sika Anoa'i, the Wild Samoans. Peter Maivia and grandson The Rock are considered honorary members. WWE Hall of Famer & former wrestler Jimmy Snuka also married into the family through his first wife, Sharon Georgi. Snuka's daughter, Tamina Snuka, is considered as part of the family as well, and WWE Superstar Naomi married into the family by marrying Jimmy Uso.\n\nReverend Amituana'i Anoa'i and Peter Maivia were blood brothers, a connection that continued with Afa and Sika, who regard Peter as their uncle. Peter married Ofelia \"Lia\" Fuataga, who already had a daughter named Ata, whom he adopted and raised as his own. Ata married wrestler Rocky Johnson, and the couple became the parents of Dwayne Johnson, who wrestled as \"Rocky Maivia\" and \"The Rock\" before establishing himself as an actor. Peter's first cousin Joseph Fanene was the father of Savelina Fanene, who was formerly known in WWE as Nia Jax.\n\nAnoa'i Family tree\n\nOther members \nHollywood stuntman Tanoai Reed (known as Toa on the new American Gladiators) is the great nephew of wrestling promoter Lia Maivia (Peter Maivia's wife), while professional wrestler Lina Fanene (Nia Jax) is Dwayne Johnson's cousin. Sean Maluta, nephew of Afa Anoa'i, was a participant in WWE's first Cruiserweight Classic tournament.\n\nTag teams and stables\n\nThe Wild Samoans\n\nThe Headshrinkers\n\n3-Minute Warning\n\nSamoan Gangstas \n\nSamoan Gangstas was a tag team in the independent promotion World Xtreme Wrestling (WXW). The tag team consisted of members from the Anoa'i family.\n\nSamoan Gangstas was a tag team made up of brothers from another mothers Matt E. Smalls and Sweet Sammy Silk (Matt and Samu Anoa'i). Their tag team was formed in 1997 in WXW, the promotion of one half of The Wild Samoans, Samu's father and Matt's uncle Afa Anoa'i. The duo received success in WXW in the tag team division. On June 24, they won their first WXW Tag Team Championship by beating Love Connection (Sweet Daddy Jay Love and Georgie Love). However, they were temporarily suspended and the title was declared vacant. Matt was repackaged as Matty Smalls. They returned in the summer of 1997 and defeated Siberian Express (The Mad Russian and Russian Eliminator), on September 17 to win their second WXW Tag Team Championship.\n\nProblems began between Smalls and Smooth. The two partners began feuding with each other and could not focus properly on their tag title. On March 27, 1998, Smooth defeated Smalls in a Loser Leaves Town match. As a result of losing this match, Smalls was forced to leave the promotion. He left WXW while Smooth focused on a singles career. After a short while, Smalls returned to WXW and the two partners reunited again as Samoan Gangstas and began teaming in the tag team division. They feuded with several tag teams in WXW and focused to regain the WXW Tag Team Championship. However, due to their family disputes and problems with each other, they did not take part in the tournament for the vacated tag title, and instead feuded with each other. Samoan Gangstas feuded with each other after their splitting until Smalls left WXW and began wrestling as Kimo. He began teaming with Ekmo (Eddie Fatu) as The Island Boyz and the duo worked in Frontier Martial-Arts Wrestling (FMW) before signing with World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) and working in its developmental territories.\n\nThe Sons of Samoa \nThe Sons of Samoa are a tag team currently wrestling in the Puerto Rican wrestling promotion World Wrestling Council and WXW. The team consists of Afa Jr. and L.A. Smooth.\n\nThe team was formed at WXW in 1998, briefly as a stable with Samu. The team reformed in April 2009 at a WXW show with Afa Jr. and L.A. Smooth. In 2013, they began wrestling at the WWC promotion in Puerto Rico. At Euphoria 2013, they lost to Thunder and Lightning. They won the WWC World Tag Team Championship from Thunder and Lightning on February 9, before losing the titles back to Thunder and Lightning on March 30 at Camino a la Gloria. However, they won the titles on June 29, 2013, at Summer Madness.\n\nThe Usos \n\nThe Usos (born August 22, 1985) are a Samoan American professional wrestling tag team consisting of twin brothers Jimmy Uso and Jey Uso, who appear in WWE where they are former two-time WWE Tag Team Champions. They are also former five-time WWE SmackDown Tag Team Champions. The pair were previously managed by Tamina Snuka and are one-time FCW Florida Tag Team Champions.\n\nThe Bloodline \n\nThe Bloodline is a professional wrestling stable currently performing in WWE on the SmackDown brand. The group is led by Roman Reigns, who is the current WWE Universal Champion, and is also composed of The Usos, and Paul Heyman, who acts as Reigns' on-screen \"special counsel\".\n\nChampionship and accomplishments \n Afa Anoa'i\nChampionships and accomplishments\n Sika Anoa'i\nChampionships and accomplishments\n Lloyd Anoa'i\nChampionships and accomplishments\n Rikishi\n Championships and accomplishments\n Sam Fatu\n Championships and accomplishments\n Umaga\n Championships and accomplishments\n Yokozuna\n Championships and accomplishments\n Rosey\n Championships and accomplishments\n Roman Reigns\n Championships and accomplishments\n The Usos\n Championships and accomplishments\n Dwayne Johnson\n Championships and accomplishments\n Peter Maivia\n Championships and accomplishments\n Jacob Fatu\n Championships and accomplishments\n Lance Anoa'i\n Championships and accomplishments\nNia Jax\n Championships and accomplishments\n\nSee also \nList of family relations in professional wrestling\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n\nExternal links \n Samoan Dynasty\n\n \nProfessional wrestling families\nAmerican families",
"The discography of Ivy Queen, a Puerto Rican singer, consists of 10 studio albums, four compilation albums, seven EPs, one live album, 87 singles, and 57 music videos.\n\nAlbums\n\nStudio\n\n1990s\n\n2000s\n\n2010s\n\n2020s\n\nFollowing the installation of the Billboard Latin Rhythm Albums chart in 2005, reggaetón titles no longer appeared on certain charts including the Tropical Albums and Reggae Albums charts, making albums released by Queen after May 2005 ineligible for those charts.\n\nReissues\n\nCompilations\n\nExtended plays (EPs)\n\nLive\n\nChart accomplishments\n\nSingles\n\nAs lead performer\n\n1990s\n\n2000s\n\n2010s\n\n2020s\n\nPromotional singles and other charted songs\n\nAs featured performer\n\nOn January 12, 2017, Billboard updated its methodology for the Tropical Songs chart to exclude any songs that do not fit in the tropical music category.\n\nChart accomplishments\n\nAlbum appearances\n\n1990s\n\n2000s\n\n2010s\n\n2020s \n\nThe same songs have appeared on multiple different albums therefore, only the earliest album appearance is listed above. Furthermore, songs included on albums by Queen are not listed.\n\nUnreleased songs\n\nMusic videos\n\nAs lead performer\n\nAs featured performer\n\nCameo appearances\n\nLive performances\n\nAward show performances\n\nMusic festivals\n\nOther credits\n\nSee also\nList of awards and nominations received by Ivy Queen\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nDiscographies of Puerto Rican artists\nReggaeton discographies\nDiscography"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)"
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | when did they sign their first hit? | 1 | when did Martha and the Vandellas sign their first hit? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | 1962, | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | true | [
"Michael Gary Potter (born May 16, 1951 in Montebello, California) is an American former professional baseball outfielder who played from 1976 to 1977 for the St. Louis Cardinals. With no hits in 23 career at-bats, he is tied for the most career MLB at-bats by a non-pitcher without a hit.\n\nCareer\nOriginally drafted by the Detroit Tigers in the 3rd round of the 1970 amateur draft, Potter chose not to sign. However, when he was drafted by the Cardinals out of Mount San Antonio College in the sixth round of the secondary phase of the 1971 amateur draft, he did sign.\n\nPotter made his major league debut on September 6, 1976, at the age of 25. Facing pitcher Steve Dunning, Potter went 0–3 with two strikeouts in his big league debut. In 16 at-bats in his first season, Potter did not collect a single hit. However, he did walk once.\n\nHe appeared in only five games in 1977, collecting no hits in seven at-bats. In total, Potter played in 14 big league games, collecting no hits in 23 at-bats. He is tied with Larry Littleton for most career at-bats by a non-pitcher without a hit.\n\nHe played his final big league game on October 2, 1977.\n\nPotter returned to the minors to bring his professional career to a close. In the 1978 minor league season, Potter hit 22 home runs and drove in 94 RBI. On October 27, 1978, he was sent by the Cardinals to the Seattle Mariners to complete an earlier trade made on June 26, 1978. Originally, the Cardinals sent a player to be named later to the Mariners for José Báez. He hit only five home runs in 117 minor league games in 1979.\n\nReferences\n\nMajor League Baseball outfielders\nMt. SAC Mounties baseball players\nSt. Louis Cardinals players\nSt. Petersburg Cardinals players\nBaseball players from California\n1951 births\nLiving people\nSportspeople from Montebello, California",
"Matthew 12:38 is the 38th verse in the twelfth chapter of the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament.\n\nContent\nIn the original Greek according to Westcott-Hort for this verse is:\nΤότε ἀπεκρίθησάν τινες τῶν γραμματέων καὶ Φαρισαίων, λέγοντες, Διδάσκαλε, θέλομεν ἀπὸ σοῦ σημεῖον ἰδεῖν. \n\nIn the King James Version of the Bible the text reads:\nThen certain of the scribes and of the Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign from thee.\n\nThe New International Version translates the passage as:\nThen some of the Pharisees and teachers of the law said to him, \"Teacher, we want to see a miraculous sign from you.\"\n\nAnalysis\nNote Luke (11:16) includes, [a sign] from Heaven. The scribes and Pharisees mentioned here the ones which previously stated that Christ had cast out devils by the help of Beelzebub. Now they ask for a heavenly sign. According to Lapide the meaning of the scribes is as follows: \"O Christ, are in the earth and of the earth, but we wish to see celestial miracles in Heaven. For God, Whom You assert to be the Author of these miracles, dwells in Heaven. Cause, therefore, that fire may come down from Heaven, as Elijah did; or that the sky may flash with new and marvellous thunders and lightnings, as Samuel did (1 Sam. 7:10); or that the sun should stand still, as Joshua did.\"\n\nCommentary from the Church Fathers\nChrysostom: \" Because the Lord had so oft repressed the shameless tongue of the Pharisees by His sayings, they now turn to His works, whereat the Evangelist wondering, says, Then certain of the Scribes and Pharisees answered, saying, Master, we would see a sign of thee; and that at a time when they should have been moved, when they should have wondered, and been dumb with astonishment; yet even at such time they desist not from their malice. For they say, We would see a sign of thee, that they may take Him as in a snare.\"\n\nJerome: \"They require a sign of Him, as though what they had seen were not signs; and in another Evangelist what they required is more fully expressed, We would see of thee a sign from heaven. Either they would have fire from heaven as Elias did; or after the example of Samuel they would that in summer-time, contrary to the nature of the climate, thunder should be heard, lightnings gleam, and rain descend; as though they could not have spoken falsely even against such miracles, and said that they befel by reason of divers hidden motions in the air. For if thou cavillest against what thou not only beholdest with thine eyes, but feelest with thine hand, and reapest the benefit of, what wilt thou do in those things which come down from heaven. You might make answer, that in Egypt the magi also had given many signs from heaven.\"\n\nChrysostom: \"But their words are full of hypocrisy and irony. But now they were railing against Him, saying that He had a dæmon; now they fawn upon Him, calling Him, Master. Wherefore the Lord rebukes them severely; He answered and said unto them, An evil and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign. When they railed on Him, He had answered them mildly; now they approached Him with smooth and deceitful words, He rebukes them sharply; showing that He was above either affection, and was neither moved to anger by evil speaking, nor was to be gained by flattery. What He says is this; What wonder that ye do thus to Me who am unknown to you, when you have done the same to the Father, of whom ye have had such large knowledge, in that, despising Him ye went after dæmons? He calls them an evil generation, because they have ever been ungrateful to their benefactors, and were made worse when they received benefits, which is the extreme of wickedness.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nOther translations of Matthew 12:38 at BibleHub\n\n12:38"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)",
"when did they sign their first hit?",
"1962,"
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | What were some of their major hits? | 2 | What were some of the major hits of Martha and the Vandellas? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | true | [
"Now That's What I Call Classic Rock Hits is one of many genre-themed compilation albums from the Now! series in the United States, this one focusing on popular classic rock songs from the 1970s. It was released on May 1, 2012.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReception\n\nIn his review for Allmusic, Gregory Heaney says \"the Now series delivers a dose of good ol' classic rock with Now That's What I Call Classic Rock Hits,\" which \"gathers some of rock's most enduring crossover hits.\" Now That's What I Call Classic Rock Hits is \"an album that achieves its primary goal of being able to please most of the people most of the time with a wide-ranging selection of hits that should fit into most anyone's definition of classic rock.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Official U.S. Now That's What I Call Music website\n\n2012 compilation albums\nClassic Rock Hits\nEMI Records compilation albums",
"Greatest Hits 1982–1989 is the third greatest hits album, and twentieth album overall, by the American band Chicago, released by Full Moon/Reprise Records on November 21, 1989. Spanning from Chicago 16 in 1982 to Chicago 19 in 1988, the set includes founding vocalist Peter Cetera and his successor Jason Scheff. It includes a remix of \"What Kind of Man Would I Be?\".\n\nA variation titled The Heart of... Chicago was issued in countries outside North America, with similar artwork but a different track list including four songs originally released on the Columbia record label.\n\nTrack listing Greatest Hits 1982–1989 \n\"Hard to Say I'm Sorry/Get Away\" (Peter Cetera, David Foster, Robert Lamm) – 5:07\n\"Look Away\" (Diane Warren) – 4:03\n\"Stay the Night\" (Cetera, Foster) – 3:49\n\"Will You Still Love Me?\" (Foster, Tom Keane, Richard Baskin) – 5:43\n\"Love Me Tomorrow\" (Cetera, Foster) – 5:06\n\"What Kind of Man Would I Be?\" (Remix) (Jason Scheff, Chas Sandford, Bobby Caldwell) – 4:14\n\"You're the Inspiration\" (Cetera, Foster) – 3:50\n\"I Don't Wanna Live Without Your Love\" (Warren, Albert Hammond) – 3:52\n\"Hard Habit to Break\" (Steve Kipner, Jon Parker) – 4:44\n\"Along Comes a Woman\" (Cetera, Mark Goldenberg) – 4:16\n\"If She Would Have Been Faithful...\" (Kipner, Randy Goodrum) – 3:53\n\"We Can Last Forever\" (Scheff, John Dexter) – 3:44\n\nUnlike the two previous Greatest Hits releases, all of the songs were released in their album lengths, except \"What Kind of Man Would I Be?\". Some US copies on vinyl, and possibly CD copies as well, list \"Along Comes a Woman\" but actually contain \"Remember the Feeling\" (originally the flipside of \"Hard Habit to Break\").\n\nTrack listing The Heart of... Chicago\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nCertifications\n\nGreatest Hits 1982–1989\n\nThe Heart of... Chicago\n\nSingles\n\nReferences\n\n1989 greatest hits albums\nAlbums produced by David Foster\nAlbums produced by Ron Nevison\nChicago (band) compilation albums"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)",
"when did they sign their first hit?",
"1962,",
"What were some of their major hits?",
"Their second hit, \"Heat Wave\", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100"
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | what was their first debut song? | 3 | what was the first debut song of Martha and the Vandellas? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | true | [
"\"What Do I Know\" is a song recorded by American country music band Ricochet. It was released on December 4, 1995, as their debut single, and was served as the first single from their self-titled debut album. The song reached #5 on the Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart in April 1996. It was written by Stephony Smith, Sunny Russ and Cathy Majeski.\n\nCritical reception\nIn a summary of the band's career, Billboard magazine called the song a \"harmony-laden ballad.\"\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nOther recordings\n \"What Do I Know\" was recorded by country singer Linda Davis, appearing on her 1996 album Some Things Are Meant to Be.\n\nReferences\n\n1995 debut singles\n1995 songs\nRicochet (band) songs\nSongs written by Cathy Majeski\nSongs written by Sunny Russ\nSongs written by Stephony Smith\nSong recordings produced by Ron Chancey\nColumbia Records singles",
"\"What a Night\" is a song performed by British band, Loveable Rogues. It was their debut single and was intended to feature on a debut album. The single was released in Ireland and the United Kingdom on 19 April 2013. The band were dropped from Syco in October 2013, but the single was featured on their debut album This and That, released in 2014 on Super Duper Records.\n\nBackground\nLoveable Rogues first announced that they're signed to Syco on June, 2012. In late 2012, the band released a free mixtape through their Soundcloud channel. The collection of songs was released as a free download and was called 'First Things First'. \"What A Night\" was previewed along with new songs such as \"Maybe Baby\", \"Talking Monkeys\" and \"Honest\".\n\nMusic video\n\nTwo teaser videos were released before the music video. The first teaser video was uploaded to their Vevo channel on 11 February 2013. The second teaser released two days after or a week before the music video released; on 19 February 2013, the music video was uploaded to their Vevo channel.\nThe video features the band having a night party with their friends.\n\nChart performance\n\"What a Night\" debuted on the UK Singles Chart at number 9 on 27 April 2013 after debuting at number 5 on the UK Singles Chart Update.\n\nTrack listing\nDigital download\n What a Night - 2:50\n Nuthouse - 3:58\n What a Night (feat. Lucky Mason) Sonny J Mason Remix] - 3:41\n What a Night (Supasound Radio Remix) - 2:42\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2013 debut singles\n2013 songs\nSyco Music singles\nSong recordings produced by Red Triangle (production team)\nSongs written by Rick Parkhouse\nSongs written by George Tizzard"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)",
"when did they sign their first hit?",
"1962,",
"What were some of their major hits?",
"Their second hit, \"Heat Wave\", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100",
"what was their first debut song?",
"\"Come and Get These Memories\". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording,"
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | Did they get on any billboards or charts with their music? | 4 | Did Martha and the Vandellas get on any billboards or charts with their music? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | true | [
"\"Live for the Night\" is a single by American electronic dance music band Krewella. The song was released on July 2, 2013 for digital download and streaming. It is the fourth single from their debut album Get Wet, the first of which did not appear in one of their previous extended plays Play Hard or Play Harder. The song was written by band members Kris Trindl, Yasmine Yousaf and Jahan Yousaf, along with Nicholas Ditri and Daniel Boselovic, whilst production was handled by the electronic music trio Cash Cash, who also assisted in writing the song. It reached number one on Billboards Dance Club Songs chart in its October 19, 2013 issue.\n\nBackground\nKrewella's debut album Get Wet was released on September 20, 2013. It spawned three singles prior to the release of \"Live for the Night\" these being \"Killin' It\", \"Alive\", and \"Come & Get It\".\n\nPromotion\nA set of remixes by Pegboard Nerds, Xilent, Dash Berlin, W&W, Danny Avila & Deniz Koyu was released on November 4, 2013.\n\nMusic video\nThe audio and lyric videos were released on the same day as the single's release, with the audio video being released via Proximity and the lyric video being released via KrewellaMusicVEVO, both on YouTube.\nThe music video was released on August 1, 2013. The music video features Krewella cutting off the power to a town and luring the people to a secret concert at the power plant where they are no longer slaves to the various electronic devices that distract them all day long.\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences \n\n2013 singles\n2013 songs\nColumbia Records singles\nKrewella songs",
"\"He\" is a song about God, written in 1954. The song made the popular music charts the following year.\n\nThe music was written by Jack Richards, with lyrics by Richard Mullan. The song was originally published by Avas Music Publishing, Inc.\n\nBackground\nThe final lines in the two verses state:\n\n\"Though it makes him sad\nto see the way we live,\nHe'll always say: \"I Forgive\".\n\nFirst recordings\nThe first recording to be released was by Al Hibbler, whose version reached No. 4 on Billboards chart of Best Sellers in Stores, No. 7 on Billboards Top 100, No. 7 on Billboards chart of Most Played by Jockeys, and No. 8 on Billboards chart of Most Played in Juke Boxes. Despite its popularity with listeners to Radio Luxenbourg, the song never reached the British charts - mainly due to the ban imposed by the BBC on popular songs with what they termed pseudo-religious lyrics and both Hibbler's and the version by the McGuire Sisters lost out due to that decision.\n\nThe McGuire Sisters also released a version of the song in 1955, which reached No. 10 on Billboards chart of Most Played in Juke Boxes, No. 12 on Billboards Top 100, No. 12 on Billboards chart of Best Sellers in Stores, and No. 16 on Billboards chart of Most Played by Jockeys.\n\nThe song was ranked No. 33 on Billboards ranking of \"1955's Top Tunes\", based on the Honor Roll of Hits and No. 34 on Billboards ranking of \"1956's Top Tunes\".\n\nOther recordings\nAndy Williams released a version on his 1960 album, The Village of St. Bernadette.\nThe Righteous Brothers released a version of the song in 1966, which spent eight weeks on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, peaking at No. 18.\nDiana Ross & The Supremes covered the song for In Loving Memory, a 1968 gospel compilation featuring Motown Records artists.\nElvis Presley recorded the song in 1960 at his home in Bel Air.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Lyrics of this song\n \n \n\n1954 songs\n1955 singles\n1966 singles\nThe McGuire Sisters songs\nThe Righteous Brothers songs\nAndy Williams songs\nDecca Records singles\nCoral Records singles\nVerve Records singles\nNumber-one singles in Australia\nSongs about God\nChristian songs\nGospel songs\nSongs banned by the BBC"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)",
"when did they sign their first hit?",
"1962,",
"What were some of their major hits?",
"Their second hit, \"Heat Wave\", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100",
"what was their first debut song?",
"\"Come and Get These Memories\". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording,",
"Did they get on any billboards or charts with their music?",
"The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, \"Quicksand"
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | What were some of their other songs? | 5 | What were some other songs of Martha and the Vandellas besides "Heat Wave", and Quicksand? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | false | [
"Inception/Nostalgia is a 1970 compilation album of previously unreleased songs recorded by the Bee Gees in 1966. This double album contains a mixture of both self-penned songs and covers. The first LP in the set is titled Inception while the second LP is titled Nostalgia, hence the album title. Supposedly intended as a follow-up to the three volumes of Rare, Precious and Beautiful this set was first issued by Karussell in Germany and by Triumph in France, both being Polydor budget labels and therefore linked to their licensing deal with Festival Records. The Gibb brothers were unaware of its release until Maurice saw one during a skiing holiday in Switzerland. It did not remain in print for long but it was released by Polydor in Japan in 1972 as Inception and Nostalgia and a number of single disc releases with a varying selection of these songs appeared on a number of compilations across the world over the next few years.\n\nBackground\nThe original songs, those written by one or more Gibb brother, were all written and recorded during or shortly after the recording of what made up the Spicks and Specks album at Ossie Byrne's recording studio in Hurstville. Those twelve songs could have made up the contents of a subsequent Bee Gees album, but were ultimately turned over as demos for other artists to record, among them Ronnie Burns who promptly used eight of their songs for his 1967 album \"Ronnie\", including \"All the King's Horses\" of which the Bee Gees version remains unreleased.\n\"Lonely Winter\" was part of a deal with the band Steve & the Board to each record a song written by a member of the other band, Barry Gibb in turn supplied them with \"Little Miss Rhythm & Blues\". The brothers also took time to record a number of covers of songs by The Beatles as well as the Lovin' Spoonful, but for what purpose is unknown. Two additional songs from this batch, the Walker Brothers' \"Another Tear Falls\" and The Beatles' \"If I Needed Someone\", still remain unreleased.\nAt some point during their recording sessions the brothers found some orchestral backing tracks to which they added lead vocals with no intention of releasing them.\n\nTrack listing\n\nCD release\nAlthough no official reissue of this album has been made available on CD ten of the tracks were included on Birth of Brilliance issued by Festival Records in 1994, itself being a reissue of the 1978 double LP on the Infinity label. It was superseded in 1998 by another Festival compilation with the confusingly similar title of Brilliant from Birth which included 63 of their Australian recordings, including all of the songs from Inception/Nostalgia. The song writing credits on the Brilliant from Birth set has some inaccuracies as does the liner notes.\n\nReferences\n\nBee Gees compilation albums\n1970 compilation albums",
"Led Zeppelin were an English rock band who recorded 108 songs between 1968 and 1980. The band pioneered the concept of album-oriented rock and often refused to release popular songs as singles, instead viewing their albums as indivisible, complete listening experiences, and disliked record labels re-editing their songs for single releases.\n\nTheir self-titled debut album, Led Zeppelin, released in early 1969, contained songs that were influenced by the genres of blues, hard rock and heavy metal. Led Zeppelin II, released in October 1969, built upon their debut with a more direct, hard-hitting sound that has become a blueprint for heavy metal bands. Led Zeppelin III (1970) marked a musical growth for the band; half of its songs were hard rockers while the other half were built upon folk and acoustic music that gave it \"extra depth\". \"Immigrant Song\", released as a single, was backed by the band's only non-album single, \"Hey, Hey, What Can I Do\". Their untitled fourth album, commonly referred to as Led Zeppelin IV, was released in November 1971. Bringing together all the genres from their previous albums, the album contains some of the band's best-known songs, including \"Black Dog\", \"Rock and Roll\", \"Going to California\" and \"Stairway to Heaven\", referred to as one of the greatest rock songs of all time.\n\nThe band's following albums, Houses of the Holy (1973) and Physical Graffiti (1975), continued the band's musical growth. Houses of the Holy contained a wider range of musical styles, from the ballad \"The Rain Song\" to the funk-inspired \"The Crunge\", while Physical Graffiti was a double album that contained new songs as well as unreleased outtakes from previous albums. The album, like its predecessor, contained a variety of musical styles, including hard rock, funk, acoustic rock, blues, soft and progressive rock, and even country rock. Presence (1976) marked a departure from their previous albums by featuring more straightforward, guitar-driven songs with less emphasis on musical experimentation. In Through the Out Door (1979), a direct contrast to Presence, featured a keyboard-heavy sound that was dominated by Jones. The album would prove to be their last as a band, as after Bonham's death in September 1980, the remaining members decided to disband the group. Coda (1982) is a collection of outtakes from various sessions during the band's career.\n\nSince their breakup, 26 songs have seen official release. The Led Zeppelin Boxed Set (1990) saw the release of the band's cover of Robert Johnson's \"Travelling Riverside Blues\", the live medley \"White Summer/Black Mountain Side\", and the first album release of \"Hey, Hey, What Can I Do?\"; the second boxed set (1993) saw the release of \"Baby Come On Home\". New songs were also released on BBC Sessions (1997) and its remaster, The Complete BBC Sessions (2015), 2003's Led Zeppelin DVD and the live album How the West Was Won (2003). After the release of the concert film Celebration Day (2012), Page announced the remastering of the band's discography in the form of deluxe editions, which together included 13 previously unreleased songs, some of which were different mixes of previously released songs. The albums were released between 2014 and 2015.\n\nSongs\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nBibliography\n\nExternal links\n Led Zeppelin discography\n\n \nBritish music-related lists\nLed Zeppelin"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)",
"when did they sign their first hit?",
"1962,",
"What were some of their major hits?",
"Their second hit, \"Heat Wave\", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100",
"what was their first debut song?",
"\"Come and Get These Memories\". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording,",
"Did they get on any billboards or charts with their music?",
"The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, \"Quicksand",
"What were some of their other songs?",
"The next two singles, \"Live Wire\" and \"In My Lonely Room\" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40."
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | Where there any other singles they performed? | 6 | Where there any other singles Martha and the Vandellas performed besides "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room"? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" ( | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | true | [
"\"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" is a song by Canadian singer Celine Dion. It was included on her first English-language album, Unison (1990). \"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" was released by Columbia Records as the album's lead single in Canada on 26 March 1990. The next year, it was issued as the second single in other countries. The song was written by Paul Bliss, while production was handled by Christopher Neil.\n\nAfter its release, \"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" received positive reviews from music critics. The song peaked at number 23 in Canada and number 35 on the US Billboard Hot 100. Additionally, it became a success on the adult contemporary charts, reaching number eight in the United States and number 12 in Canada. Two accompanying music videos for the song were filmed. Dion performed \"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" during her Unison Tour (1990–91).\n\nBackground and release\nIn 1990, Dion was preparing to issue her first English-language album, Unison. After releasing various French-language albums in Canada and France in the '80s, she recorded new English songs in London, Los Angeles and New York. At first, Unison was released in Canada, and \"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" was chosen as its lead single. Written by British musician, Paul Bliss, and produced by British record producer, Christopher Neil, it was issued on 26 March 1990.\n\nOne year later on 18 March 1991, \"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" was released as the second single in the United States after \"Where Does My Heart Beat Now\". For the US market the single was remixed by Walter Afanasieff. This US version features a different audio mix from the Canadian single version and the album version: reverb has been applied throughout (most noticeably to Dion's vocal track), the guitars have been rebalanced so that they are less audible in some places in the song and more prominent in others, the drum track features \"rimshot\" effects during the chorus, additional synthesizer lines have been overdubbed onto the existing keyboard track (most noticeably in the bar before the instrumental break), and the fadeout has been slightly extended in length. It was also used in the American music video of the song that year. Additionally \"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" was remixed by Daniel Abraham, a French record producer living in New York. His dance remixes appeared on a promotional US single.\n\n\"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" was also released as a single in selected European countries, Australia, and Japan in June 1991.\n\nCritical reception\nAllMusic's senior editor Stephen Thomas Erlewine picked the song as an album standout along with \"Where Does My Heart Beat Now\". Larry Flick from Billboard noted that Dion \"continues to soar\" with a \"spirited, up-tempo\" song. He complimented the \"crystalline production and shimmering backup vocal support combined with a passionate lead performance\". Dave Sholin from the Gavin Report wrote about the song: \"Nothing like witnessing the growth and development of a genuine artist. Celine definitely falls into that category, capturing the hearts of Americans the way she's been doing in her native Canada for the past several years. Switching from torch song to snappy rhythm affords listeners an opportunity to hear another side of this wonderful talent\". Music & Media noted that \"talented Canadian chanteuse enters the Whitney Houston racket\" and described it as \"satisfying AC pop.\" Christopher Smith from TalkAboutPopMusic described it as a \"pop-soft rock mid tempo number\".\n\nCommercial performance\nIn Canada \"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" entered the RPM Top Singles chart on 31 March 1990 and peaked at number twenty-three on 9 June 1990. The song also entered the RPM Adult Contemporary chart on 24 March 1990 and reached number twelve there. In the United States \"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" debuted on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, dated 6 April 1991, and peaked at number thirty-five on 1 June 1991. The track also entered Billboards Adult Contemporary chart dated 30 March 1991, reaching number eight.\n\nMusic video\nThere were two music videos made for the song. The first one was directed by Derek Case and released in March 1990 for the Canadian market. The second one was filmed for the US market in Los Angeles, California, and Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It was directed by Dominic Orlando and premiered in March 1991. The two videos were included separately on Dion's 1991 home video Unison, depending on the Canadian or US release.\n\nLive performances\nDion performed \"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" on a few Canadian television shows in 1990. She also sang it on the Canadian/US variety show, Super Dave and performed it in Norway in 1991. It was included in her Unison Tour as well.\n\nTrack listings and formatsAustralian 7\", cassette, CD / Canadian 7\" single\"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" – 3:59\n\"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" (Instrumental) – 3:59Canadian cassette / European 3\", 7\" / Japanese 3\" single\"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" – 3:59\n\"I'm Loving Every Moment With You\" – 4:08European 12\", CD single\"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" – 3:59\n\"I'm Loving Every Moment With You\" – 4:08\n\"If We Could Start Over\" – 4:23US 7\" single\"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" – 3:59\n\"Where Does My Heart Beat Now\" – 4:33US cassette single\"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" (Walter Afanasieff Remix) – 4:13\n\"Where Does My Heart Beat Now\" – 4:33US promotional CD single'\n\"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" (Daniel Abraham's 7\" Remix) – 3:54\n\"(If There Was) Any Other Way\" (Daniel Abraham's 12\" Remix) – 5:39\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCredits and personnel\nRecording\nRecorded at West Side Studios, London\n\nPersonnel\nCeline Dion – lead and backing vocals\nChristopher Neil – producer, backing vocals\nPhil Palmer – guitars\nPaul Bliss – songwriter, drums, keyboard programming, backing vocals\nSimon Hurrell – engineer\nWalter Afanasieff – additional producer, keyboards, percussion (Remix only)\nDaniel Abraham – additional producer (Dance Remix only)\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1990 singles\n1990 songs\nCeline Dion songs\nColumbia Records singles\nDance-pop songs\nEpic Records singles\nSong recordings produced by Christopher Neil",
"\"If There's Any Justice\" is the first single taken from British R&B singer Lemar's second album, Time to Grow (2004). Originally offered to Hear'Say, the song was rejected by the group after they decided it was \"too mature\" for them. It would eventually become a top-10 hit for Lemar, peaking at 3 on the UK Singles Chart, his fourth in a row to reach the top 10. Outside the UK, the song reached No. 1 in Hungary and entered the top 40 in France, Ireland, and New Zealand.\n\nLyrical content\nThe lyrics refer to Lemar being in love with a girl who already has a man. He claims that if he had met her first, he would be her man instead. He is making it clear in the song that he feels that there is no justice in the world because of this fact.\n\nCover versions\nDutch singer Floortje Smit covered the song—retitled \"Justice\"—for her debut album \"Fearless\". James Blunt performed an acoustic version of the song on BBC Radio 1's Live Lounge (part of Jo Wiley's show), later released on the compilation album \"Radio 1's Live Lounge\".\n\nTrack listings\n UK CD1\n \"If There's Any Justice\" (radio edit) – 3:29\n \"If There's Any Justice\" (Ron G remix featuring Cassidy) – 3:55\n\n UK CD2\n \"If There's Any Justice\" (album version) – 3:49\n \"If There's Any Justice\" (5am remix featuring Cassidy) – 3:34\n \"All I Ever Do/My Boo (Part II)\" – 4:12\n \"If There's Any Justice\" (video) – 3:49\n\n UK 12-inch vinyl\nA1. \"If There's Any Justice\" (Kardinal Beats remix featuring Cassidy) – 3:34\nA2. \"If There's Any Justice\" (Ron G remix featuring Cassidy) – 3:53\nA3. \"If There's Any Justice\" (Cutfather & Joe remix featuring Cassidy) – 3:17\nB1. \"If There's Any Justice\" (5am remix featuring Cassidy) – 3:34\nB2. \"If There's Any Justice\" (First Man remix) – 3:30\nB3. \"If There's Any Justice\" (accapella) – 3:40\n\nCharts and certifications\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCertifications\n\nReferences\n\n2004 singles\n2004 songs\nLemar songs\nNumber-one singles in Hungary\nSongs written by Mick Leeson\nSongs written by Peter Vale\nSony Music UK singles"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)",
"when did they sign their first hit?",
"1962,",
"What were some of their major hits?",
"Their second hit, \"Heat Wave\", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100",
"what was their first debut song?",
"\"Come and Get These Memories\". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording,",
"Did they get on any billboards or charts with their music?",
"The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, \"Quicksand",
"What were some of their other songs?",
"The next two singles, \"Live Wire\" and \"In My Lonely Room\" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40.",
"Where there any other singles they performed?",
"singles like \"Wild One\" (US #34), \"Nowhere to Run\" (US #8; UK #26), \"Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)\" (US #70; R&B #22), \"You've Been in Love Too Long\" ("
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | Did any of the group leave during the hit years? | 7 | Did any of the group of Martha and the Vandellas leave during the hit years? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | true | [
"Below is a list of awards received by Twins since they were formed in 2001 as a cantopop girl group. They average to receive about 2-3 awards in each Hong Kong music awards. Their major accomplishment is in 2007 when they received the Asia Pacific Most Popular Female Artist Award from Jade Solid Gold Top 10 Awards.\n\nBecause of the Edison Chen photo scandal in 2008, Gillian took a short leave from the group. And thus the group did not record any songs or receive any awards between March 2008 to 2009.\n\nCommercial Radio Hong Kong Ultimate Song Chart Awards\nThe Ultimate Song Chart Awards Presentation (叱咤樂壇流行榜頒獎典禮) is a cantopop award ceremony from one of the famous channel in Commercial Radio Hong Kong known as Ultimate 903 (FM 90.3). Unlike other cantopop award ceremonies, this one is judged based on the popularity of the song/artist on the actual radio show.\n\nGlobal Chinese Music Awards\n\nIFPI Hong Kong Sales Awards\nIFPI Awards is given to artists base on the sales in Hong Kong at the end of the year.\n\nJade Solid Gold Top 10 Awards\nThe Jade Solid Gold Songs Awards Ceremony(十大勁歌金曲頒獎典禮) is held annually in Hong Kong since 1984. The awards are based on Jade Solid Gold show on TVB.\n\nMetro Radio Mandarin Music Awards\n\nMetro Showbiz Hit Awards\nThe Metro Showbiz Hit Awards (新城勁爆頒獎禮) is held in Hong Kong annually by Metro Showbiz radio station. It focus mostly in cantopop music.\n\nRTHK Top 10 Gold Songs Awards\nThe RTHK Top 10 Gold Songs Awards Ceremony(十大中文金曲頒獎音樂會) is held annually in Hong Kong since 1978. The awards are determined by Radio and Television Hong Kong based on the work of all Asian artists (mostly cantopop) for the previous year.\n\nSprite Music Awards\nThe Sprite Music Awards Ceremony is an annual event given by Sprite China for work artists performed in previous years; awards received on 2008 are actually for the work and accomplishment for 2007.\n\nReferences\n\nTwins\nCantopop",
"House of Lords is the fourth album by Lords of the Underground, their first album in eight years. The album was released on August 21, 2007 for Affluent Records and was produced by Marley Marl, K-Def and DJ Lord Jazz. Like the group's previous album Resurrection the album received very little promotion and was a commercial failure, and it did not make it to the Billboard charts nor did it produce any hit singles.\n\nTrack listing\n\"Intro\"- 0:44\n\"I Love Hip Hop\"- 3:14\n\"Fab 3\"- 3:22\n\"English Mami\"- 3:38\n\"Yes Were Fresh\"- 3:20\n\"Belly of the Beast\"- 3:53\n\"Hum It Out\"- 3:22\n\"Slick Talk\"- 3:25\n\"Say My Name\"- 3:54\n\"No Pass\"- 2:37\n\"To Love Me\"- 4:02\n\"The Clinic\"- 3:32\n\"Certified\"- 2:47\n\"What Yall Wanna Know\"- 3:26\n\"What Is an MC\"- 3:21\n\"Remember Me\"- 3:39\n\nLords of the Underground albums\n2007 albums"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)",
"when did they sign their first hit?",
"1962,",
"What were some of their major hits?",
"Their second hit, \"Heat Wave\", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100",
"what was their first debut song?",
"\"Come and Get These Memories\". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording,",
"Did they get on any billboards or charts with their music?",
"The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, \"Quicksand",
"What were some of their other songs?",
"The next two singles, \"Live Wire\" and \"In My Lonely Room\" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40.",
"Where there any other singles they performed?",
"singles like \"Wild One\" (US #34), \"Nowhere to Run\" (US #8; UK #26), \"Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)\" (US #70; R&B #22), \"You've Been in Love Too Long\" (",
"Did any of the group leave during the hit years?",
"Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave"
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | Did she ever come back? | 8 | Did Martha and the Vandellas ever come back? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | true | [
"Blackface is a studio album by the R&B group Shai. It is the follow-up to their debut album ...If I Ever Fall in Love.\n\nTrack listing \n\"Come with Me\" – 4:39\n\"During the Storm\" – 4:38\n\"I Don't Wanna Be Alone\" – 4:54\n\"Mr. Turn U Out\" – 4:40\n\"Concert a (The Hidden One)\" – 1:57\n\"Falling\" – 5:11\n\"Planet Solitude\" – 1:12\n\"Did You Know\" – 4:00\n\"To Get to Know You\" – 4:00\n\"Let's Go Back\" – 4:22\n\"Will I Find Someone\" – 3:53\n\"95\" – 3:23\n\"The Place Where You Belong\" – 4:21\n\"If I Gave (A Confession of Hope)\" – 2:07\n\nSingles\nThe Place Where You Belong - August 2, 1994 \nCome With Me - September 26, 1995 \nI Don't Wanna Be Alone - April 9, 1996\n\nFormats\nCassette - October 17, 1995, MCA\nUK Release - December 23, 1999, Universal\nJapan Release - December 2, 2003, Victor\n\n1995 albums\nMCA Records albums\nShai (band) albums",
"Wooden Head is a compilation album by the American rock band the Turtles, consisting of B-sides and previously unreleased songs mostly recorded in the group's early years and in some cases left unfinished.\n\nBackground\nWooden Head was first released in 1970 on White Whale Records. It was re-released on vinyl by Rhino Records, which took the opportunity to change the track listing to avoid duplicates in 1984 (RNLP 154). The album was again reissued as a compact disc in 1993 by Repertoire Records, and included seven bonus tracks.\n\nTrack listing\n\"I Can't Stop\" (Lambert) – 2:04\n\"She'll Come Back\" (Howard Kaylan) – 2:38\n\"Get Away\" (Portz, Portz) – 2:10\n\"Wrong from the Start\" (Gordon Waller, Peter Asher) – 2:15\n\"I Get Out of Breath\" (P.F. Sloan, Steve Barri) – 3:12\n\"We'll Meet Again\" (Hughie Charles, Ross Parker) – 2:20\n\"On a Summer's Day\" (Al Nichol) – 3:34\n\"Come Back\" (Howard Kaylan) – 2:22\n\"Say Girl\" (Nichol, Portz, Portz) – 2:06\n\"Tie Me Down\" (David Gates) – 2:03\n\"Wanderin' Kind\" (Howard Kaylan) – 2:06\n\nBonus tracks\n\"Ain't Gonna Party No More\" – 4:55 (recorded 1969)\n\"Who Would Ever Think That I Would Marry Margaret\" – 2:04 (recorded 1969)\n\"Is It Any Wonder\" – 2:32 (recorded 1967)\n\"There You Sit Lonely\" – 3:44 (recorded late 1969)\n\"Cat in the Window\" – 1:39 (recorded 1967)\n\"Like It or Not\" – 3:43 (recorded 1969)\n\"You Want to Be a Woman\" – 3:26 (recorded 1969)\n\nRhino LP release track listing\n\nSide one\n\"I Can't Stop\" - 2:06\n\"Grim Reaper of Love\" - 2:41\n\"She'll Come Back\" - 2:38\n\"Is It Any Wonder\" - 2:28\n\"On a Summer's Day\" - 3:37\n\"Come Back\" - 2:24\n\nSide two\n\"Get Away\" - 2:10\n\"I Get Out of Breath\" - 3:15\n\"Tie Me Down\" - 2:03\n\"Wrong from the Start\" - 2:15\n\"Say Girl\" - 2:06\n\"We'll Meet Again\" - 2:20\n\nReferences\n\nThe Turtles albums\nB-side compilation albums\n1969 compilation albums\nAlbums produced by Bones Howe\nWhite Whale Records compilation albums"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)",
"when did they sign their first hit?",
"1962,",
"What were some of their major hits?",
"Their second hit, \"Heat Wave\", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100",
"what was their first debut song?",
"\"Come and Get These Memories\". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording,",
"Did they get on any billboards or charts with their music?",
"The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, \"Quicksand",
"What were some of their other songs?",
"The next two singles, \"Live Wire\" and \"In My Lonely Room\" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40.",
"Where there any other singles they performed?",
"singles like \"Wild One\" (US #34), \"Nowhere to Run\" (US #8; UK #26), \"Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)\" (US #70; R&B #22), \"You've Been in Love Too Long\" (",
"Did any of the group leave during the hit years?",
"Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave",
"Did she ever come back?",
"Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise."
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 9 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article besides the hits of Martha and the Vandellas? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | true | [
"Přírodní park Třebíčsko (before Oblast klidu Třebíčsko) is a natural park near Třebíč in the Czech Republic. There are many interesting plants. The park was founded in 1983.\n\nKobylinec and Ptáčovský kopeček\n\nKobylinec is a natural monument situated ca 0,5 km from the village of Trnava.\nThe area of this monument is 0,44 ha. Pulsatilla grandis can be found here and in the Ptáčovský kopeček park near Ptáčov near Třebíč. Both monuments are very popular for tourists.\n\nPonds\n\nIn the natural park there are some interesting ponds such as Velký Bor, Malý Bor, Buršík near Přeckov and a brook Březinka. Dams on the brook are examples of European beaver activity.\n\nSyenitové skály near Pocoucov\n\nSyenitové skály (rocks of syenit) near Pocoucov is one of famed locations. There are interesting granite boulders. The area of the reservation is 0,77 ha.\n\nExternal links\nParts of this article or all article was translated from Czech. The original article is :cs:Přírodní park Třebíčsko.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nNature near the village Trnava which is there\n\nTřebíč\nParks in the Czech Republic\nTourist attractions in the Vysočina Region",
"Damn Interesting is an independent website founded by Alan Bellows in 2005. The website presents true stories from science, history, and psychology, primarily as long-form articles, often illustrated with original artwork. Works are written by various authors, and published at irregular intervals. The website openly rejects advertising, relying on reader and listener donations to cover operating costs.\n\nAs of October 2012, each article is also published as a podcast under the same name. In November 2019, a second podcast was launched under the title Damn Interesting Week, featuring unscripted commentary on an assortment of news articles featured on the website's \"Curated Links\" section that week. In mid-2020, a third podcast called Damn Interesting Curio Cabinet began highlighting the website's periodic short-form articles in the same radioplay format as the original podcast.\n\nIn July 2009, Damn Interesting published the print book Alien Hand Syndrome through Workman Publishing. It contains some favorites from the site and some exclusive content.\n\nAwards and recognition \nIn August 2007, PC Magazine named Damn Interesting one of the \"Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites\".\nThe article \"The Zero-Armed Bandit\" by Alan Bellows won a 2015 Sidney Award from David Brooks in The New York Times.\nThe article \"Ghoulish Acts and Dastardly Deeds\" by Alan Bellows was cited as \"nonfiction journalism from 2017 that will stand the test of time\" by Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic.\nThe article \"Dupes and Duplicity\" by Jennifer Lee Noonan won a 2020 Sidney Award from David Brooks in the New York Times.\n\nAccusing The Dollop of plagiarism \n\nOn July 9, 2015, Bellows posted an open letter accusing The Dollop, a comedy podcast about history, of plagiarism due to their repeated use of verbatim text from Damn Interesting articles without permission or attribution. Dave Anthony, the writer of The Dollop, responded on reddit, admitting to using Damn Interesting content, but claiming that the use was protected by fair use, and that \"historical facts are not copyrightable.\" In an article about the controversy on Plagiarism Today, Jonathan Bailey concluded, \"Any way one looks at it, The Dollop failed its ethical obligations to all of the people, not just those writing for Damn Interesting, who put in the time, energy and expertise into writing the original content upon which their show is based.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Official website\n\n2005 podcast debuts"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)",
"when did they sign their first hit?",
"1962,",
"What were some of their major hits?",
"Their second hit, \"Heat Wave\", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100",
"what was their first debut song?",
"\"Come and Get These Memories\". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording,",
"Did they get on any billboards or charts with their music?",
"The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, \"Quicksand",
"What were some of their other songs?",
"The next two singles, \"Live Wire\" and \"In My Lonely Room\" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40.",
"Where there any other singles they performed?",
"singles like \"Wild One\" (US #34), \"Nowhere to Run\" (US #8; UK #26), \"Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)\" (US #70; R&B #22), \"You've Been in Love Too Long\" (",
"Did any of the group leave during the hit years?",
"Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave",
"Did she ever come back?",
"Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show,"
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | What did the perform on the show? | 10 | What did the perform on the show The Ed Sullivan? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | true | [
"India's Best Dancer 2 also known as India's Best Dancer: Best Ka Next Avatar is the second season of the Indian reality TV series India's Best Dancer. It premiered on 16 October 2021 on Sony Entertainment Television. This season hosted by Manish Paul. The Grand Finale was aired on 09 January 2022 and winner was Saumya Kamble.\n\nConcept \nIndia's Best Dancer will showcase the people of some of the best dancing talent, who with their solo performances, will compete to win the show. In the Grand Premiere, the judges announced the Top 12 contestants who will have a respective mentor in the journey ahead. Week-on-week these 12 contestants will have to impress the judges and audience alike to move closer to winning the most coveted title of India's Best Dancer.\n\nTop 12 contestants\n\nScore chart\n\nColor key\n indicates the contestant was eliminated.\n indicates the contestants in bottom.\n indicates the contestants got the full score.\n indicates the contestants did not perform.\n indicates the winner of the season.\n indicates the runner-up of the season.\n indicates the contestant quit the show.\n indicates the finalists of the season.\n\nNotes \n : On 16th,17th,23rd & 24th October the episodes aired were auditions rounds only.\n : Initially Rajendra Bishnoi is in top 12 but due his injury Stand-By contestant Dibbay Das join Best 12.\n : On 30th & 31st October the episodes were Mega Auditions and selected the top 12 contestants.\n : On 6th & 7th November the episodes were Grand Premiere there contestants were not scored by judges.\n : On 18th & 19th December, the contestants performed twice (one with their choreographer and the other with the contestant) and the contestants got scores from the judges twice.\n: On 25th & 26th December, Sanket did not perform due to the demise of his father and hence did not receive the score.\n: On 1st January, Dibbay Das did not perform as he got injured while practicing and hence did not receive the score.\n\nBattle of the best\n\nEpisodes\n\nGuests\n\nSee also\nDance Plus\nDance India Dance\nDance Deewane\nSuper Dancer\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n India's Best Dancer 2 on Sony Liv\n\n2022 Indian television seasons\nIndia's Best Dancer seasons",
"\"Bad Fog of Loneliness\" is a song written by Canadian singer-songwriter Neil Young, recorded in 1971 but not released until 2007 on the album Live at Massey Hall 1971, in 2009 on The Archives Vol. 1 1963-1972 and in 2013 on Live at the Cellar Door. It also appeared on Young's live \"Red Rocks\" DVD released in 2000.\n\nIn the introduction to the Live at Massey Hall version, Young explains that he originally intended to perform the song on the Johnny Cash Show but his appearance was canceled. By the time he was rescheduled to appear in February 1971, he decided that the song was \"too old\" and would perform something else instead (he eventually did two other brand new songs, \"The Needle and the Damage Done\" and \"Journey Through the Past\").\n\nA studio version of the song also appears on The Archives Vol. 1, featuring Ben Keith on pedal steel guitar, Tim Drummond on bass guitar, Kenny Buttrey on drums, and Linda Ronstadt and James Taylor on background vocals. The fact that this is the same line-up that recorded \"Heart of Gold\" and \"Old Man\" strongly suggests that this version was recorded as part of the Harvest sessions on February 6–7, 1971.\n\n\"Bad Fog of Loneliness\" has much in common with much of what Young was writing at the time. The riff in the introduction is reminiscent of that of \"The Needle and the Damage Done\", and the change from 4/4 to 3/4 time in the bridge is similar to what he does in \"Words (Between the Lines of Age)\".\n\nSongs about loneliness\nNeil Young songs\n1971 songs\nSongs written by Neil Young\nSong recordings produced by Neil Young\nSong recordings produced by David Briggs (record producer)"
] |
[
"Martha and the Vandellas",
"Motown major hit years (1962-1968)",
"when did they sign their first hit?",
"1962,",
"What were some of their major hits?",
"Their second hit, \"Heat Wave\", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100",
"what was their first debut song?",
"\"Come and Get These Memories\". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording,",
"Did they get on any billboards or charts with their music?",
"The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, \"Quicksand",
"What were some of their other songs?",
"The next two singles, \"Live Wire\" and \"In My Lonely Room\" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40.",
"Where there any other singles they performed?",
"singles like \"Wild One\" (US #34), \"Nowhere to Run\" (US #8; UK #26), \"Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)\" (US #70; R&B #22), \"You've Been in Love Too Long\" (",
"Did any of the group leave during the hit years?",
"Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave",
"Did she ever come back?",
"Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show,",
"What did the perform on the show?",
"The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!."
] | C_88fa5a18805c4e97b4eb1c788ade0ff6_0 | Can you share anything else about the article? | 11 | Can you share anything else about the article besides the hits of Martha and the Vandellas? | Martha and the Vandellas | Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland-Dozier-Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance. (On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.) The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise. The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at #21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at #4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history. Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. CANNOTANSWER | Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. | Martha and the Vandellas (known from 1967 to 1972 as Martha Reeves & The Vandellas) were an American vocal girl group formed in Detroit in 1957. The group achieved fame in the 1960s with Motown.
An act founded by friends Annette Beard, Rosalind Ashford and Gloria Williams, the group eventually included Martha Reeves, who moved up in ranks as lead vocalist of the group after Williams' departure in 1962. The group signed with and eventually recorded all of their singles for Motown's Gordy imprint.
The group's string of hits included "Come and Get These Memories", "Heat Wave", "Quicksand", "Nowhere to Run", "Jimmy Mack", "I'm Ready for Love", "Bless You" and "Dancing in the Street", the latter song becoming their signature single.
During their nine-year run on the charts from 1963 to 1972, Martha and the Vandellas charted over twenty-six hits and recorded in the styles of doo-wop, R&B, pop, blues, rock and roll and soul. Ten Vandellas songs reached the top ten of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including two R&B number ones, and six Top Ten Pop Hits on the Billboard Hot 100. Selected members of the group were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame in 2013.
History
Early years (1957–1962)
Teenagers Rosalind Ashford and Annette Beard first became acquainted after a local music manager hired them to be members of a girl group he named the Del-Phis. Ashford, Beard, and lead vocalist Gloria Williams, performed at local clubs, private events, church benefits, YMCA events and school functions. They were also being coached by Maxine Powell at Detroit's Ferris Center. One of the group's first professional engagements was singing background for singer Mike Hanks.
The group originally had up to six members, subsequently reduced to four. When one of the four left the group, she was replaced by Alabama-born vocalist Martha Reeves, a former member of two groups, the Fascinations and the Sabre-Ettes. In 1960, the group signed their first recording contract with Checker Records, releasing the Reeves-led "I'll Let You Know," which flopped. The Del-Phis then went to Checkmate Records, a subsidiary of Chess Records, recording their "There He Is (At My Door)" featuring Williams on lead vocals, which also flopped.
Reeves reverted to a solo artist under the name Martha LaVaille in the hope of getting a contract with emerging Detroit label Motown. After Motown staffer Mickey Stevenson saw Reeves singing at a Detroit club, he offered her an audition. Reeves showed up at Motown's Hitsville USA studios on a Tuesday rather than Thursday, Motown's usual audition day. Initially upset with Reeves, Stevenson soon assigned her as his secretary eventually responsible for handling Motown's auditions. By 1961, the group, now known as The Vels, were recording background vocals for Motown acts. Prior to her success as lead singer of The Elgins, Sandra Edwards (then going by her surname Maulett) recorded the song "Camel Walk", in 1962, which featured the Vels in background vocals. That year, the quartet began applying background vocals for emerging Motown star Marvin Gaye, singing on Gaye's first hit single, "Stubborn Kind of Fellow" After Mary Wells failed to make a scheduled recording session feigning a short illness, the Vels recorded what was initially a demo recording of "I'll Have to Let Him Go". Motown was so impressed by the group's vocals – and Martha's lead vocals in the song – that the label CEO Berry Gordy offered to give the group a contract. Figuring that being in show business was too rigorous, Williams opted out of the group. With Williams out, the remaining trio of Ashford, Beard and Reeves were told by Gordy that they would need a new name. After failing to come up with a name on their own, Gordy gave the group the name The Vandellas. As stated in an interview with The History Makers, Ashford emphatically states that contrary to popular belief, The Vandellas were not named after Della Reese and Van Dyke Avenue, nor did Reeves come up with the name.
Motown major hit years (1962–1968)
Following their signing to Motown's Gordy imprint in 1962, the Vandellas struck gold with their second release, the first composition and production from the famed writing team, Holland–Dozier–Holland, titled "Come and Get These Memories". It became the Vandellas' first Top 40 recording, reaching number twenty-nine on the Billboard Hot 100 and peaking at number six on the R&B chart. Their second hit, "Heat Wave", became a phenomenal record for the group, reaching number four on the Hot 100 and hitting number one on the R&B singles chart for five weeks. It became their first million-seller and eventually got the group their only Grammy Award nomination for Best R&B Performance. On the single and album, the song was titled "Heat Wave". It was sometime later that the song was retitled to avoid confusion with the Irving Berlin song.
The group's success continued with their second Top Ten single and third Top 40 single, "Quicksand", which was another composition with Holland-Dozier-Holland and reached number eight pop in the late fall of 1963. Around that time, Annette, who was pregnant with her first child and set to get married, chose to leave her singing career behind by 1964. Betty Kelley, formerly of the Velvelettes, was brought in shortly afterward to continue the Vandellas' rise.
The next two singles, "Live Wire" and "In My Lonely Room" (#6 R&B Cashbox) were less successful singles, failing to reach the Pop Top 40. However, their next single, "Dancing in the Street", rose up to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 and also found global success, peaking at No. 21 on the UK Singles Chart in 1964. In 1969, "Dancing in the Street" was re-issued and it was plugged heavily on radio stations. It did not take long for the song to peak at No. 4 in the UK, thus making the song one of the all-time favourite Motown single releases ever. The song became a million-seller, and one of the most played singles in history.
Between 1964 and 1967, singles like "Wild One" (US #34), "Nowhere to Run" (US #8; UK #26), "Love (Makes Me Do Foolish Things)" (US #70; R&B #22), "You've Been in Love Too Long" (US #36), "My Baby Loves Me" (US #22; R&B #3), "I'm Ready for Love" (US #9; R&B #2; UK #29) and "Jimmy Mack" (US #10; R&B #1; UK #21) kept the Vandellas on the map as one of the label's top acts. The Vandellas' popularity helped the group get spots on The Ed Sullivan Show, The Mike Douglas Show, American Bandstand and Shindig!. Throughout this period, the Vandellas had also become one of the label's most popular performing acts. On June 28, 1965, the group appeared with several other popular acts of the period on CBS-TV's Murray The K-It's What's Happening, Baby. Martha, Rosalind and Betty performed "Nowhere to Run," as they skipped through a Ford auto plant and sat in a Ford Mustang convertible as it's being assembled.
Personnel changes
Motown struggled to find good material for many of their acts after the exit of Motown contributor and Reeves' mentor William "Mickey" Stevenson in 1967 and Holland–Dozier–Holland in early 1968, but after their former collaborators left the label, the Vandellas initially continued to find success with the Richard Morris-produced singles "Love Bug Leave My Heart Alone" (US #25; R&B #14) and "Honey Chile" (US #11; UK #30; R&B #5) added to their already extended list of charted singles. In the summer of 1968, the group joined The Supremes, The Temptations, The Four Tops and Marvin Gaye in performing at the Copacabana though much like albums from the Four Tops and Gaye, a live album of their performance there was shelved indefinitely.
That same year, label changes had started to take effect, and Gordy focused much of his attention on building the Supremes' as well as Diana Ross' burgeoning upcoming solo career that would follow in 1970. The Vandellas' chart performance (and the chart performance of many Motown acts with the exception of Marvin Gaye, The Temptations, and Stevie Wonder) suffered as a result.
However it was the infighting among the members of the Vandellas that led to their problems. Kelley was the first to be let go after reportedly missing shows, as well as getting into altercations with Reeves. There were many instances where these "fights" happened on stage. Kelley was fired in 1967 and was replaced by Martha Reeves' sister Lois. Simultaneously, the group's name was officially changed to Martha Reeves and the Vandellas, to conform with the company's recent changes of The Supremes' and The Miracles' names to reflect their featured lead singers. During this time, Vandellas records including "(We've Got) Honey Love", "Sweet Darlin'" and "Taking My Love and Leaving Me" were issued as singles with diminishing success.
"Bless You" (1969–1972)
Reeves, out of the group temporarily due to illness, recovered and returned; Ashford was replaced by another former member of the Velvelettes, Sandra Tilley, and the group continued to release albums and singles into the early 1970s. Although they could not reignite the fire they had made in America they continued to have successful records the UK and abroad. Among their late 1960s hits was "I Can't Dance to That Music You're Playing", which featured singer Syreeta Wright singing the chorus, and peaked at number forty-two. Reeves reportedly hated singing the song sensing it "close to home". In 1969 a reissue of "Nowhere To Run" reached the top 40 in the UK. In 1970, the group issued Motown's first protest single, the controversial anti-war song, "I Should Be Proud", which peaked at a modest forty-five on the R&B singles chart. The song was uncharacteristic of the Vandellas and did nothing to promote the group. On some stations, the flip-side "Love, Guess Who" was played instead, however the group reached the top 20 that year in the UK with a reissue of "Jimmy Mack".
In 1971, the group scored a top 11 hit in the UK with "Forget Me Not". later that year they scored an international hit with "Bless You" (produced by the Jackson 5's producers The Corporation). The song peaked at number fifty-three on the American pop singles chart (the biggest peak of Vandellas' seventies singles in the US), and number twenty-nine on the R&B singles chart. "Bless You" reached number thirty-three in the UK giving the group two big hits that year in England. . "Bless You" reached number 16 in Canada and went all the way to number 2 in Puerto Rico . It was to be the last Billboard Hot 100 hit single for the group. After two successive Top 40 R&B singles, the ballad "In and Out of My Life" (#22 US R&B) and the Marvin Gaye cover, "Tear It On Down" (#37 US R&B), the group disbanded following a farewell concert, held at Detroit's Cobo Hall on December 21, 1972, but Martha Reeves is still often billed as ‘Martha Reeves& The Vandellas’.
The next year, Reeves announced plans of starting a solo career. At the same time, Motown Records moved its operations to Los Angeles. When Reeves did not want to move, she negotiated out of her contract with Motown, signing with MCA in 1974, and releasing the critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, Martha Reeves. Despite rave reviews of her work, neither of Reeves' post-Vandellas/Motown recordings produced the same success as they had the decade before. After living what she called "a rock & roll lifestyle" of prescription pills, cocaine and alcohol, Reeves sobered up in 1977, overcoming her addictions and becoming a born-again Christian.
Epilogue
After the Vandellas' split, Reeves' sister Lois sang with the group Quiet Elegance and sang background for Al Green, while Tilley retired from show business in the late 1970s, suddenly dying of a brain aneurysm in 1981 at the age of thirty-eight. Original member Gloria Williams, who retired from show business when she left the group, died in 2000. In 1978, Reeves and original Vandellas Ashford and Beard reunited at a Los Angeles benefit concert for actor Will Geer. In 1983, Reeves successfully sued for royalties from her Motown hits and the label agreed to have the songs credited as Martha Reeves and the Vandellas from then on. That year, Reeves performed solo at Motown 25, which alongside some of their songs being placed on the Big Chill soundtrack, helped Reeves and the Vandellas gain a new audience. In 1989, original members Ashford and Beard also sued Motown for royalties. During this time, the original trio were inspired to reunite both as a recording act and in performances. They were offered a recording contract with Ian Levine at Motorcity Records who issued the group's first single since the Vandellas disbanded seventeen years earlier called "Step Into My Shoes."
Although they are no longer singing together full-time, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas have occasionally reunited for various concerts. Currently, Ashford, whose full name now is Rosalind Ashford-Holmes, and Beard, whose full name now is Annette Beard-Helton, continue to perform with other singers, most notably Roschelle Laughhunn, as "The Original Vandellas." Reeves, with her sisters Lois and Delphine Reeves, tour as "Martha Reeves and the Vandellas."
From 2005 to 2009, Reeves held the eighth seat of Detroit's city council. She has since lost her seat and told the press that she would continue performing.
A remake of the song "Nowhere To Run," sung by Arnold McCuller, is heard in the film "The Warriors" during the scene in which the Gramercy Riffs call a hit on the Warriors.
In a Season One episode of the television show The Golden Girls, Blanche described her car as the "noisiest thing to come out of Detroit since Martha & The Vandellas.".
Candice Bergen, who hosted the Saturday Night Live episode on which Martha Reeves appeared in its inaugural season, made sure that Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were a presence throughout her "Murphy Brown" series. The group's picture was displayed prominently in Murphy's office. When Aretha Franklin guest starred and Murphy tried to sing with her, Franklin stopped her, saying, ". . .I'm not Martha, and you ain't no Vandella."
The group is briefly portrayed in the 2017 film Detroit, performing "Nowhere To Run" at the Fox Theatre, Detroit.
Awards and accolades
Martha and the Vandellas' "Dancing in the Street" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999 (they were nominated for Best R&B Vocal Performance by a Duo or Group for the song in 1964). In 1993, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were awarded the Pioneer Award by the Rhythm & Blues Foundation. Except for pre-Vandellas member Gloria Williamson and Vandellas member Sandra Tilley, all members of the group were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995, becoming the second all-female group to be inducted. They were inducted by rock group The B-52's, whose frothy dance music was inspired by the Vandellas. They were inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003. Two of their singles, "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the group No. 96 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2005, Martha & The Vandellas were voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame.
Always concert favorites, Martha Reeves and the Vandellas were nominated for UK Festival Awards in 2010 and 2011 as "Best Headliner."
Martha and the Vandellas was inducted into the inaugural class of the Official Rhythm & Blues Music Hall of Fame at Cleveland State University August 2013
Lineups
The Del-Phis
1957–1962
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Gloria Williams
Martha & the Vandellas
1964–1967
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Betty Kelly
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1969–1972
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Sandra Tilley
The Original Vandellas
2000s-present
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Roschelle Laughhunn
Martha & the Vandellas
1962–1964
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Annette Beard-Helton
Martha Reeves & the Vandellas
1967–1969
Martha Reeves
Rosalind Ashford-Holmes
Lois Reeves
Martha Reeves & The Vandellas
2010–present
Martha Reeves
Lois Reeves
Delphine Reeves
Discography
For a detailed listing of albums and singles, see Martha and the Vandellas discography
Albums
Come and Get These Memories (1963)
Heat Wave (1963)
Dance Party (1965)
Greatest Hits (1966)
Watchout! (1966)
Martha and the Vandellas Live! (1967)
Ridin' High (1968)
Sugar 'n' Spice (1969)
Natural Resources (1970)
Black Magic (1972)
Top 10 singles
The following singles reached the top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100 song chart in the U.S.
"Heat Wave" (1963)
"Quicksand" (1963)
"Dancing in the Street" (1964)
"Nowhere to Run" (1965)
"I'm Ready for Love" (1966)
"Jimmy Mack" (1967)
Awards and recognition
Martha Reeves and the Vandellas' "(Love Is Like a) Heat Wave" and "Dancing in the Street" were inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame and were both included in the list of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.
They were inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1995 becoming just the second all-female group to be inducted and the fifth group in the Motown roster to be inducted.
They were inducted to the Vocal Group Hall of Fame in 2003.
They were nominated for a Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance in 1964 for their hit song "Heat Wave"
"Dancing in the Street" was included in the United States Library of Congress' National Recording Registry for its historical, artistic and cultural significance in 2006.
References
External links
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame page on Martha and the Vandellas
'Martha and the Vandellas' Vocal Group Hall of Fame Page
History of Rock page on Martha and the Vandellas
The Original Vandellas (Rosalind Ashford-Holmes & Annette Beard-Helton) page
Martha and the Vandellas History, Charts and Songs
Martha & The Vandellas at Doo Wop Heaven
Martha & The Vandellas bio on the Soulwalking U.K. website.
African-American girl groups
American soul musical groups
Motown artists
Musical groups from Detroit
Northern soul musicians
1957 establishments in Michigan
Musical groups disestablished in 1972
Singers from Detroit | true | [
"\"If You Can Do Anything Else\" is a song written by Billy Livsey and Don Schlitz, and recorded by American country music artist George Strait. It was released in February 2001 as the third and final single from his self-titled album. The song reached number 5 on the U.S. Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks chart in July 2001. It also peaked at number 51 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100.\n\nContent\nThe song is about man who is giving his woman the option to leave him. He gives her many different options for all the things she can do. At the end he gives her the option to stay with him if she really can’t find anything else to do. He says he will be alright if she leaves, but really it seems he wants her to stay.\n\nChart performance\n\"If You Can Do Anything Else\" debuted at number 60 on the U.S. Billboard Hot Country Singles & Tracks for the week of March 3, 2001.\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences\n\n2001 singles\n2000 songs\nGeorge Strait songs\nSongs written by Billy Livsey\nSongs written by Don Schlitz\nSong recordings produced by Tony Brown (record producer)\nMCA Nashville Records singles",
"Claw Law is a supplement published by Iron Crown Enterprises in 1982 for the fantasy role-playing game Rolemaster.\n\nContents\nClaw Law is a supplement to Arms Law with 12 new attack tables such as bite, talon, and sting.\n\nReception\nIn the October 1982 edition of The Space Gamer (No. 56), Richard Wolfe, Jr. was ambivalent about the book, saying, \"If you own Arms Law and like it, this is for you. If you are pleased with the combat system you use now, or you don't like the idea of killer rabbits, you can live without it.\"\n\nIn the August 1984 edition of Dragon (Issue #88), Arlen Walker criticized the lack of descriptions of the animals covered in Claw Law, saying, \"The animal descriptions have little if anything to do with animals. Calling them descriptions, in fact, is probably overstating the case dramatically... We are told nothing else about the animal, including what it looks like, where it can be found, and how it will behave if found.\"\n\nReferences\n\nRolemaster supplements"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)"
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | Was Final Straw a song or an album? | 1 | Was Final Straw by Snow Patrol a song or an album? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | true | [
"Sessions@AOL is the title of two separate EPs by alternative rock band Snow Patrol. Both EPs feature the band's performance at AOL music. Snow Patrol was one of the acts chosen in AOL Music's \"Breakers\" in December 2003, a program to promote bands for months leading up to the release of their respective albums in the United States. Snow Patrol's appearance on the sessions was a part of the program.\n\nFirst performance\nThe band's first performance at AOL was when they were touring in support of their album Final Straw in 2004. It was released exclusively on the United Kingdom and German iTunes Stores for digital download on 15 June 2004. The album cover was the same as the album Final Straw.\n\nThe album features the band performing six songs from the album Final Straw and an interview with lead singer Gary Lightbody and lead guitarist Nathan Connolly. The interview and their performance of \"Run\" later made their way to the DualDisc on the re-release of Final Straw.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\nGary Lightbody – vocals, guitar\nNathan Connolly – guitar, backing vocals\nMark McClelland – bass guitar\nJonny Quinn – drums\nTom Simpson – keyboards\n\nSecond performance\nThe band's second performance at AOL was when they were touring in support of their album Eyes Open in 2006. A post on the band's website announced that the band had spent some time in Manhattan and performed at sessions@AOL, performing three new songs from Eyes Open. They also performed a cover of the Bright Eyes' song \"You Will. You? Will. You? Will. You? Will.\". Gary Lightbody, who has talked about being inspired by Bright Eyes' frontman Conor Oberst, finds him an \"honest, eloquent and intelligent\" singer.\n\nThe EP was released exclusively on the United States iTunes Store for digital download on 31 October 2006.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\nGary Lightbody – vocals, guitar\nNathan Connolly – guitar, backing vocals\nPaul Wilson – bass guitar\nJonny Quinn – drums\nTom Simpson – keyboards\n\nReferences\n\n2004 EPs\n2006 EPs\nSnow Patrol live albums\n2004 live albums\n2006 live albums\nLive EPs\nInterscope Records live albums\nInterscope Records EPs\nITunes-exclusive releases\nSnow Patrol EPs",
"Straw Dogs is a country rock band.\n\nThe Beginnings (Legends and Lies) \n\nDavid von Beck formed the Straw Dogs as an outlet for his shimmering, mellow country rock.\n\nLegends & Lies (1998) was recorded (and toured) with the band's original line-up. After touring the United States as a full band in support of the group's debut, Legends & Lies, von Beck pared Straw Dogs down to a simple duo, initiating the help of his old friend Darren Smith from the Colorado-based Stranger Neighbor. Darren Smith agreed to join his friend. After Smith joined Straw Dogs, the band has enjoyed moderate success.\n\nAny Place At All \n\nAny Place At All was the band's first album recorded with Darren Smith. The 2001 album is often publicised and referred to as the band's debut. The songs on Any Place At All earned von Beck and Smith 4 Billboard songwriting awards and the opening slot on the Crash Test Dummies final tour. Songs from the album found its way onto AAA and college radio, and won first place in the KZOK (Seattle) talent contest. The song “All My Days” has been played over 1 million times at mp3.com.\n\nHum Of The Motor \nHum of the Motor, a tribute to the open road and Americana was released on March 18, 2003, this time with a full band dishing out the tunes. \"We've upped the ante,\" said David von Beck, the band's lead vocalist and guitarist, who co-wrote all of the new songs with guitarist Darren Smith. Smith also handles backing vocals, piano, and even some bass. \"This record is fuller, more electric. We brought in Casey Miller on drums, Dan Tyack on pedal steel and some other great players, so it has added some depth to the Straw Dogs sound.\"\n\nThe Straw Dogs' \"second album (Legends and Lies is overlooked by the band as their first album) was a harder sell than Any Place At All.\n\nTell The Rising Sun \n\n\"Tell the Rising Sun\", is the band's 2005 release. The song \"Not Gone\" was in top rotation in Belgium. Listeners to The Mountain, 103.7 FM (Seattle) also hear tracks from the album quite often. For instance, \"Troubles Down\" gets regular airplay on The Mountain's Sunday Brunch. Numerous internet radio stations also broadcast the CD, including Live365, CelticRadio, Buzz Music, GarageRadio, and altcountry.nl, where the \"Not Gone\" was in the station's \"Top 20\" for January 2006.\n\nTheir song, \"Guess Again,\" was featured in an upcoming Warren Miller Film, entitled, Hunt. They were also asked to write a song for another upcoming production entitled, Trial By Self. The song is entitled, \"When Heaven Falls.\"\n\nLive Shows \n\nAs a four-piece rock outfit, Straw Dogs consistently put on live shows.\n\nIn longer shows, Darren and David add an acoustic set, which gives the audience a chance to hear just voice and guitar, the root tones and clean harmony that drive this band's compositions. There are also occasional guest musicians in the line-up, including on keyboards, pedal steel, and dobro.\n\nMore About David von Beck \n\nStraw Dogs founder David von Beck is also a plaintiff's construction-defect lawyer with Levy-von Beck and Associates. He is married to Marcie, who is an architect who traded in her 12-year career to teach fifth grade. They have 2 daughters.\n\nOther Interesting Information \n\nStraw Dogs' latest record, \"Love and then Hope,\" was released in March 2009. The band's label, Crafty Records, has also released Darren Smith's solo album entitled, \"Last Drive.\"\n\nAwards \n 2007 Unisong Song Contest (Honorable Mention - \"When Heaven Falls\")\n 2006 Unisong Song Contest (Double finalists - \"Amelia\" and \"When She Was Good\")\n 2005 Jeff Buckley Tribute (Chicago): Showcase artist\n 2004 SongOfTheYear Contest: Honorable Mention (“Mostly Alone”)\n 2004 CMT.com – NSAI Contest: Honorable Mention (“Pains of Arkansas”)\n 2003 USA Songwriting Contest - Finalists\n Winners, KZOK (Seattle) Talent Search (national showcase in Las Vegas)\n 2002 Billboard Song Contest: Two “Honorable Mention” Awards\n 2000 World Music Awards: Fourth Place (\"All My Days\")\n 2000 Billboard Song Contest: Two “Honorable Mention” Awards\n\nDiscography \n\n Legends and Lies (1998)[with different line-up]\n Any Place at All (2000)\n Hum of the Motor (2003)\n Tell the Rising Sun (2005)\n Love and then Hope (2009)\n No Dividing Line (2013)\n\nReferences\n\nRock music groups from Washington (state)\nAmerican country rock groups\nMusical groups from Seattle"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,"
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | What were the band's first 2 albums? | 2 | What were Snow Patrol's first 2 albums? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | false | [
"The discography of Foreigner, a British-American rock band, consists of 9 studio albums, 7 live albums, 20 compilation albums, and 47 singles.\n\nThe band was formed in New York City in 1976 by veteran English musicians Mick Jones and Ian McDonald, and American vocalist Lou Gramm. Since then, Foreigner has released nine studio albums, seven of which have reached the top 30 of the Billboard 200 chart. 4 was the band's only chart-topper in the US, while Agent Provocateur was their only album to achieve the same feat on the UK Albums Chart. Overall, Foreigner's albums have sold more than 50 million copies worldwide, almost 40 million of them in the United States alone.\n\nAmong the 47 singles released by the band, 14 of them became top 20 hits in the Billboard Hot 100 chart, including the number-one song \"I Want to Know What Love Is\" and the number-two \"Waiting for a Girl Like You\", which spent a record-setting 10 weeks at the number 2 position of the chart without ever reaching the top. Four of these singles were certified Gold by the RIAA for shipments of over a million copies, all of them which peaked within the top 3 (\"Hot Blooded\", \"Double Vision\", \"Waiting for a Girl Like You\" and \"I Want to Know What Love Is\"). Despite its British roots, the band achieved only moderate success in the UK Singles Chart, with only two of their songs, \"Waiting for a Girl Like You\" and \"I Want to Know What Love Is\", peaking within the top 20.\n\nIn 2014, Rhino released a boxed set of the band's seven albums recorded for Atlantic entitled Foreigner: The Complete Atlantic Studios Albums 1977-1991. The first four albums that were expanded to include bonus tracks in 2002 were included in the set along with the remaining albums by the band. These were housed in cardboard replicas of the original vinyl sleeves.\n\nAlbums\n\nStudio albums\n\nLive albums\n\nCompilation albums\n\nSingles\n\nReferences\n\nDiscography\nDiscographies of American artists\nRock music group discographies",
"Back Again... No Matter What is the fourth compilation album released by Irish boy band Boyzone. The album was released on 13 October 2008. It became the band's sixth top-ten album in the United Kingdom, charting at No. 4 and staying in the top 100 for 43 non-consecutive weeks; it also peaked at No. 3 in Ireland. Three new recordings were made for the album: \"Love You Anyway\", \"Better\" and \"Can't Stop Thinking About You\", the former two of which were both released as singles in promotion of the album. The three new songs were the first new material recorded by the band in nine years, and the last to be recorded before the death of Stephen Gately. The band's tour in the summer of 2008 was the tenth highest grossing set of concerts for that year.\n\nTrack listing\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCertifications and sales\n\nReferences\n\n2008 greatest hits albums\nBoyzone albums\n2008 video albums\nMusic video compilation albums\nUniversal Records compilation albums\nUniversal Records video albums"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,",
"What were the band's first 2 albums?",
"I don't know."
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | What songs were on Final Straw? | 3 | What songs were on Final Straw? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | Run | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | true | [
"\"Jack Straw\" is a rock song written by Bob Weir and Robert Hunter. The track appeared on the album Europe '72 by the Grateful Dead, who frequently performed it live.\n\nThe song was first performed in concert on October 19, 1971, in Minneapolis, Minnesota at new keyboardist Keith Godchaux's first appearance with the band. In the song's earliest performances (c. 1971–72), Weir sang all of the vocals. On the Europe 72 Tour at The Olympia Theater in Paris on 5-03-72, Weir and Jerry Garcia began switching up the vocals.. The song appeared in both the first and second sets until the band's short hiatus in 1974-1975. After re-forming, the song almost exclusively appeared in the first set. After Brent Mydland joined the band in 1979, the song almost exclusively opened the band's first set. The band also often extended the jam after the second verse after Mydland's joining, often extending the song to over six minutes. Dead and Company have also further extended the song, often adding an abstract opening jam prior to the song's first verse.\n\nBob Weir stated in a 2004 interview that the song's lyrics were partly based on John Steinbeck's novel Of Mice and Men. The song's themes include riding the rails, the Great Depression, and hobo (homeless) camps of the era. Jack Straw is also—perhaps coincidentally—the name of the original plantation owner, who lived controversially with his gay lover, Peter Ochello, in Tennessee Williams's play Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.\n\nThe Grateful Dead tribute album Deadicated contains a rendition of \"Jack Straw\" recorded by Bruce Hornsby and the Range.\n\nReferences\n\nWeiner, Robert G.(1999). Perspectives on the Grateful Dead: Critical Writings. Greenwood Publishing Group, 20, 150. .\nsetlists.net\nMurder Ballad Monday's introduction to \"Jack Straw\"\n\nGrateful Dead songs\n1971 songs\nSongs with lyrics by Robert Hunter (lyricist)\nSongs written by Bob Weir\nMurder ballads\nSongs about trains",
"The Straw Hat (, translit. Solomennaya shlyapka) is a 1974 Soviet musical comedy television film directed by Leonid Kvinikhidze based on a play by Eugène Marin Labiche and Marc-Michel. The film's music was composed by Isaac Schwartz.\n\nPlot summary\nThe extravagant life of a charming rentier who thought nothing of consequences. But living on credit finally wakes him up, forcing to end his bachelor's life by marrying the daughter of a wealthy earl for her money. All goes well until a horse eats a certain straw hat, triggering a series of farcical vents interwoven with the marriage.\n\nCast\n Andrei Mironov\n Vladislav Strzhelchik\n Zinovi Gerdt\n Yefim Kopelyan\n Lyudmila Gurchenko\n Yekaterina Vasilyeva\n Alisa Freindlich\n Mikhail Kozakov\n Igor Kvasha\n Aleksandr Benyaminov\n Vladimir Tatosov\n Irina Maguto\n Marina Starykh\n Sergey Migitsko\n Mikhail Boyarsky\n Yelena Yefimova\n\nSongs from the film \n Intro song (We actors, minstrels, bards and poets...)\n I'm getting married, I'm getting married...\n Song about lovers\n Song about the straw hat\n Song about broken hopes\n Our city isn't worse than Paris...\n National Guards March\n Final song (Rest in peace, Eugène Labiche...)\nSee Sonkino.ru for the text of the songs\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1974 films\nSoviet films\n1970s musical comedy films\nLenfilm films\nRussian-language films\nSoviet films based on plays\n1974 comedy films"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,",
"What were the band's first 2 albums?",
"I don't know.",
"What songs were on Final Straw?",
"Run"
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | Was there a single released? | 4 | Was there a single released on the Final Straw album? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | false | [
"Love Is the Law is the second studio album by English singer-songwriter Charlene Soraia. It was released on 11 September 2015 by Peacefrog Records. The album features the singles \"Ghost\", \"Broken\", \"Caged\", and \"I'll Be There\".\n\nSingles\n \"Ghost\" was released as the album's lead single on 18 March 2013. This song was co-written by the performer's ex-boyfriend, Jon Allen.\n \"Broken\" was released as the album's second single on 4 August 2013. This song was co-written by Ricky Ross and Francis White.\n \"Caged\" was released as the album's third single on 21 July 2014. This song was co-written by Jim Eliot.\n \"I'll Be There\" was released as the album's fourth single on 9 March 2015.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Official website\n Charlene Soraia on Facebook\n Charlene Soraia on Twitter\n Charlene Soraia's YouTube Channel\n Charlene Soraia's VEVO YouTube Channel\n\n2015 albums\nCharlene Soraia albums\nPeacefrog Records albums",
"\"Alone in My Room\" is a song by Skin, which was the first single to be released from Skin's second album, Fake Chemical State. It was released as download only and the first single to be released from Skin since joining V2 Records. The song was co-written with Paul Draper, of Mansun fame, and was his first piece of work since Mansun.\n\nTrack listing\nSince the single was download only, there was no set track listing. There was, however, a remix of the single available via iTunes.\n\n \"Alone in My Room\"\n \"Alone in My Room\" (Fuck Me I'm Famous Remix) – iTunes release\n\n2003 singles\nSkin (musician) songs\nSongs written by Paul Draper (musician)\nSongs written by Skin (musician)\n2003 songs\nV2 Records singles"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,",
"What were the band's first 2 albums?",
"I don't know.",
"What songs were on Final Straw?",
"Run",
"Was there a single released?",
"They followed the success of \"Run\" up with three more singles from the album: \"Chocolate"
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | Which other singles were there? | 5 | Besides “Run”, which other singles were there that Snow Patrol released? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | How to Be Dead | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | false | [
"\"Flower\" is the thirty-fourth single by Japanese recording artist Gackt, released on July 1, 2009. This single is the final of the four singles of the countdown to Gackt's 10th anniversary as solo artist. Each of the countdown singles were released within a week of each other. There are two versions of the music video.\n\nCD\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2009 singles\nGackt songs\nSongs written by Gackt\n2009 songs",
"The 1902 All England Championships was a badminton tournament held at the Central Transept, The Crystal Palace in Sydenham, London, England, from 18-20 March 1902.\n\nScoring in the singles went back to the first to 15 (for a game) following the previous year when it was 11. There were five rounds in the men's singles but the other events consisted of four rounds. The 1901 edition has been such a success that the Badminton Association put on extra events of a handicap nature. There were 47 entries for men and 49 for women and it was the first time that players from Scotland and Ireland entered. John Stokes & Thomas Good became the first non-English winners of an event although it was not considered one of the five 'Championship events'.\n\nHowever there were only 9 entries for the women's doubles.\n\nFinal results\n\nMen's Singles\n\nWomen's Singles\n\nMen's Doubles\n\nWomen's Doubles\n\nMixed Doubles\n\nReferences\n\nAll England Open Badminton Championships\nAll England\nAll England Open Badminton Championships in London\nAll England Championships\nAll England Badminton Championships"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,",
"What were the band's first 2 albums?",
"I don't know.",
"What songs were on Final Straw?",
"Run",
"Was there a single released?",
"They followed the success of \"Run\" up with three more singles from the album: \"Chocolate",
"Which other singles were there?",
"How to Be Dead"
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | Did the singles make the charts? | 6 | Did any of the singles from Final Straw make the charts? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | false | [
"\"Make Me Crazy\" is the second and final single by Scandal'us from their debut album Startin' Somethin'. It did not live up to the success of their debut single, \"Me, Myself & I\", only managing to debut and peak at No. 30 on the Australian ARIA Charts. This was the last release from the band before they broke up in 2002.\n\nTrack listing\n Maxi Single\n \"Make Me Crazy\" (3:15)\n \"Make Me Crazy\" (Crazy Nights Mix) (3:30)\n \"Make Me Crazy\" (Wired Meshmix)\t(3:26)\n \"Make Me Crazy\" (KCB Klubbmix) (3:34)\n \"Make Me Crazy\" (Karaoke Mix) (3:17)\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2001 singles\nWarner Music Group singles\n2001 songs",
"\"Love in Stero\" is a Swedish English language song co-written by Tony Nilsson and Mirja Breitholtz and sung by Swedish singer Ola Svensson during Melodifestivalen in the 2008 series. The song also appears on Good Enough - The Feelgood Edition, the re-release of the singer's sophomore studio album. The song was first performed on 16 February 2008 in Västerås and then in Kiruna in the second chance round, but did not make it to the finals. Although the song did not make it to the finals of Melodifestivalen 2008, it still proved popular on the Swedish Singles Chart, peaking at number two. The single was certified Gold in Sweden, in recognition of 10,000 copies sold.\n\nTrack listing\nLove in Stereo (radio version) \nLove in Stereo (instrumental version)\n\nCharts\nReleased on 12 March 2008, the song reached number 2 on charts dated 5 May 2008 and stayed on the chart for a total of 11 weeks, but remained at number two only for one week.\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nReferences\n\n2008 singles\nOla Svensson songs\nMelodifestivalen songs of 2008\nSongs written by Tony Nilsson\n2008 songs\n2007 songs"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,",
"What were the band's first 2 albums?",
"I don't know.",
"What songs were on Final Straw?",
"Run",
"Was there a single released?",
"They followed the success of \"Run\" up with three more singles from the album: \"Chocolate",
"Which other singles were there?",
"How to Be Dead",
"Did the singles make the charts?",
"Run\" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart"
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | Did How to be Dead make the charts? | 7 | Did How to be Dead by Snow Patrol make the charts? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | reaching number 39. | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | false | [
"\"How to Be Dead\" is the fourth (fifth if the re-issue of \"Spitting Games\" is counted) and final single by Snow Patrol from their album Final Straw. It was released in 2004, slightly remixed by Chris Lord-Alge from the album version, and reached number 39 in the United Kingdom and number 42 in Ireland.\n\nThe song is a downtempo rock ballad, with lyrics detailing a conversation between a couple.\n\nReception\nYahoo! Music's Jairne Gill reviewed the single positively, giving it 7 stars out of 10. Though he felt Snow Patrol usually made \"ugly empty anthems\", the single was a \"rather lovely little song\" and \"modest\" and \"chimingly melodic\". Gill praised the lyrics of the song, calling it \"a pretty little knife which Gary Lightbody seems to be twisting into his own chest, a list of druggy regrets and lost loves\" and also said that, though the song's \"gentle, skipping rhythm threatens to go BIG\", it doesn't and \"a pretty and intimate song is preserved\".\n\nTrack listings\nCD\n \"How to Be Dead\" (Chris Lord-Alge Mix) – 3:23\n \"You Are My Joy\" (Live at Somerset House) – 3:20\n \"Chocolate\" (Grand National Mix) – 4:58\n\nGermany 3\" CD\n \"How to Be Dead\" (Chris Lord-Alge Mix) – 3:23\n \"You Are My Joy\" (Live at Somerset House) – 3:20\n\n7\"\n \"How to Be Dead\" (Chris Lord-Alge Mix) – 3:23\n \"You Are My Joy\" (Live at Somerset House) – 3:20\n\nPromo CD\n \"How to Be Dead\" (Chris Lord-Alge Edited Mix) – 3:12\n\nCharts\n\nIn popular culture\n\"How to Be Dead\" was featured on the soundtracks to American Pie: Band Camp and Wicker Park.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n2000s ballads\n2003 singles\nRock ballads\nSnow Patrol songs\nSong recordings produced by Jacknife Lee\nSongs written by Gary Lightbody\nSongs written by Nathan Connolly\nSongs written by Jonny Quinn\nSongs written by Mark McClelland\n2003 songs\nFiction Records singles\nInterscope Records singles",
"Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen – The Album is a compilation album of various artists' music from the 2009 live-action Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. The official single is \"New Divide\" by Linkin Park. It was rumored that Dead by Sunrise would be releasing a track called \"Crawl Back In\" for the soundtrack. However, Chester Bennington said he decided not to include it. Similarly, Tyrese Gibson, who plays Sgt. Epps in the movie, said that he would be in a duet track with Jewel (produced by Babyface), titled \"Make It Last\", which he had hoped would appear in the film's soundtrack, but ultimately did not. The album charted at #7 on the US Billboard 200 album chart.\n\nTrack listing\n\nNot included in the Soundtrack\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\nRevenge of the Fallen – The Album\n2009 soundtrack albums\n2000s film soundtrack albums"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,",
"What were the band's first 2 albums?",
"I don't know.",
"What songs were on Final Straw?",
"Run",
"Was there a single released?",
"They followed the success of \"Run\" up with three more singles from the album: \"Chocolate",
"Which other singles were there?",
"How to Be Dead",
"Did the singles make the charts?",
"Run\" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart",
"Did How to be Dead make the charts?",
"reaching number 39."
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | Are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | 8 | Besides Final Straw, are there any other interesting aspects about this article? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | false | [
"Přírodní park Třebíčsko (before Oblast klidu Třebíčsko) is a natural park near Třebíč in the Czech Republic. There are many interesting plants. The park was founded in 1983.\n\nKobylinec and Ptáčovský kopeček\n\nKobylinec is a natural monument situated ca 0,5 km from the village of Trnava.\nThe area of this monument is 0,44 ha. Pulsatilla grandis can be found here and in the Ptáčovský kopeček park near Ptáčov near Třebíč. Both monuments are very popular for tourists.\n\nPonds\n\nIn the natural park there are some interesting ponds such as Velký Bor, Malý Bor, Buršík near Přeckov and a brook Březinka. Dams on the brook are examples of European beaver activity.\n\nSyenitové skály near Pocoucov\n\nSyenitové skály (rocks of syenit) near Pocoucov is one of famed locations. There are interesting granite boulders. The area of the reservation is 0,77 ha.\n\nExternal links\nParts of this article or all article was translated from Czech. The original article is :cs:Přírodní park Třebíčsko.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nNature near the village Trnava which is there\n\nTřebíč\nParks in the Czech Republic\nTourist attractions in the Vysočina Region",
"Damn Interesting is an independent website founded by Alan Bellows in 2005. The website presents true stories from science, history, and psychology, primarily as long-form articles, often illustrated with original artwork. Works are written by various authors, and published at irregular intervals. The website openly rejects advertising, relying on reader and listener donations to cover operating costs.\n\nAs of October 2012, each article is also published as a podcast under the same name. In November 2019, a second podcast was launched under the title Damn Interesting Week, featuring unscripted commentary on an assortment of news articles featured on the website's \"Curated Links\" section that week. In mid-2020, a third podcast called Damn Interesting Curio Cabinet began highlighting the website's periodic short-form articles in the same radioplay format as the original podcast.\n\nIn July 2009, Damn Interesting published the print book Alien Hand Syndrome through Workman Publishing. It contains some favorites from the site and some exclusive content.\n\nAwards and recognition \nIn August 2007, PC Magazine named Damn Interesting one of the \"Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites\".\nThe article \"The Zero-Armed Bandit\" by Alan Bellows won a 2015 Sidney Award from David Brooks in The New York Times.\nThe article \"Ghoulish Acts and Dastardly Deeds\" by Alan Bellows was cited as \"nonfiction journalism from 2017 that will stand the test of time\" by Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic.\nThe article \"Dupes and Duplicity\" by Jennifer Lee Noonan won a 2020 Sidney Award from David Brooks in the New York Times.\n\nAccusing The Dollop of plagiarism \n\nOn July 9, 2015, Bellows posted an open letter accusing The Dollop, a comedy podcast about history, of plagiarism due to their repeated use of verbatim text from Damn Interesting articles without permission or attribution. Dave Anthony, the writer of The Dollop, responded on reddit, admitting to using Damn Interesting content, but claiming that the use was protected by fair use, and that \"historical facts are not copyrightable.\" In an article about the controversy on Plagiarism Today, Jonathan Bailey concluded, \"Any way one looks at it, The Dollop failed its ethical obligations to all of the people, not just those writing for Damn Interesting, who put in the time, energy and expertise into writing the original content upon which their show is based.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Official website\n\n2005 podcast debuts"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,",
"What were the band's first 2 albums?",
"I don't know.",
"What songs were on Final Straw?",
"Run",
"Was there a single released?",
"They followed the success of \"Run\" up with three more singles from the album: \"Chocolate",
"Which other singles were there?",
"How to Be Dead",
"Did the singles make the charts?",
"Run\" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart",
"Did How to be Dead make the charts?",
"reaching number 39.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour"
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | What else happened on the tour? | 9 | Besides Snow Patrol performing an opening act, what else happened on U2’s Vertigo Tour? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | false | [
"\"What Happened to Us\" is a song by Australian recording artist Jessica Mauboy, featuring English recording artist Jay Sean. It was written by Sean, Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim and Israel Cruz. \"What Happened to Us\" was leaked online in October 2010, and was released on 10 March 2011, as the third single from Mauboy's second studio album, Get 'Em Girls (2010). The song received positive reviews from critics.\n\nA remix of \"What Happened to Us\" made by production team OFM, was released on 11 April 2011. A different version of the song which features Stan Walker, was released on 29 May 2011. \"What Happened to Us\" charted on the ARIA Singles Chart at number 14 and was certified platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA). An accompanying music video was directed by Mark Alston, and reminisces on a former relationship between Mauboy and Sean.\n\nProduction and release\n\n\"What Happened to Us\" was written by Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim, Israel Cruz and Jay Sean. It was produced by Skaller, Cruz, Rohaim and Bobby Bass. The song uses C, D, and B minor chords in the chorus. \"What Happened to Us\" was sent to contemporary hit radio in Australia on 14 February 2011. The cover art for the song was revealed on 22 February on Mauboy's official Facebook page. A CD release was available for purchase via her official website on 10 March, for one week only. It was released digitally the following day.\n\nReception\nMajhid Heath from ABC Online Indigenous called the song a \"Jordin Sparks-esque duet\", and wrote that it \"has a nice innocence to it that rings true to the experience of losing a first love.\" Chris Urankar from Nine to Five wrote that it as a \"mid-tempo duet ballad\" which signifies Mauboy's strength as a global player. On 21 March 2011, \"What Happened to Us\" debuted at number 30 on the ARIA Singles Chart, and peaked at number 14 the following week. The song was certified platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA), for selling 70,000 copies. \"What Happened to Us\" spent a total of ten weeks in the ARIA top fifty.\n\nMusic video\n\nBackground\nThe music video for the song was shot in the Elizabeth Bay House in Sydney on 26 November 2010. The video was shot during Sean's visit to Australia for the Summerbeatz tour. During an interview with The Daily Telegraph while on the set of the video, Sean said \"the song is sick! ... Jessica's voice is amazing and we're shooting [the video] in this ridiculously beautiful mansion overlooking the harbour.\" The video was directed by Mark Alston, who had previously directed the video for Mauboy's single \"Let Me Be Me\" (2009). It premiered on YouTube on 10 February 2011.\n\nSynopsis and reception\nThe video begins showing Mauboy who appears to be sitting on a yellow antique couch in a mansion, wearing a purple dress. As the video progresses, scenes of memories are displayed of Mauboy and her love interest, played by Sean, spending time there previously. It then cuts to the scenes where Sean appears in the main entrance room of the mansion. The final scene shows Mauboy outdoors in a gold dress, surrounded by green grass and trees. She is later joined by Sean who appears in a black suit and a white shirt, and together they sing the chorus of the song to each other. David Lim of Feed Limmy wrote that the video is \"easily the best thing our R&B princess has committed to film – ever\" and praised the \"mansion and wondrous interior décor\". He also commended Mauboy for choosing Australian talent to direct the video instead of American directors, which she had used for her previous two music videos. Since its release, the video has received over two million views on Vevo.\n\nLive performances\nMauboy performed \"What Happened to Us\" live for the first time during her YouTube Live Sessions program on 4 December 2010. She also appeared on Adam Hills in Gordon Street Tonight on 23 February 2011 for an interview and later performed the song. On 15 March 2011, Mauboy performed \"What Happened to Us\" on Sunrise. She also performed the song with Stan Walker during the Australian leg of Chris Brown's F.A.M.E. Tour in April 2011. Mauboy and Walker later performed \"What Happened to Us\" on Dancing with the Stars Australia on 29 May 2011. From November 2013 to February 2014, \"What Happened to Us\" was part of the set list of the To the End of the Earth Tour, Mauboy's second headlining tour of Australia, with Nathaniel Willemse singing Sean's part.\n\nTrack listing\n\nDigital download\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean – 3:19\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Sgt Slick Remix) – 6:33\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Just Witness Remix) – 3:45\n\nCD single\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Album Version) – 3:19\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (Sgt Slick Remix) – 6:33\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (OFM Remix) – 3:39\n\nDigital download – Remix\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Jay Sean (OFM Remix) – 3:38\n\nDigital download\n \"What Happened to Us\" featuring Stan Walker – 3:20\n\nPersonnel\nSongwriting – Josh Alexander, Billy Steinberg, Jeremy Skaller, Rob Larow, Khaled Rohaim, Israel Cruz, Jay Sean\nProduction – Jeremy Skaller, Bobby Bass\nAdditional production – Israel Cruz, Khaled Rohaim\nLead vocals – Jessica Mauboy, Jay Sean\nMixing – Phil Tan\nAdditional mixing – Damien Lewis\nMastering – Tom Coyne \nSource:\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly chart\n\nYear-end chart\n\nCertification\n\nRadio dates and release history\n\nReferences\n\n2010 songs\n2011 singles\nJessica Mauboy songs\nJay Sean songs\nSongs written by Billy Steinberg\nSongs written by Jay Sean\nSongs written by Josh Alexander\nSongs written by Israel Cruz\nVocal duets\nSony Music Australia singles\nSongs written by Khaled Rohaim",
"McBusted's Most Excellent Adventure Tour is a 2015 concert tour by English supergroup McBusted, composed of members of pop rock bands McFly and Busted.\n\nBackground\nThe second McBusted tour, to support their debut self-titled album. On 4 November 2014, the band posted on their Twitter and Facebook pages: \"It's possibly the worst kept secret in entertainment, but we are so stoked to announce the #McBusted2015Tour!!!\" On 26 January 2015, on their website, they announced that the tour would be called McBusted's Most Excellent Adventure Tour. The tour lasted from 12 March to 22 April 2015, consisting of 21 shows. McBusted were also the support act for the Australian and European legs of One Direction's On the Road Again Tour in 2015. During the Australian dates, McBusted announced and performed two of their own gigs, one in Sydney and one in Melbourne. A music video was shot for their song \"Get Over It\" in 2014 with the intention of releasing it as a single the next year. However James Bourne confirmed on Twitter that the release was scrapped. A DVD and Blu-ray release of the 2015 tour, McBusted's Most Excellent Adventure Tour – Live at the O2, was released on 22 June 2015 and reached number one in the music video charts. The name of the tour is likely a reference to the 1989 comedy Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure.\n\nSupport acts\nSymmetry\nNew City Kings\nHometown\n\nTour dates\n\nSetlist\nMain stage:\n \"Air Guitar\"\n \"Hate Your Guts\"\n \"One for the Radio\"\n \"Thunderbirds Are Go\"\n \"Get Over It\"\n \"You Said No\"\n \"3AM\"\n \"What Happened to Your Band?\" \nB – Stage:\n \"Air Hostess\" \n \"What I Go to School For\" \n \"Obviously\" \n \"Beautiful Girls Are the Loneliest\"\n\"Here Comes The Bride\" Interlude:\n \"Crashed the Wedding\"\n \"Riding on My Bike\"\n \"All About You\"\n \"Star Girl\"\nEncore:\n \"5 Colours in Her Hair\"\n \"Shine a Light\"\n \"Year 3000\"\n\nNote:\n At Nottingham Capital FM Arena on the 19th of April, Crashed The Wedding followed What Happened To Your Band? but the rest of the set list remained the same thereafter. There was no \"B-Stage\" at this date, which is the reason for the set list change.\n During \"Riding On My Bike\", James rides a bicycle on stage throwing T-shirts into the audience.\n During the interlude to the B – Stage, The band descends onto the B – Stage in the same Delorean used for opening sequence of the McBusted Tour.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nMcBusted website\nMcBusted on Twitter\n\n2015 concert tours\nMcFly\nBusted (band)\nCo-headlining concert tours\n2015 in British music\nConcert tours of the United Kingdom\nConcert tours of Ireland"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,",
"What were the band's first 2 albums?",
"I don't know.",
"What songs were on Final Straw?",
"Run",
"Was there a single released?",
"They followed the success of \"Run\" up with three more singles from the album: \"Chocolate",
"Which other singles were there?",
"How to Be Dead",
"Did the singles make the charts?",
"Run\" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart",
"Did How to be Dead make the charts?",
"reaching number 39.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour",
"What else happened on the tour?",
"The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw."
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | Where did they tour in the US? | 10 | Where did Snow Patrol tour in the US? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | true | [
"Pioneer is the third full-length studio album by The Maine. The album sold over 12,000 copies in its first week, debuting at number 90 on the Billboard 200.\n\nBackground\nIn May and June 2011, the group went on a co-headlining US tour with Augustana. During the tour, the group debuted several new songs. On June 5, the group revealed that they had started recording their next album before the tour began, and were going to continue following the tour's conclusion. Recording took place at Sonic Ranch in El Paso, Texas with producer Colby Wedgeworth. On June 22, the group performed a new track titled \"Don't Give Up on \"Us\"\" on Fuel TV.\n\nRelease\nIn October and November, the group supported Taking Back Sunday on their headlining US tour. On October 5, Alternative Press reported that the group's next album would be titled Pioneer and was due for released in either late November or early December. On October 27, the group announced that the album would be released in December. In addition, a trailer was released which featured a snippet of a new track titled \"Some Days\". In November and December, the group went on a headlining US tour. On November 1, \"Don't Give Up on \"Us\"\" was made available for streaming. Later that day, the album's track listing and artwork were revealed. On November 6, a lyric video was released for \"Don't Give Up on \"Us\"\". On November 9, the group released a video of them making the album. On November 15, \"Some Days\" was made available for streaming. A lyric video was released for the track on November 21.\n\nOn December 2, Pioneer was made available for streaming, before being released on December 6 through the band's own label, Action Theory. The album features singles \"Don't Give Up On Us\" and \"Some Days.\" To promote its release, the group held a livestream event via Stickam called This Is Pioneer. It featured a documentary on the making of the album and a concert where the band performed material from all of their previous albums and EPs. Shortly afterwards, the group performed at the Unsilent Night festival. In January and February 2012, the band supported All Time Low on their UK tour. On January 22, the group released \"Take Me Dancing\", an outtake from the album, as a free download. On February 5, a lyric video was released for the track. On February 16, a music video was released for the song. Later in February, the group embarked on a European tour.\n\nBetween April and June, the group went on a headlining US tour with support from Lydia and Arkells. On July 27, a music video was released for \"Like We Did (Windows Down)\". A behind-the-scenes video was subsequently released. On September 11, Pioneer was reissued in the UK through Rude Records. Under the new title Pioneer & the Good Love, it featured new artwork and six new songs. The new songs were also released separately on the Good Love EP, which was released on the same day. A behind-the-scenes video of the group recording the new songs was also released. On September 30, the group performed at the Bazooka Rocks Festival in the Philippines. On October 11, the band released an alternative version of \"Like We Did (Windows Down)\" under the name \"Like We Did (When We Were Lost)\". They explained it was \"a more abstract take on friendship and adventure\". In October and November, the group went on a co-headlining US tour with Mayday Parade. They were supported by The Postelles. On October 20, the group released a music video for \"Thinking of You\".\n\nTrack listing\nAll lyrics written by John O'Callaghan, all music composed by The Maine.\n\nChart performance\n\nPersonnel\n Members\n John O'Callaghan – lead vocals, piano\n Jared Monaco – lead guitar\n Kennedy Brock – rhythm guitar, vocals\n Garrett Nickelsen – bass guitar\n Pat Kirch – drums, percussion\n\n Production\nTim Kirch – Art direction, design, management\nAdrian Lozano – Engineering\nDirk Mai – Art direction, design, photography\nThe Maine – Composer, engineer, producer\nKyle Miller – Design\nJohn O'Callaghan – Art direction, design\nMatt Salveson – Engineering\nMatthew Van Gasbeck – Engineering, keyboard\nColby Wedgeworth – Engineering, mastering, mixing, producer\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nPioneer at YouTube (streamed copy where licensed)\n\nThe Maine (band) albums\n2011 albums\nAlbums recorded at Sonic Ranch",
"Lite, stylized as LITE, is a Japanese math rock band that has been termed \"one of Japan's top instrumental rock acts.\" The band's members are Nobuyuki Takeda (guitar), Kozo Kusumoto (guitar & synthesizer), Jun Izawa (bass), and Akinori Yamamoto (drums).\n\nBiography\nFormed in 2003 in Tokyo, LITE did many gigs around Tokyo and self-released two demo CDs. In 2006, they released one mini-album, LITE, and one full-length album, Filmlets, through Transduction in the UK and Cargo in Europe.\n\nLITE's sound combines the precision and musicianship of prog rock with the emotionally charged cinematic compositions of art rock, in a heavier, more modern package that they describe as “math rock”. \n\nLITE toured the UK and Ireland in 2006. In July 2007, they played at Fuji Rock Festival in Japan and followed that with another UK & Ireland tour in September, coinciding with a split release with Funanori (Kaori Tsuchida from The Go! Team and Mike Watt from the Minutemen). Titled \"A Tiny Twofer\", the split CD features three songs each. In 2008 they released their second album Phantasia. In May 2009, they made their American debut in New York City opening for Mike Watt's Missingmen.\n\nLITE produced two EPs, Turns Red in 2009, and Illuminate in 2010, and third album For All the Innocence in 2011.\n\n Their mini-album Past, Present, Future was released in 2012.\n\nLITE released their 4th album Installation in 2013 from Japan (I want The Moon) and the US (Topshelf Records). \n\nIn 2015, the band released their US tour documentary DVD titled Past 7 Days (I want The Moon).\n\nIn 2016, LITE and mouse on the keys released LITE / mouse on the keys split and they did the US tour from November 2016 and March 2017.\n\nThe band released their 5th album Cubic from Japan (I want The Moon) and the US (Topshelf Records). \n\nIn 2018, LITE released their new single Blizzard from Japan (I want The Moon) and the US (Topshelf Records). \n\nIn 2019, LITE released split 7 inch with Redneck Manifesto TRM・LITE from STIFFSLACK in Japan.\n\nThe band released their 6th album Multiple from Japan (I want The Moon) and the US (Topshelf Records). \n\nIn 2021, LITE released their 7th album Fraction.\n\nMembers\n Nobuyuki Takeda (guitar)\n Kozo Kusumoto (guitar & synthesizer)\n Jun Izawa (bass)\n Akinori Yamamoto (drums)\n\nDiscography\n\nCDR releases\n 1st Demo CD (2003)\n 2nd Demo CD (2004)\n Lite Demo CD-R US West Coast Tour 2010 Limited (2010)\n\nMini-albums\n Lite (2005)\n Past, Present, Future (2012)\n\nAlbums\n Filmlets (2007)\n Phantasia (2008)\n For All The Innocence (2011)\n Installation (2013)\n Cubic (2016)\nMultiple (2019)\n Fraction (2021)\n\nLive appearances\n Live in Limerick (2007)\n Live in New York (2009)\n Live in Los Angeles (2010)\n\nEP\n A Tiny Twofer (2007)\n Turns Red (2009)\n Illuminate (2010)\nBlizzard (2018)\n\nDVDs\nApproaches (2011)\nApproaches 2 (2013)\nApproaches 4 (2015)\nPast 7 Days (2015)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n Official Facebook page\n Lite on Topshelf Records\n\nJapanese rock music groups\nMusical groups established in 2003\nMusical groups from Tokyo\nTopshelf Records artists\nMath rock groups"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,",
"What were the band's first 2 albums?",
"I don't know.",
"What songs were on Final Straw?",
"Run",
"Was there a single released?",
"They followed the success of \"Run\" up with three more singles from the album: \"Chocolate",
"Which other singles were there?",
"How to Be Dead",
"Did the singles make the charts?",
"Run\" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart",
"Did How to be Dead make the charts?",
"reaching number 39.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour",
"What else happened on the tour?",
"The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw.",
"Where did they tour in the US?",
"That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8."
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | Was live 8 well attended? | 11 | Was the Live 8 concert well attended? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | the worldwide benefit concert | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | true | [
"Live is a live album by Canadian industrial band Front Line Assembly, released in 1989. The album contains recordings from the Gashed Senses & Crossfire tour in Europe. It was released only on vinyl and limited to 4.000 numbered copies.\n\nThe album was recorded during Front Line Assembly's first show in London in July 1989 which was probably not well attended. Thus \"the recorded sound of the crowd cheering had to be edited and recycled from track to track just to give the sonic illusion of a packed room.\"\n\nLive is known for its bad sound quality about which the band later expressed their discontent. Rhys Fulber did not even consider it a proper Front Line Assembly release. \"The first one really doesn't count\", he said in an interview in 1996 with Sonic Boom Magazine, comparing Live to the then upcoming live album of the Hard Wired tour.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\n Bill Leeb\n Rhys Fulber\n Michael Balch\n\nReferences\n\nFront Line Assembly albums\n1989 live albums\nFront Line Assembly live albums\nThird Mind Records live albums",
"Happy Day is a live album by British worship leader Tim Hughes. In September 2008, Hughes attended Shepherd's Bush Empire in London, England, to record a live concert album and DVD. 2,000 fans attended the event. The album was released on 14 March 2009, to many positive reviews. British guitarist Stu G of Delirious? also performed at the event, and a duet of 'Here I Am To Worship' was performed with Martin Smith. Rap act 29th Chapter also dueted with Hughes on the song 'Dance'.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences\n\nTim Hughes albums\n2009 live albums"
] |
[
"Snow Patrol",
"Final Straw (2002-2005)",
"Was Final Straw a song or an album?",
"Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums,",
"What were the band's first 2 albums?",
"I don't know.",
"What songs were on Final Straw?",
"Run",
"Was there a single released?",
"They followed the success of \"Run\" up with three more singles from the album: \"Chocolate",
"Which other singles were there?",
"How to Be Dead",
"Did the singles make the charts?",
"Run\" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart",
"Did How to be Dead make the charts?",
"reaching number 39.",
"Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?",
"during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour",
"What else happened on the tour?",
"The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw.",
"Where did they tour in the US?",
"That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8.",
"Was live 8 well attended?",
"the worldwide benefit concert"
] | C_250850e245c348649abdb0eb83bba051_1 | Did they ever play with U2 at any other shows? | 12 | Besides the Vertigo Tour, did Snow Patrol ever play with U2 at any other shows? | Snow Patrol | In 2002, the band started to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life. Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join the band in the spring of 2002. During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Through Richard, brother Paul too had come to know the band. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close approached the band in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 90s punk rock band Compulsion had no rock production experience at that point, being known at the time for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem. Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The album, along with "Run" (which debuted at No. 5 in the UK Singles Chart), gave the band their first taste of mainstream success. The record peaked at No. 3 in the UK Albums Chart. They followed the success of "Run" up with three more singles from the album: "Chocolate", as well as a re-release of "Spitting Games", both reaching the top 30, and "How to Be Dead" reaching number 39. The release of Final Straw in the United States in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th most popular album in the UK of that year. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on U2's Vertigo Tour in Europe. The band then returned to the United States to continue touring in support of Final Straw. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive 2-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign, Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur. CANNOTANSWER | toured with U2 | Snow Patrol are a Northern Irish–Scottish rock band formed in 1994 in Dundee, Scotland. They consist of Gary Lightbody (vocals, guitar), Nathan Connolly (guitar, backing vocals), Paul Wilson (bass guitar, backing vocals), Jonny Quinn (drums), and Johnny McDaid (piano, guitar, backing vocals). Initially an indie rock band, Snow Patrol rose to prominence in the early– mid-2000s as part of the post-Britpop movement.
The band were founded at the University of Dundee in 1994 by Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison of Shrug. After briefly using the name Polarbear, releasing the EP Starfighter Pilot (1997) and losing Morrison as a member, the band became Snow Patrol in 1997 and added Quinn to its lineup. Their first two studio albums, Songs for Polarbears (1998) and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001), released by the independent record label Jeepster Records, were commercially unsuccessful. The band then signed to the major record label Polydor Records in 2002.
Connolly joined Snow Patrol in 2002, and after their major-label debut album, Final Straw, the following year, with "Run", the album's biggest hit, the band rose to national fame. The album was certified 5× platinum in the UK. Their next studio album, Eyes Open (2006), and its hit single, "Chasing Cars"—reported in 2019 to be the most-played song of the 21st century on UK radio—propelled the band to greater international fame. The album topped the UK Albums Chart and was the best-selling British album of the year. In 2008, Snow Patrol released their fifth studio album, A Hundred Million Suns; then, in 2009, they released their first compilation album, Up to Now; and, in 2011, their sixth studio album, Fallen Empires, was published. The band released their seventh album, Wildness, on 25 May 2018.
During the course of their career, Snow Patrol have won seven Meteor Ireland Music Awards and been nominated for six Brit Awards and one Grammy. Final Straw, Eyes Open, and A Hundred Million Suns have sold ten million copies worldwide, combined.
History
Early years (1994–1997)
Snow Patrol were originally formed in early 1994 by University of Dundee students Gary Lightbody, Mark McClelland, and Michael Morrison under the name Shrug. The band started by performing gigs at the university and surrounding pubs such as Lucifer's Mill. Their first EP was entitled The Yogurt vs. Yoghurt Debate. In 1996, they changed their name to Polarbear to avoid issues with any American bands that were also named Shrug. Shortly afterwards, drummer Michael Morrison left the group after suffering a breakdown and returned to Northern Ireland. In mid-1997, Polarbear released a three-track EP, Starfighter Pilot, on the Electric Honey label. The band again renamed, this time to Snow Patrol in 1997, because of a naming conflict with a band named Polar Bear, fronted by ex-Jane's Addiction bassist Eric Avery.
Songs for Polarbears and When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (1997–2001)
Snow Patrol joined independent label Jeepster in 1997. Jeepster had the same idea for Snow Patrol as the approach they had with Belle & Sebastian, who had become popular by word of mouth, without heavy promotion. The band were happy to be associated with an indie label, because it provided them greater independence than a major label would. At that time, they were quoted as saying Jeepster wouldn't expect them to have a strict work ethic or focus too much on promotional efforts.
Snow Patrol's debut album, Songs for Polarbears, was released in 1998 after the band had started living in Glasgow. Lightbody was then working at the Nice n Sleazy's Bar in Sauchiehall Street. The album was a critical success but did not make any impact commercially. The same year, the band came close to getting featured in a worldwide advertisement for Philips. Gomez was ultimately signed. In 1999, Snow Patrol won the "Phil Lynott Award for Best New Band" by Irish music magazine Hot Press. In 2001, still living in Glasgow, the trio followed up with When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up. Like its predecessor, the album was praised by critics but did not sell.
The band began to work harder and tour more. They slept on fans' floors after concerts and pretended to be members of Belle & Sebastian to get into nightclubs. They owed rent to their landlords and used to receive regular visits and letters from them when on tour. After the failure of the second album, Snow Patrol began to realise that the label's lax attitude towards management and record promotion, qualities that had initially attracted them to Jeepster, was likely holding them back. The band's manager at the time was Danny McIntosh. Lightbody has described him as "the angriest man in pop: great, great man". He has said that he loved the band "with every atom in his body" and was never angry towards them. Lightbody has credited their manager with keeping the band together in those years. McIntosh had a gold-coloured splitter bus, in which the band used to travel to play concerts.
Jeepster dropped Snow Patrol in 2001, a decision that was criticised by Hot Press magazine as brainless. By July 2001, many major labels had started showing interest in the band, who were cash-strapped and had no record deal. Lightbody sold a major part of his record collection to raise money to keep the band going. The singer calls the time "miserable" but he was confident they would get signed to another label quickly. However, the music scene in the United Kingdom had turned its attention to American bands, and British bands were not getting signed. The group spent this time constantly writing songs. Lightbody, bored at this point, assembled The Reindeer Section, a Scottish supergroup, and found a record label to release the project's recordings. Quinn said that though the time was hard for everyone involved except for Nathan, the question of splitting up never arose. It was during this time the band wrote "Run" (which had been around since 2000) in a room on an acoustic guitar, which later became the band's breakthrough single. The band's "low point" came when they played a concert to eighteen people at a popular strip club in High Wycombe. The show took place in a shoddy VIP area, and the management had to unscrew poles used by pole dancers to make space for the band to play, something that Gary would later joke about whilst performing at a sold-out Wembley Arena. Quinn calls the show "horrendous". Desperate for attention, the band raised £200 to nominate themselves for a Mercury Prize but failed to get shortlisted.
Final Straw (2002–2005)
In 2002, Snow Patrol began to be managed and published by Jazz Summers of Big Life.
Guitarist Nathan Connolly, previously a member of the band File Under Easy Listening, had been working in an HMV store room in Belfast at the time. Connolly and the band had a mutual friend, who introduced them to him. Connolly moved to Glasgow to join Snow Patrol in the spring of 2002.
During Lightbody and McClelland's years at the University of Dundee, they had been noticed by Richard Smernicki, a senior student. Richard's brother Paul had come to know the band as well. Richard graduated in 1996, two years before Lightbody and McClelland, to become Polydor's Scottish A&R representative. Paul became Polydor's Press and Artist Development Manager and Fiction's label manager. Later, Jim Chancellor, an A&R executive for Fiction, and fellow talent scout Alex Close, approached Snow Patrol in Glasgow to listen to their demos, and judged them on "the quality of the songs", according to Lightbody. Chancellor introduced them to producer Jacknife Lee, who despite having been a guitarist in 1990s punk rock band Compulsion, had no rock production experience at that point, being known instead for his work with Basement Jaxx and Eminem.
Final Straw was released on 4 August 2003, under Black Lion, a subsidiary of Polydor Records. Its music was along the same lines as the band's first two albums, and no attempt was made to change the sound to something more radio-friendly. The release of Final Straw in the US in 2004 saw the album sell more than 250,000 copies and become the 26th-most popular album in the UK of that year. The album was eventually certified five-times platinum in the UK. In mid-2005, during their tour to support Final Straw, the band toured with U2 as an opening act on the Vertigo Tour in Europe. That summer also saw Snow Patrol playing a short set in London at the worldwide benefit concert Live 8. After finishing their opening act duties and extensive two-year tour of Final Straw in late July, the band took a few weeks off and began writing and recording songs for a new album. Snow Patrol's new version of John Lennon's "Isolation" was released on 10 December 2005 as part of the Amnesty International campaign Make Some Noise. The song was later issued on the 2007 John Lennon tribute album, Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur.
Eyes Open and worldwide success (2005–2007)
On 16 March 2005, McClelland left the band, with Lightbody stating, "a whole new set of new and unexpected pressures...have unfortunately taken their toll on working relationships within the band, and it was felt the band could not move forward with Mark as a member." At the end of March 2005, former Terra Diablo member Paul Wilson was announced as the official replacement for McClelland, and Snow Patrol also declared longtime touring keyboardist Tom Simpson an official member of the band.
Snow Patrol completed the recording of Eyes Open in December 2005, with Jacknife Lee returning for production. The album was released on 28 April 2006 in Ireland and 1 May 2006 in the UK, with the first UK single, "You're All I Have", coming out on 24 April 2006. The record was released in North America on 9 May. While "Hands Open" was the first American single, "Chasing Cars" pushed its way onto the download and pop charts after it was heard during an emotional scene of the second-season finale of the television show Grey's Anatomy on 15 May 2006. On 23 July 2006, "Chasing Cars" had the distinction of being the last song performed live on the BBC's Top of the Pops. The song peaked at number 6 on the UK Singles Chart and number 5 on the US Billboard Hot 100.
On 26 November 2006, Eyes Open had become the best-selling album of 2006 in the UK, selling 1.5 million copies. It was also the 15th best-selling album of the 2000s and is one of the best-selling albums in UK chart history.
At the 2007 Grammy Awards, "Chasing Cars" was nominated for Best Rock Song and at the 2007 Brit Awards, the song was nominated for Best British Single. 1 September 2007 saw Snow Patrol headlining a "homecoming" mini-festival in Lightbody and Jonny Quinn's home town of Bangor, County Down. Around 30,000 people came to see the band.
A Hundred Million Suns (2008–2009)
Lightbody stated that recording for the follow-up to Eyes Open was to begin in Autumn 2006, with Jacknife Lee returning a third time for production.
The band kicked off their Taking Back the Cities Tour on 26 October 2008. Singer Miriam Kaufmann toured with the band and sang backing vocals, most notably on "Set the Fire to the Third Bar", which originally featured Martha Wainwright. The UK & Ireland Arena Tour ended on 23 March. The final show was played at the Odyssey in Belfast to a 9,000-strong crowd, including family and friends of the band, and the Northern Irish football squad. It was also reported that the band played to an estimated 200,000 fans during the tour.
Snow Patrol next visited South Africa to play a few dates at the Coca-Cola Zero Festival, supporting Oasis, before beginning a European leg of the tour. In June, they supported Coldplay for a month on the Viva la Vida Tour.
The band also released a compilation album featuring tracks from their fifteen-year history, Up to Now, on 9 November 2009. It includes thirty tracks spanning two CDs, of which three are new songs. "Just Say Yes", a track written by Lightbody and earlier recorded by Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger and X Factor star Diana Vickers, was released as the lead single on 2 November. The album additionally contains covers and rarities, including songs from the band's side project, The Reindeer Section. Snow Patrol expressed wishes to make a tour documentary in the future, along the lines of U2's Rattle and Hum.
In December 2009, the PPL announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. The same month, in a UK poll conducted by Channel 4, it was voted the nation's favourite "song of the noughties". In January 2010, the band were nominated in three categories in the annual Meteor Awards. They also played at the event, on 19 February 2010 at The RDS.
Fallen Empires (2010–2012)
In 2009, Snow Patrol stated they would enter their "next phase" with the release of their sixth album. The band took a new musical direction, and Connolly advised fans to keep an open mind regarding the new material. On 12 January 2011, Lightbody launched a blog to give details about the progress of the band's next release.
Snow Patrol released the single "Called Out in the Dark" (remixed by Fatboy Slim) for radio airplay on 21 July 2011 on BBC Radio 1 on Zane Lowe's radio show. According to official sources, the single itself would be released independently and as part of an EP later on and the UK release date was said to be 4 September. More details on the EP were announced on 3 August, when the group's website revealed the artwork and track list contents. Along with the new single, the release contained three new tracks, entitled "My Brothers", "I'm Ready", and "Fallen Empires". In addition, it was revealed that the EP was intended to be a digital release limited to the UK and Ireland.
Shortly after the premiere of the new lead single, the quintet's official website confirmed the news that the name of the new album would be Fallen Empires. Fallen Empires was released on 14 November 2011 in the UK and was launched at O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire. Singer-songwriter Johnny McDaid, after being involved in the album as a guest musician and songwriter, would then join the band on the subsequent tour and eventually become a full member of Snow Patrol.
The second single from Fallen Empires was "This Isn't Everything You Are", released on 13 November 2011.
Greatest Hits (2013–2018)
The band released a compilation entitled Greatest Hits on 14 May 2013.
Snow Patrol headlined the Tennent's Vital festival in August 2013 and performed a special warm-up show in London before the festival. After the show, they announced that Simpson would be leaving the band.
Wildness (2018–present)
The follow-up to Fallen Empires was initially due for release in 2016. Lightbody told NME that he had to overcome a bout of writer's block and that the songs written for the new album were scrapped before being replaced by new "mind-boggling" material.
On 28 January 2018, the band's social media announced the upcoming release of their seventh studio album, entitled Wildness, which was published on 25 May 2018.
In November 2018, they released an EP, What If This Is All the Love You Ever Get?, featuring remixes of the track of the same name from Wildness. The band released their third compilation album, Reworked, on 8 November 2019, and followed it up with a tour.
Contributions
In 2009, Snow Patrol curated the 22nd album in the Late Night Tales series of mix albums. The band covered the INXS song "New Sensation" for the occasion. Lightbody has also spoken of plans to release songs from the Listen... Tanks! project (with Snow Patrol producer Jacknife Lee) and Tired Pony, a country group.
In 2014, the band contributed a new song, "I Won't Let You Go", to the soundtrack for the film Divergent.
Appearances
On 30 July 2006, Snow Patrol appeared on the finale of the long-running BBC music show Top of the Pops, performing "Chasing Cars". The band were the last act to appear on the show.
On 7 July 2007, they performed at the UK leg of Live Earth at Wembley Stadium, London. Shortly after their performance, Simpson was arrested at RAF Northolt for missing a court date in Glasgow, having been charged with possession of cocaine.
Other ventures
Snow Patrol founded Polar Music, a publishing company run through Kobalt Music. The venture is independent from the band's publishing deal with Universal Music. Polar Music was planned to sign artists regardless of their genre, as drummer Jonny Quinn explained: "there is no agenda—if it's good enough and we believe in it 110%, we will sign it." Quinn, and his fellow band members Connolly and Lightbody, are acting as A&R. The company's first signing was Johnny McDaid, previously of the Northern Irish band Vega4. Quinn has said that they wish to sign artists to a one-album deal and do not want to put undue pressure on the artists with bigger, multi-year contracts. Polar Music had its initial chart hit in the first week of October 2009.
Gary Lightbody and Tom Simpson are both fans of the football club Dundee F.C. In 2008, they met the club's board of directors to find ways to financially help the struggling club. The band also owns a stake in the Houndstooth Pub in New York City.
Philanthropy
On 25 November 2007, Snow Patrol performed an acoustic session for the charity Mencap at Union Chapel, Islington. They were one of the main bands to take part in the project, called "Little Noise Sessions", which was curated by Jo Whiley.
In 2009, Lightbody and Connolly donated plectrums and certificates to the Music Beats Mines project, which aims to clear unexploded mines/landmines from conflict zones. The items were auctioned on eBay.
Recognition
Other musicians, such as Ozzy Osbourne, Bono, Michael Stipe, and Nikki Sixx, have expressed admiration for Snow Patrol. Terri Hooley, founder of the Good Vibrations label and a lifelong supporter of local Northern Irish music, has expressed pride in bands like Snow Patrol.
Awards and nominations
"Chasing Cars" was voted the song of the decade on Channel 4's programme The Song of the Decade, which was broadcast on 28 December 2009. On 30 December 2009, Phonographic Performance Limited announced "Chasing Cars" was the most-played song of the decade in the UK. Ten years later in 2019, it was reportedly still the most played song of the 21st century in the UK.
In June 2010, the band were commemorated with a Heritage Award by PRS for Music. A plaque was erected on the Duke of York pub in Belfast, where Snow Patrol performed their first gig. The band were the sixth to receive the award, with all its members turning out. They later performed a live set to a small crowd of around thirty people.
Band members
Current
Gary Lightbody – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano, keyboards (1994–present)
Nathan Connolly – lead guitar, backing vocals (2002–present)
Johnny McDaid – keyboards, rhythm guitar, backing vocals (2011–present)
Paul Wilson – bass, backing vocals (2005–present)
Jonny Quinn – drums, percussion (1997–present)
Touring musicians
Richard Colburn – keyboards, drums, guitars, percussion (1996–1997, 2008–present)
Iain Archer – guitar, backing vocals (2001–present)
Colm MacAthlaoich – trumpet (2001–present)
Miriam Kaufmann – backing vocals (2006–2007, 2008–present)
Troy Stewart – guitar (2008–present)
Former
Mark McClelland – bass, keyboards, piano (1994–2005)
Michael Morrison – drums (1994–1996)
Tom Simpson – keyboards, piano, samples (2005–2013)
Timeline
Discography
Songs for Polarbears (1998)
When It's All Over We Still Have to Clear Up (2001)
Final Straw (2003)
Eyes Open (2006)
A Hundred Million Suns (2008)
Fallen Empires (2011)
Wildness (2018)
Concert tours
References
External links
Michael Morrison's tribute page to Shrug
Ivor Novello Award winners
Musical groups established in 1994
Scottish alternative rock groups
Scottish indie rock groups
Indie rock groups from Northern Ireland
Alternative rock groups from Northern Ireland
Fiction Records artists
Polydor Records artists
Post-Britpop groups
Musical quintets
Interscope Records artists
1994 establishments in the United Kingdom
University of Dundee | true | [
"Philippe Ménard (born August 15, 1986) is a Canadian curler from Boucherville, Quebec. He currently played for his brother, Jean-Michel's team from 2011 to 2018. He is known for wearing a bandana during play.\n\nCareer\n\nJuniors\nMénard was a member of the Quebec team at the 2006 Canadian Junior Curling Championships, skipped by Martin Crête. Ménard threw third stones on the team. The team finished with a 7–5 record, missing the playoffs in 6th place. Before then, Ménard played at the 2003 Canada Winter Games, placing 10th.\n\nMen's\nAfter juniors, Ménard would skip his own team for a season before joining the Simon Dupuis rink for the 2007–08 season, as his lead. That year, Ménard was invited to be Team Quebec's alternate at the 2008 Tim Hortons Brier. The team, skipped by brother Jean-Michel went 4–7, and Ménard would play in two matches. The next season, he joined the François Gagné rink. He again played as his brother's alternate, playing at the 2009 Tim Hortons Brier. The team went 7–4, losing in a tie breaker to Manitoba. Ménard did not play in any games, however. He then joined the Pierre Charette rink for one season, before joining the Gagné team again for a run at the 2011 Tim Hortons Brier, where Ménard played lead. The team would finish the round robin with a 3–8 record. After the season Ménard was recruited to his brother's rink as their lead in 2011. He has remained with his brother's team ever since.\n\nIn his first season with his brother, the team won the Challenge Casino Lac Leamy World Curling Tour event, and played in the 2011 BDO Canadian Open Grand Slam event, where they made the quarterfinals. The team did not make it to the Brier that year. The next season they played in two Grand Slam events, the 2012 ROGERS Masters of Curling and the 2012 Canadian Open of Curling, missing the playoffs in both events. They also played in the 2012 Tim Hortons Brier, finishing with a 6–5 record. In 2013–14, the team did not play in any Slams, but found success at the 2014 Tim Hortons Brier. There they made the playoffs after posting a 7-4 round robin record. However the team lost both of their playoff matches, including the bronze medal game, settling for fourth.\n\nIn 2014–15, the team again did not play in any Slams, but were the winners of the Challenge Casino de Charlevoix WCT event. They again went to the Brier, posting a 6–5 record at the 2015 Tim Hortons Brier. The next season they played in The National Grand Slam event, missing the playoffs. They played at the 2016 Tim Hortons Brier, finishing with a 4–7 record.\n\nPersonal life\nMénard works as an administrative coordinator with Martin Ménard Consultant Inc. He is married and has one child.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1986 births\nCurlers from Quebec\nFrench Quebecers\nLiving people\nPeople from Boucherville\nPeople from Amos, Quebec\nCanadian male curlers",
"The Tour That Didn't Tour Tour...Now On Tour was a comedy tour by British stand-up comedian Peter Kay. Announced in November 2009, Kay said he would be playing four dates at Manchester Arena, which was later extended to 20 nights in April and May 2010, with a tour entitled The Tour That Doesn't Tour Tour. The reason Kay was restricting the tour to Manchester was so he could be close to his family. During an interview with Jonathan Ross, Kay announced that due to high demand for tickets, he would extend and rename it to The Tour That Doesn't Tour Tour...Now On Tour, taking place in November 2010 and April 2011. The tour was staged at the Manchester Arena, The O2 Arena, London, The O2 Arena, Dublin, The Odyssey Arena, Belfast, Cardiff International Arena, SSE Hydro, Glasgow, the Sheffield Arena, the Resorts World Arena, Birmingham, the Utilita Arena Newcastle, and the Liverpool Arena before returning to Manchester.\n\nSinger Rick Astley appeared as a warm-up act in all April and May 2010 dates of the tour, performing various hits including his own.\n\nAll shows completely sold out with over 750,000 tickets sold.\n\nOn 4 November 2010, extra shows were announced for London, Manchester and Birmingham.\n\nIt was announced on 12 November that a sixth show was to be added to the O2 in Dublin, with all proceeds going to the Irish Autism Action.\n\nExtra shows were added for Belfast, Sheffield, Nottingham, Newcastle and London on 24 November.\n\nRecords\nLongest individual run at the Manchester Arena performing 20 nights.\nFirst ever stand-up comedian to play 15 sold out nights at The O2, London.\nThe only British artist to ever play 20 consecutive nights at an arena.\nOver one million tickets sold in arenas across the UK and Ireland, making it the biggest stand-up comedy tour in the world.\n\nNumber of shows\n Manchester – Manchester Arena – 40 Shows – Most consecutive nights at venue with 20. \n London – O2 Arena – 15 Shows – Most show by a comedian at venue. \n Dublin – O2 – 6 Shows – Most show by a comedian, most consecutive show by a single artist at venue.\n Belfast – Odyssey Arena – 8 shows \n Cardiff – International Arena – 5 Shows \n Liverpool – Echo Arena – 5 Shows \n Glasgow – SECC – 5 Shows \n Newcastle – Metro Radio Arena – 8 Shows \n Nottingham – Trent FM Arena – 3 Shows \n Birmingham – LG Arena/NIA – 10 Shows, 5 in LG Arena & 5 in NIA \n Sheffield – Motorpoint Arena – 8 Shows\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Official Website\n Ticketmaster UK\n Ticketmaster Ireland\n\nComedy tours"
] |
[
"The Bella Twins",
"Team Bella (2014-2015)"
] | C_70ae421b29c944d1936f9af142452d7e_0 | What is Team Bella all about ? | 1 | What is Team Bella all about ? | The Bella Twins | Nikki received her title match against AJ Lee on November 23 at Survivor Series, which she won, with Brie's help, to become a two-time Divas Champion. This led to the duo reuniting as a result. Nikki then went on to retain her championship in three separate occasions - against Lee in a rematch on December 14, at TLC: Tables, Ladders and Chairs, against Naomi two days later on SmackDown and against Paige at Fastlane on February 22, 2015. Paige and Lee then formed an alliance against Bellas which led to a tag team match at WrestleMania 31, where Lee and Paige were victorious. On April 26, after Nikki retained her title over Naomi at Extreme Rules, a feud started, with Naomi aligning with the returning Tamina to even the odds against Bellas, who began showing more heroic characteristics. This change in character was criticized as "sudden", "randomly" and "for no reason". This led to a tag team match between the two teams on May 17, at Payback, which Naomi and Tamina won. Two weeks later at Elimination Chamber, Nikki retained her title against Naomi and Paige in a triple threat match, with Brie banned from ringside. In June, The Bella Twins became villainess once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 episode of Raw and at Money in the Bank. During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina. After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi, and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon called for a "revolution" in the WWE Divas division and introduced the debuting Charlotte and Becky Lynch as Paige's allies, while NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks debuted as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, which led to a brawl between the three teams. Nikki then lost to Charlotte in a tag team match on the August 3 episode of Raw, and to Banks on the August 17 episode of Raw in a non-title match. The three teams faced off on August 23 at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match, in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win. On the September 14 episode of Raw, Nikki defended her title against Charlotte, who pinned Brie after the twins had switched places to win the match; however, since the title cannot change hands by disqualification, Nikki retained the championship, and in the process, became the new longest reigning Divas Champion in history, surpassing AJ Lee's previous record of 295 days. CANNOTANSWER | In June, The Bella Twins became villainess once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 | The Bella Twins were a professional wrestling tag team who performed on WWE and consisted of identical twin sisters Brie Bella and Nikki Bella (real names Brianna and Nicole). The Bella Twins are both former Divas Champions, with Brie becoming the first twin in WWE History to win the WWE Divas Championship once, while Nikki holding it twice. Nikki is also the longest-reigning holder of that title.
Both sisters signed with WWE in 2007 (then known as World Wrestling Entertainment) and were assigned to the farm territory Florida Championship Wrestling. As Brie Bella, Brianna was called up to the main roster in 2008. She began to wrestle and, during her matches, she switched places with her sister to win. Weeks later, it was revealed that they were twins and Nicole began to work as Nikki Bella. During the next years, they worked together as a team and won the WWE Divas Championship one time each one, but in 2012, when they were released. The Bella Twins made their return in 2013 and featured the reality show Total Divas. While in 2014 they disbanded the team and feud between them, they reunited in 2015 and Nikki won the Divas Championship for a second time. She retained the title for 301 days, the longest reign of the title. After 2015, they began to appear less in WWE shows until they announced their retirement in 2019. In 2021, they were inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame as part of the 2020 class.
In November 2015, Nikki was ranked No. 1 in Pro Wrestling Illustrateds Female 50.
Early lives and careers
Nicole and Brianna Garcia-Colace were born sixteen minutes apart on November 21, 1983, in San Diego, California and raised on a farm in the outskirts of Scottsdale, Arizona. They are of Mexican and Italian descent and played soccer in their youth. The twins graduated from Chaparral High School in 2002. They returned to San Diego for college, where Nicole continued playing soccer for Grossmont College, with both twins also working at Hooters. A year later, the twins relocated to Los Angeles in pursuit of acting and modeling opportunities, making ends meet doing various gigs from marketing for a now defunct record label, to cocktail waitressing at the Mondrian Hotel.
They then made their first national TV appearance on the Fox reality show Meet My Folks. Following this appearance, the twins were hired to be the World Cup Twins for Budweiser and were photographed holding the World Cup trophy. They were contestants in the 2006 "International Body Doubles twins search". They participated in the 2006 WWE Diva Search, but did not make the cut.
Professional wrestling career
World Wrestling Entertainment/WWE
Florida Championship Wrestling (2007–2008)
The Bella Twins were signed to developmental contracts by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) in June 2007 and were assigned to Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW), WWE's then-developmental territory, in Tampa, Florida. On September 14, the twins made their in-ring debut defeating Nattie Neidhart and Krissy Vaine with Victoria Crawford as the special guest referee. As a part of their on-screen personas, they switched places behind the referee's back if one of them was hurt. This was called "Twin Magic". They also occasionally competed in mixed tag team matches, teaming with male wrestlers including Kofi Kingston and Robert Anthony. They also made some non-wrestling appearances on Heath Miller's Happy Hour promo segment.
Starting in December 2007, they managed Derrick Linkin, but this storyline was cut short when Linkin was released in January 2008. They then resumed their feud with Neidhart and Crawford, wrestling them throughout much of 2008. In FCW, the twins competed in bikini contests and wrestled against Katie Lea Burchill, Milena Roucka, and Nattie Neidhart. Their last FCW appearance was on September 2, when they competed in a Divas battle royal won by Miss Angela.
Various storylines (2008–2011)
On the August 29 episode of SmackDown, Brianna debuted as Brie Bella and defeated Victoria. She had a series of matches with Victoria and Victoria's accomplice Natalya. In each match, Brie would roll out of the ring and go underneath it, emerging revived as she would then win the match. On the November 7 episode of SmackDown, Brie picked up a win against Victoria and then ran under the ring to escape Natalya and Victoria, but Victoria and Natalya both reached for Brie under the ring, resulting in both Nicole and Brie being pulled out. Nicole was then introduced as Nikki Bella. The twins had their first official match as a team on the November 21 episode of SmackDown, defeating Victoria and Natalya. They continued competing in tag team matches over the following months.
Starting in November, the twins developed an on-screen relationship with The Colóns (Carlito and Primo). In February 2009, the storyline expanded to include John Morrison and The Miz, who flirted with the Bellas and took them on a date for Valentine's Day. The date provoked a rivalry between the teams of The Miz and Morrison and Primo and Carlito, with the four competing for the affection of the twins, who were seemingly unable to choose between them. On March 17 on ECW, Carlito and Primo, aiming for Morrison and The Miz, accidentally spat apples in the face of Brie. Nikki began to laugh at Brie's misfortune, and a fight broke out between the two, which led to Nikki leaving with The Miz and Morrison while Brie stayed with Primo and Carlito. Brie won her first match over Nikki in a six-person intergender tag team match on SmackDown the following week. On ECW on March 31, Nikki pinned Brie in their first singles match against each other after a distraction from Morrison and The Miz.
On April 15, The Bella Twins were both drafted to the Raw brand as part of the 2009 supplemental draft. On April 27, Brie made her Raw in-ring debut in an eight-Diva tag team match, which her team won. Nikki also made an appearance, reuniting with her twin, as she was under the ring to help Brie during the match. Nikki then made her in-ring debut for the brand the following month in a battle royal, but was eliminated by Beth Phoenix.
On June 29, they were both traded to the ECW brand. They debuted on ECW the following night on The Abraham Washington Show, as the special guests. They quickly developed a storyline feud with Katie Lea Burchill, when Nikki defeated her in a match by switching places with Brie behind the referee's back. The following week on Superstars, Brie defeated Burchill after a similar fashion, and the feud ended in September, when Nikki defeated Burchill on Superstars.
On October 12, the Bellas were traded back to Raw as part of a tri-branded Divas trade, where they predominately appeared in backstages segments with the weekly guest stars and only occasionally competed in matches. In June 2010, they developed a feud with Jillian Hall, when Brie defeated her after switching places with Nikki. The following week, Nikki defeated Hall after switching with Brie. The feud was exacerbated when the Bellas acted as the special guest referees during one of Hall's matches. During the match, Hall attacked both twins, but lost the match when Nikki made a fast count, allowing her to be pinned by Gail Kim. The next week on Superstars, the twins defeated Hall and Maryse in a tag team match to end the storyline.
On August 31, The Bella Twins announced they would be part of the all-female third season of NXT, mentoring Jamie. Jamie was the first rookie Diva eliminated on the October 5 episode of NXT. In November, the twins began a storyline with Daniel Bryan, when Brie accompanied him to the ring for his match. Following his win, Nikki ran out and the two fought over Bryan's affection, until Bryan broke it up and had them hug each other. They began to manage Bryan and frequently accompanied him to the ring over the next two months. In January 2011, they discovered Bryan kissing Gail Kim backstage and assaulted her. They continued to attack Kim, both at the Royal Rumble on January 30 and the following night on Raw. On February 7, they teamed with Melina in a losing effort to Kim, Eve Torres and Tamina.
Divas Champions (2011–2012)
The Bellas began feuding with Eve Torres after they appeared as lumberjills during a Divas Championship match between Torres and Natalya on the February 14 episode of Raw. Following the match, they attacked Torres backstage before Gail Kim and Natalya stopped them. The next week on Raw, the twins defeated Torres and Kim in a tag team match. The following week on Raw, Nikki won a battle royal to become the number one contender for the Divas Championship and unsuccessfully challenged Torres for the championship on March 7.
On April 11, Brie defeated Torres to win the Divas Championship, marking the first time either twin had held a championship in WWE. On May 22, Brie went on to successfully defend the championship against Kelly Kelly at Over the Limit after switching places with Nikki. On a special "Power to the People" episode of Raw on June 20, Brie defended her WWE Divas Championship against Kelly (who was selected by voters), losing the title and ending her reign at 70 days. On July 17, Brie challenged Kelly for the championship in a rematch at Money in the Bank on July 17, but she failed to win.
The Bellas began to show friction in March 2012 after both twins lost to AJ Lee in singles competition. After Brie's match with Lee, Nikki revealed that Brie was rooting for Team Johnny in the 12-man tag team match at WrestleMania XXVIII on April 1 whilst Nikki was rooting for Team Teddy, thus furthering their dissension.
On the April 6 episode of SmackDown, Nikki defeated the Divas Champion Beth Phoenix in a non-title match after Kelly Kelly distracted Phoenix. On April 23, Nikki defeated Phoenix in a lumberjill match on Raw to win the Divas Championship for the first time. Brie lost Nikki's championship to Layla at Extreme Rules on April 29 after Twin Magic failed, ending her Divas Championship reign after only a week. The following night on Raw, they competed in their last match with the WWE, failing to win back the Divas Championship from Layla in a triple threat match. Later that night, WWE announced on their website that the twins had been fired by Executive Administrator Eve Torres.
Independent circuit promotions (2012–2013)
On May 1, 2012, the twins appeared at their first independent wrestling show in Newburgh, New York at Northeast Wrestling. They later appeared for CTWE Pro Wrestling at the Season Beatings pay-per-view on December 15, each accompanying a different wrestler to the ring.
Return to WWE
Total Divas storylines (2013–2014)
The Bella Twins returned to WWE on the March 11, 2013, episode of Raw in a backstage segment with Team Rhodes Scholars (Cody Rhodes and Damien Sandow). On the March 15 episode of SmackDown, the twins attacked The Funkadactyls (Cameron and Naomi) and the following week interfered in matches between Team Rhodes Scholars and Brodus Clay and Tensai, but were attacked by The Funkadactyls. The twins made their in-ring return defeating The Funkadactyls on the March 27 episode of Main Event after interference from Cody Rhodes. The Bella Twins were scheduled to participate in an eight-person tag team match with Team Rhodes Scholars against Tons of Funk (Clay and Tensai) and The Funkadactyls at WrestleMania 29 on April 7, but the match was canceled due to time restraints and instead took place the following night on Raw, where The Bella Twins and Team Rhodes Scholars were defeated. In June, Nikki suffered a fractured tibia.
Upon the debut of the Total Divas reality television program in July, The Bellas began a feud with their co-star on the show Natalya, with Brie and Natalya trading victories in singles competition on Raw and at SummerSlam on August 18. The cast of Total Divas then transitioned into a scripted feud with Divas Champion AJ Lee, who mocked the show and cast. At Night of Champions on September 15, Brie unsuccessfully challenged Lee for the Divas Championship in a four-way match, which also involved Natalya and Naomi. Continuing their feud into October, Brie and Lee faced off at Battleground and Hell in a Cell for the Divas Championship, but Brie was unsuccessful. Nikki returned to in-ring action on the October 25 episode of SmackDown, losing to Lee. At Survivor Series on November 24, the twins were part of the victorious Team Total Divas. On April 6, they failed to win the Divas Championship again at WrestleMania XXX in the Divas Invitational match, which was won by Lee.
Brief split (2014)
In April 2014, Brie became involved in her real-life husband Daniel Bryan's ongoing storyline with Stephanie McMahon and Kane, whereas part of the storyline McMahon threatened to fire Brie if an injured Bryan did not relinquish the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at Payback on June 1, which forced Brie to "quit" WWE before slapping McMahon in the face. After Brie "quit", McMahon put Nikki in several handicap matches as punishment. After a month absence, Brie returned to WWE television, appearing in the crowd on July 21 and starting a confrontation with McMahon who slapped Brie and was subsequently arrested. In order to have Brie drop the "charges", Brie was rehired and received a match against McMahon at SummerSlam.
Nikki attacked Brie at the event on August 17, which allowed McMahon to win the match. The next several weeks saw the twins fight in several backstage and in-ring segments, including a cameo appearance from Jerry Springer on Raw on September 8. As part of the storyline, McMahon declared Nikki the face of the WWE Divas division and granted her a match at Night of Champions for the Divas Championship, which she failed to win. At Hell in a Cell, Nikki defeated Brie in a match where the loser was forced to become the winner's personal assistant for 30 days.
Nikki and Brie reunited at Survivor Series on November 23 when Nikki defeated AJ Lee with Brie's help to become a two-time Divas Champion. Nikki retained her championship in three separate occasions—against Lee in a rematch at TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs on December 14, against Naomi two days later on SmackDown and against Paige on February 22, 2015, at Fastlane. Paige and Lee then formed an alliance against the Bellas which led to a tag team match at WrestleMania 31 on March 29, which the Bellas lost.
Team Bella (2015)
After Nikki retained her title over Naomi at Extreme Rules on April 26, Nikki started a feud with Naomi after she aligned with the returning Tamina to even the odds against Bellas. This led to a tag team match between the two teams at Payback on May 17, which Naomi and Tamina won. At Elimination Chamber on May 31, Nikki retained her title against Naomi and Paige in a triple threat match, with Brie banned from ringside.
In June, The Bella Twins became villains once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 episode of Raw and at Money in the Bank on June 14. During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina.
After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon called for a "revolution" in the WWE Divas division and introduced the debuting Charlotte and Becky Lynch as Paige's allies while NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks debuted as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, which led to a brawl between the three teams. Nikki then lost to Charlotte in a tag team match on the August 3 episode of Raw and to Banks on the August 17 episode of Raw in a non-title match. On August 23, the three teams faced off at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win.
On the September 14 episode of Raw, Nikki defended her title against Charlotte, who pinned Brie after the twins had switched places to win the match, but she retained the championship since the title cannot change hands by disqualification and in the process became the new longest reigning Divas Champion in history, surpassing AJ Lee's previous record of 295 days.
Injuries, retirements and sporadic appearances (2015–2019)
On September 20, Nikki dropped the championship to Charlotte at Night of Champions, ending her reign at 301 days and failing to regain the title in a rematch at Hell in a Cell on October 25. Shortly after, Nikki went on a hiatus from both television and in-ring competition due to a neck injury which would require surgery, but returned for one night on December 21 to accept the Slammy Award for Diva of the Year. During Nikki's absence, Brie continued to compete in singles competition and in tag team matches with Fox. Brie was unsuccessful in winning the Divas Championship at Fastlane on February 21 in a match against Charlotte. During that time, Team Bella quietly disbanded.
In March 2016, Brie was placed in a feud with Lana, who argued that Brie's fans only supported her out of pity for having a "bad husband". Brie then aligned herself with fellow Total Divas cast members Alicia Fox, Natalya, Paige and Eva Marie while Lana aligned herself with Team B.A.D. (Naomi and Tamina), Summer Rae and Emma (which was officially called Team B.A.D. and Blonde), leading to a 10-woman tag team match on the WrestleMania 32 kickoff show on April 3, which Team Total Divas would win when Naomi submitted to Brie. After the match, Nikki returned and celebrated with her co-stars. On April 6, Brie confirmed that she would be taking an extended break from in-ring competition, citing family reasons while also stating that she will continue working for WWE as an ambassador.
On January 22, 2018, on the Raw 25 Years special episode, The Bella Twins were honored as part of a segment involving women considered legends that contributed to the company's success. At the Royal Rumble on January 28, Brie and Nikki participated in the first ever women's Royal Rumble match at No. 28 and No. 27, respectively, making it into the final four with Asuka and Sasha Banks, with Nikki eliminating Brie before being eliminated herself by the winner Asuka. On the September 3 episode of Raw, The Bella Twins competed for the first time in three years, defeating The Riott Squad (Liv Morgan and Sarah Logan). The Bellas teamed with Ronda Rousey to defeat The Riott Squad at WWE Super Show-Down on October 6, and won the rematch two nights later on Raw. After the rematch, the Bellas attacked Rousey. Nikki received a title opportunity against Rousey at WWE Evolution on October 28, but was unsuccessful. In March 2019, both Bellas announced on Total Bellas that they had retired from in-ring competition with Brie making the announcement on the March 10 episode and Nikki announcing her retirement on the season finale on March 24. At February 21, 2020 edition of SmackDown, it was announced that both Bellas will be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame, during A Moment of Bliss segment. Due to the COVID Pandemic, the ceremony took place the next year.
Other media
Guest appearances
Prior to working with WWE, the twins appeared on Meet My Folks. Both twins also appeared in the music video for "Right Side of the Bed" by the band Atreyu. They were regulars on the VH1 show Best Week Ever. The twins made a guest appearance on the MTV series Ridiculousness in October 2012. They also appeared in the music video for "Na Na" by Trey Songz in 2014.
The twins guest starred on the television series Psych, in the 2014 episode "A Nightmare on State Street". Nikki and Brie are part of the main cast for the reality television show Total Divas, which began airing in July 2013. In April 2016, it was announced that Total Bellas, a spin-off of Total Divas starring the twins, would begin airing in fall 2016.
Nikki and Brie co-starred in the 2014 independent film Confessions of a Womanizer and provided voices for the 2015 movie The Flintstones & WWE: Stone Age SmackDown!.
Nikki appeared at the Miss USA 2013 pageant as one of the celebrity judges. They appeared at the 2014 MTV Europe Music Awards, where they presented the award for Best Female. The twins were both nominated for Choice Female Athlete at the 2015 Teen Choice Awards. The following year at the 2016 Teen Choice Awards, The Bella Twins won Choice Female Athlete. Brie appeared alongside Paige, Natalya, and the Chrisley family on the 88th Academy Awards edition of E! Countdown to the Red Carpet in February 2016.
The Bella Twins have appeared in ten WWE video games, making their in-game debut at WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2010 and appearing in WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2011, WWE '12 (DLC), WWE '13, WWE 2K14 (DLC), WWE 2K15, WWE 2K16, WWE 2K17, WWE 2K18, WWE 2K19, WWE 2K20 and WWE 2K Battlegrounds. Animated versions of the Bella Twins were included in WWE Network's series Camp WWE.
YouTube
Both twins appeared on the WWE YouTube show The JBL & Cole Show.
On November 21, 2016, Nikki and Brie unveiled their new YouTube channel which features daily fashion, beauty, travel, fitness, relationship and health videos along with daily video blogs, created by the twins themselves.
The Bella Twins appeared in YouTuber iiSuperwomanii's video "When Someone Tries to Steal Your BFF" on March 2, 2017.
On April 16, 2020, the twins were featured on the hit YouTube channel "First We Feast", appearing a Truth or Dab edition of Hot Ones.
Lifestyle
On August 21, 2017, Nikki and Brie launched their own wine label called Belle Radici in collaboration with Hill Family Estates and Gauge Branding. Later that year on November 1, 2017, Nikki and Brie launched Birdiebee, a lifestyle intimates and activewear brand. The line includes transitional intimates, activewear and loungewear aimed at "empowering and educating women through mirroring the twins' passion for life, strength, women's health and wellness, and fun".
On January 28, 2019, Nikki and Brie launched Nicole + Brizee, a body and beauty line. On March 27, 2019, Nikki and Brie launched their own podcast.
In March 2020, Nikki and Brie released their memoir Incomparable.
In 2021, Nikki and Brie launched another wine label called Bonita Bonita Wine.
In 2021, Nikki and Brie launched their own baby gear collection in partnership with Colugo. Nikki and Brie also announced that they joined Colugo as investors and creative advisors.
Personal life
On May 9, 2017, Brie gave birth to her first child, a daughter, Birdie Joe Danielson. In January 2020, the twins announced they were both pregnant, with due dates a week and a half apart. On July 31, Nikki gave birth to Matteo Artemovich Chigvintsev. 22 hours later, Brie gave birth to Buddy Dessert Danielson on August 1.
Bibliography
Incomparable (2020)
Filmography
Film
Television
Music videos
Championships and accomplishments
Pro Wrestling Illustrated
PWI ranked Brie Bella No. 12 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2015
PWI ranked Nikki Bella No. 1 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2015
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone named Nikki Bella as the Diva of the Year in 2015
Rolling Stone named Nikki Bella as the Most Improved Wrestler in 2015
Teen Choice Awards
Choice Female Athlete (2016)
WrestleCrap
Gooker Award (2014) Feud between each other (co-winner with Vince McMahon)
Wrestling Observer Newsletter
Worst Feud of the Year (2014) Brie vs. Nikki
Worst Feud of the Year (2015) Team PCB vs. Team B.A.D. vs. Team Bella
Worst Worked Match of the Year (2013) with Cameron, Eva Marie, JoJo, Naomi, and Natalya vs. AJ Lee, Aksana, Alicia Fox, Kaitlyn, Rosa Mendes, Summer Rae and Tamina Snuka on November 24
WWE
WWE Divas Championship (3 times) – Brie Bella (1), Nikki Bella (2)
Slammy Award (4 times)
Couple of the Year (2013, 2014)
Diva of the Year (2013)
Diva of the Year (2015)
WWE Hall of Fame (Class of 2020)
References
External links
1983 births
American female professional wrestlers
American professional wrestlers of Italian descent
American professional wrestlers of Mexican descent
American YouTubers
ECW (WWE) teams and stables
Identical twin females
Living people
Participants in American reality television series
People from San Diego
Sportspeople from Scottsdale, Arizona
Twin people from the United States
Twin sportspeople
Women's wrestling teams and stables
WWE teams and stables
WWE Diva Search contestants
WWE Hall of Fame team inductees
Professional wrestlers from California
21st-century American women
American actresses of Mexican descent | false | [
"Bella: An American Tall Tale is a stage musical with book, music, and lyrics by Kirsten Childs. The musical is set in the 1870s and tells a tale of the American frontier from a different perspective.\n\nThe musical originally premiered at Dallas Theatre Center on September 22, 2016 before its Off-Broadway premiere at Playwrights Horizons on May 19, 2017. The Off-Broadway production was co-presented by Playwrights Horizons and Dallas Theatre Center.\n\nBackground \n\nKirsten Childs noticed that African Americans were not present in history books during the 1870s in the Wild West. Childs wanted \"to create a new myth celebrating the power and the beauty of the black female.\" When Childs was considering writing this musical, she realized she did not know much about African Americans during the 1870s. She went to the library to research the history of African Americans during this time period. She learned about the Buffalo Soldiers Buffalo Soldier, who inspired the character of Aloysius T. Hunnicut.\n\nChilds was inspired to write the character of Bella after seeing an African American woman as she was walking to her apartment. Childs recounts that the woman had the biggest butt she had ever seen, and every man in the vicinity of her was staring at her butt. She also wants African Americans, who were torn from their original homes and know little of their history, to feel a sense of pride of who they are. This want inspired the song \"The Language of My Nose and Lips and Hair,\" sung by Bella's grandma, about the history of Black Americans in the United States. Childs also touches on how, after the American Civil War, African Americans were allowed to be full citizens, but the Ku Klux Klan rose up to put an end to that.\n\nThe character of Nathaniel Beckworth, who is a train porter, is based on a real-life, African American train porter named Nat Love. His last name \"Beckworth\" comes from James Beckwourth, who was an explorer, rancher, and fur trader. Tommie Haw is another real-life character that appears in Bella. Childs learned about his story while researching the Mai Wah Society in Butte, Montana, which works to document the history of Asian-Americans in the Rocky Mountains.\n\nSynopsis \nBella takes place in the 1870s in the Old West. Bella, a \"Big Booty Tupelo Girl,\" sets off to Kansas to meet her fiancé, Aloysius T. Honeycutt, who is a Buffalo Soldier. Bella must make this journey under a false name in order to escape the law. Back home in Tupelo, Mississippi, Bella is in trouble for beating up Bonny Jonny. Her Mama, Grandma, and Aunt Dinah encourage her to leave the state so that she is not arrested. When Bella boards the train headed for Kansas, she attracts the attention of the passengers because of her large bottom. While on the train journey, Bella has fantasies about a gaucho and a Chinese cowboy. A porter on the train, Nathaniel Beckworth, falls in love with Bella.\n\nCast and Character \n Ashley D. Kelley — Bella\n Marinda Anderson — Ida Lou/Aunt Dinah\n Yurel Echezarreta — Diego Moreno/CP Conyers\n Brandon Gill — Nathaniel Beckworth\n Olli Haaskivi — Gabriel Conyers/Scooter\n Josh Davis, Kevin Massey — Snaggletooth Hoskins/Bonny Jonny\n Jo’Nathan Michael — Mr. Dinwiddie/Scumbucket\n Kenita R. Miller — Miss Cabbagestalk/Mama\n Paolo Montalban — Tommie Haw/Skeeter\n Clifton Oliver — Aloysius T. Hunnicut\n Gabrielle Reyes — Mrs. Dinwiddie/Nurse\n NaTasha Yvette Williams — Grandma/Spirit of the Booty\n\nMusical Numbers \n\nAct I\n \"Big Booty Tupelo Gal\" — Bella\n \"The Language of My Nose and Lips and Hair\" — Grandma, Aunt Dinah, Bella, Mama\n \"Private Hunnicutt's Letter\" — Aloysius\n \"Quien Fuera Luna\" — Diego Moreno, Miss Cabbagestalk, Bella\n \"What I Want\" — Bella, Nathaniel\n \"Kansas Boun'\" — Mama, Bella\n \"Gal Over Younder\" — Nathaniel, Bella\n \"Tommie Haw\" — Tommie Haw\n \"Rollin' Along\" — Bella, Nathaniel\n \"Heaven Must Be Tupelo\" — Bella\n \"Bonny Johnny Rakehell\" — Bonny Jonny, Bella\n \"One Ass to Another\" — Spirit of the Booty, Bonny Jonny, Bella\n\nAct II\n \"Bide a Little Time at the Circus\" — Gabriel Conyers, Bella\n \"White People Tonight\" — Bella, CP Conyers\n \"Trav'lin the World\" — Bella, CP, Gabriel\n \"Mama, Where Did You Go?\" — Mama\n \"Don't Start No S**t\" — Aloysius\n \"Nothin' But a Man\" — Nathaniel\n \"You Don't Know What Ya Got Until It's Gone\" — Spirit of the Booty, Bella\n \"Impossible\" — Bella\n \"Finale\" — Bella, Company\n\nReferences \n\n2016 musicals\nWorks about the American Old West",
"Coblos Cinta (\"Vote for Love\") is a 2008 Indonesian comedy film directed by Findo Purwono HW. The film produced by IFI, starring Nadia Saphira and Tommy Kurniawan, tells the story about two students who compete to become Head of the Student Council. There is a lot of rivalry between them when the two candidates try to gain influence on their campus by carrying out unique and ridiculous campaigns, with unexpected events as the election day approaches.\n\nPlot \nBella (Nadia Saphira) is a student who successfully running for the Head of the Student Council on her campus. Together with her success team, Putri (Siti Anizah), Icha (Gracia Indri), Sasha (Jessica Iskandar), and Heidy (Alessia Cestaro), Bella competes with Aldi (Tommy Kurniawan) who is handsome, smart, and good at winning the hearts of campus students . Aldi us supported by his success team , Ferry (Marrio Merdhitia) and Dimas (Tarra Budiman). Bella continues to run her campaign even though she’s not supported by her boyfriend, Rhino (Boy Hamzah).\n\nThe strategy for selling brownies for Bella's campaign funds was unsuccessful because the price was too expensive, and Aldi easily defeated it by using girl’s car wash as a strategy. Bella, who had not had time to prepare a counterattack, was even more aggravated by Aldi who opened a free massage booth for the campus student. After the pre-poll announcement that Aldi will win by a landslide victory, Bella is determined to defeat Aldi. Thanks to Sasha's advice, they began asking for money from office executives while wearing sexy clothes. Obviously, many executives are willing to give them large checks.\n\nAfter Bella began competing with Aldi with a photo calendar and body painting strategy, she is unconsciously approached by Aldi, especially when Aldi drove Bella home after Bella broke up with Rhino. Outside Bella’s place, Aldi almost kissed Bella and it was photographed by a campus tabloid reporter who likes to create a sensation named Anto (Melvin Giovanie). The next day, the news and photos were published. This caused a chaos in Bella's group, Icha who secretly likes Aldi blames Bella and leaves, while the candidate debate will take place in two days.\n\nAfter the debate, Bella actually gave up when the election day announcement, successfully persuaded Heidy, they both gathered on campus with Sasha and Putri, then Icha also came there and they reconcile. Announcement was reported with the results of Bella winning as the Head of the Student Council. When Anto triggered riots, Aldi calmed the situation while supporting Bella's victory. The film ends with Aldi and Bella together and Anto is locked overnight in the campus bathroom.\n\nCast \n\n Nadia Saphira as Bella\n Tommy Kurniawan as Aldi\n Jessica Iskandar as Sasha\n Gracia Indri as Icha\n Siti Anizah as Putri\n Alessia Cestaro as Heidy\n Mario Merdhitia as Ferry\n Tarra Budiman as Dimas\n Melvin Giovanie as Anto\n Boy Hamzah as Rhino\n\nAdditional Cast \n\n Framly Daniel as Head of Student Council\n Intan Savila as Head of Faculty\n Ivan Gunawan as Himself\n Adly Fairuz as Himself\n Mama Dahlia as Herself\n Kiki Farrel as Himself\n\nCharacters \n\n Bella is a very smart, idealistic and friendly woman. She has a high self-confidence and leader spirit. She is also strong-willed when she has a certain desire, she will try very hard to gets it.\n Aldi is Bella's rival in the election of the Head of the Student Council. He is an influential campus activist on his campus. Aldi is not a handsome guy, but his cool and charming style makes him pretty much adored by girls on his campus.\n Sasha is one of Bella's sexiest friends among other gang members. Aside from being an ordinary college girl, Sasha has a side \"income\" from a man with 2 children. He always has a way out for each gang problem even though the idea is often a little naughty.\n Icha is Bella's best friend. Icha who wears glasses is a woman who is gadget freak, she likes electronic devices. In addition, Icha also likes to write and do things related to technology. His personality tends to be introverted and likes to dream.\n Putri is Bella's friend who has a tomboyish character, ignorant, \"crazy\" ball, and a football bookie on her campus. He is a very loyal and typical person ‘follower’.\n Heidy is a girl who when talks, always in English. She likes to issue stupid questions / remarks, but sometimes there are some truths in it too. Being too honest, what on her mind immediately come out uncensored.\n Ferry is one of Aldi's best friends. He can always complete his tasks even though they often fall apart. Ferry is the person responsible for Aldi's naughty campaigns. His pretends to be masculine, to cover his femininity.\n Dimas is a member of Aldi success campaign who has the full name of Dimas Joko Prayitno (Dimas = Guaranteed Mas-Mas). Even though it is pretentious in imitating hip-hopers, when he speaks, a thick Javanese accent comes out. Dimas has a hobby of providing super-crisp rhymes and puzzles.\n Anto is a campus reporter who has annoying nature. He is always looking for sensations and happy with chaos.\n Rhino is Bella's possessive boyfriend and likes to belittle other people, especially women. He disagreed when Bella was elected as the candidate for the Head of Student Council and always tries to get his girlfriend to quit the election.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n Official Website\n \n Vote for Love on Letterboxd\n Coblos Cinta on Film Indonesia\n\n2008 films\n2008 comedy films\nIndonesian films\nIndonesian comedy films\nFilms set in Indonesia\nFilms shot in Indonesia"
] |
[
"The Bella Twins",
"Team Bella (2014-2015)",
"What is Team Bella all about ?",
"In June, The Bella Twins became villainess once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1"
] | C_70ae421b29c944d1936f9af142452d7e_0 | What was the Twin Magic ? | 2 | What was the Twin Magic ? | The Bella Twins | Nikki received her title match against AJ Lee on November 23 at Survivor Series, which she won, with Brie's help, to become a two-time Divas Champion. This led to the duo reuniting as a result. Nikki then went on to retain her championship in three separate occasions - against Lee in a rematch on December 14, at TLC: Tables, Ladders and Chairs, against Naomi two days later on SmackDown and against Paige at Fastlane on February 22, 2015. Paige and Lee then formed an alliance against Bellas which led to a tag team match at WrestleMania 31, where Lee and Paige were victorious. On April 26, after Nikki retained her title over Naomi at Extreme Rules, a feud started, with Naomi aligning with the returning Tamina to even the odds against Bellas, who began showing more heroic characteristics. This change in character was criticized as "sudden", "randomly" and "for no reason". This led to a tag team match between the two teams on May 17, at Payback, which Naomi and Tamina won. Two weeks later at Elimination Chamber, Nikki retained her title against Naomi and Paige in a triple threat match, with Brie banned from ringside. In June, The Bella Twins became villainess once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 episode of Raw and at Money in the Bank. During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina. After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi, and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon called for a "revolution" in the WWE Divas division and introduced the debuting Charlotte and Becky Lynch as Paige's allies, while NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks debuted as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, which led to a brawl between the three teams. Nikki then lost to Charlotte in a tag team match on the August 3 episode of Raw, and to Banks on the August 17 episode of Raw in a non-title match. The three teams faced off on August 23 at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match, in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win. On the September 14 episode of Raw, Nikki defended her title against Charlotte, who pinned Brie after the twins had switched places to win the match; however, since the title cannot change hands by disqualification, Nikki retained the championship, and in the process, became the new longest reigning Divas Champion in history, surpassing AJ Lee's previous record of 295 days. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | The Bella Twins were a professional wrestling tag team who performed on WWE and consisted of identical twin sisters Brie Bella and Nikki Bella (real names Brianna and Nicole). The Bella Twins are both former Divas Champions, with Brie becoming the first twin in WWE History to win the WWE Divas Championship once, while Nikki holding it twice. Nikki is also the longest-reigning holder of that title.
Both sisters signed with WWE in 2007 (then known as World Wrestling Entertainment) and were assigned to the farm territory Florida Championship Wrestling. As Brie Bella, Brianna was called up to the main roster in 2008. She began to wrestle and, during her matches, she switched places with her sister to win. Weeks later, it was revealed that they were twins and Nicole began to work as Nikki Bella. During the next years, they worked together as a team and won the WWE Divas Championship one time each one, but in 2012, when they were released. The Bella Twins made their return in 2013 and featured the reality show Total Divas. While in 2014 they disbanded the team and feud between them, they reunited in 2015 and Nikki won the Divas Championship for a second time. She retained the title for 301 days, the longest reign of the title. After 2015, they began to appear less in WWE shows until they announced their retirement in 2019. In 2021, they were inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame as part of the 2020 class.
In November 2015, Nikki was ranked No. 1 in Pro Wrestling Illustrateds Female 50.
Early lives and careers
Nicole and Brianna Garcia-Colace were born sixteen minutes apart on November 21, 1983, in San Diego, California and raised on a farm in the outskirts of Scottsdale, Arizona. They are of Mexican and Italian descent and played soccer in their youth. The twins graduated from Chaparral High School in 2002. They returned to San Diego for college, where Nicole continued playing soccer for Grossmont College, with both twins also working at Hooters. A year later, the twins relocated to Los Angeles in pursuit of acting and modeling opportunities, making ends meet doing various gigs from marketing for a now defunct record label, to cocktail waitressing at the Mondrian Hotel.
They then made their first national TV appearance on the Fox reality show Meet My Folks. Following this appearance, the twins were hired to be the World Cup Twins for Budweiser and were photographed holding the World Cup trophy. They were contestants in the 2006 "International Body Doubles twins search". They participated in the 2006 WWE Diva Search, but did not make the cut.
Professional wrestling career
World Wrestling Entertainment/WWE
Florida Championship Wrestling (2007–2008)
The Bella Twins were signed to developmental contracts by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) in June 2007 and were assigned to Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW), WWE's then-developmental territory, in Tampa, Florida. On September 14, the twins made their in-ring debut defeating Nattie Neidhart and Krissy Vaine with Victoria Crawford as the special guest referee. As a part of their on-screen personas, they switched places behind the referee's back if one of them was hurt. This was called "Twin Magic". They also occasionally competed in mixed tag team matches, teaming with male wrestlers including Kofi Kingston and Robert Anthony. They also made some non-wrestling appearances on Heath Miller's Happy Hour promo segment.
Starting in December 2007, they managed Derrick Linkin, but this storyline was cut short when Linkin was released in January 2008. They then resumed their feud with Neidhart and Crawford, wrestling them throughout much of 2008. In FCW, the twins competed in bikini contests and wrestled against Katie Lea Burchill, Milena Roucka, and Nattie Neidhart. Their last FCW appearance was on September 2, when they competed in a Divas battle royal won by Miss Angela.
Various storylines (2008–2011)
On the August 29 episode of SmackDown, Brianna debuted as Brie Bella and defeated Victoria. She had a series of matches with Victoria and Victoria's accomplice Natalya. In each match, Brie would roll out of the ring and go underneath it, emerging revived as she would then win the match. On the November 7 episode of SmackDown, Brie picked up a win against Victoria and then ran under the ring to escape Natalya and Victoria, but Victoria and Natalya both reached for Brie under the ring, resulting in both Nicole and Brie being pulled out. Nicole was then introduced as Nikki Bella. The twins had their first official match as a team on the November 21 episode of SmackDown, defeating Victoria and Natalya. They continued competing in tag team matches over the following months.
Starting in November, the twins developed an on-screen relationship with The Colóns (Carlito and Primo). In February 2009, the storyline expanded to include John Morrison and The Miz, who flirted with the Bellas and took them on a date for Valentine's Day. The date provoked a rivalry between the teams of The Miz and Morrison and Primo and Carlito, with the four competing for the affection of the twins, who were seemingly unable to choose between them. On March 17 on ECW, Carlito and Primo, aiming for Morrison and The Miz, accidentally spat apples in the face of Brie. Nikki began to laugh at Brie's misfortune, and a fight broke out between the two, which led to Nikki leaving with The Miz and Morrison while Brie stayed with Primo and Carlito. Brie won her first match over Nikki in a six-person intergender tag team match on SmackDown the following week. On ECW on March 31, Nikki pinned Brie in their first singles match against each other after a distraction from Morrison and The Miz.
On April 15, The Bella Twins were both drafted to the Raw brand as part of the 2009 supplemental draft. On April 27, Brie made her Raw in-ring debut in an eight-Diva tag team match, which her team won. Nikki also made an appearance, reuniting with her twin, as she was under the ring to help Brie during the match. Nikki then made her in-ring debut for the brand the following month in a battle royal, but was eliminated by Beth Phoenix.
On June 29, they were both traded to the ECW brand. They debuted on ECW the following night on The Abraham Washington Show, as the special guests. They quickly developed a storyline feud with Katie Lea Burchill, when Nikki defeated her in a match by switching places with Brie behind the referee's back. The following week on Superstars, Brie defeated Burchill after a similar fashion, and the feud ended in September, when Nikki defeated Burchill on Superstars.
On October 12, the Bellas were traded back to Raw as part of a tri-branded Divas trade, where they predominately appeared in backstages segments with the weekly guest stars and only occasionally competed in matches. In June 2010, they developed a feud with Jillian Hall, when Brie defeated her after switching places with Nikki. The following week, Nikki defeated Hall after switching with Brie. The feud was exacerbated when the Bellas acted as the special guest referees during one of Hall's matches. During the match, Hall attacked both twins, but lost the match when Nikki made a fast count, allowing her to be pinned by Gail Kim. The next week on Superstars, the twins defeated Hall and Maryse in a tag team match to end the storyline.
On August 31, The Bella Twins announced they would be part of the all-female third season of NXT, mentoring Jamie. Jamie was the first rookie Diva eliminated on the October 5 episode of NXT. In November, the twins began a storyline with Daniel Bryan, when Brie accompanied him to the ring for his match. Following his win, Nikki ran out and the two fought over Bryan's affection, until Bryan broke it up and had them hug each other. They began to manage Bryan and frequently accompanied him to the ring over the next two months. In January 2011, they discovered Bryan kissing Gail Kim backstage and assaulted her. They continued to attack Kim, both at the Royal Rumble on January 30 and the following night on Raw. On February 7, they teamed with Melina in a losing effort to Kim, Eve Torres and Tamina.
Divas Champions (2011–2012)
The Bellas began feuding with Eve Torres after they appeared as lumberjills during a Divas Championship match between Torres and Natalya on the February 14 episode of Raw. Following the match, they attacked Torres backstage before Gail Kim and Natalya stopped them. The next week on Raw, the twins defeated Torres and Kim in a tag team match. The following week on Raw, Nikki won a battle royal to become the number one contender for the Divas Championship and unsuccessfully challenged Torres for the championship on March 7.
On April 11, Brie defeated Torres to win the Divas Championship, marking the first time either twin had held a championship in WWE. On May 22, Brie went on to successfully defend the championship against Kelly Kelly at Over the Limit after switching places with Nikki. On a special "Power to the People" episode of Raw on June 20, Brie defended her WWE Divas Championship against Kelly (who was selected by voters), losing the title and ending her reign at 70 days. On July 17, Brie challenged Kelly for the championship in a rematch at Money in the Bank on July 17, but she failed to win.
The Bellas began to show friction in March 2012 after both twins lost to AJ Lee in singles competition. After Brie's match with Lee, Nikki revealed that Brie was rooting for Team Johnny in the 12-man tag team match at WrestleMania XXVIII on April 1 whilst Nikki was rooting for Team Teddy, thus furthering their dissension.
On the April 6 episode of SmackDown, Nikki defeated the Divas Champion Beth Phoenix in a non-title match after Kelly Kelly distracted Phoenix. On April 23, Nikki defeated Phoenix in a lumberjill match on Raw to win the Divas Championship for the first time. Brie lost Nikki's championship to Layla at Extreme Rules on April 29 after Twin Magic failed, ending her Divas Championship reign after only a week. The following night on Raw, they competed in their last match with the WWE, failing to win back the Divas Championship from Layla in a triple threat match. Later that night, WWE announced on their website that the twins had been fired by Executive Administrator Eve Torres.
Independent circuit promotions (2012–2013)
On May 1, 2012, the twins appeared at their first independent wrestling show in Newburgh, New York at Northeast Wrestling. They later appeared for CTWE Pro Wrestling at the Season Beatings pay-per-view on December 15, each accompanying a different wrestler to the ring.
Return to WWE
Total Divas storylines (2013–2014)
The Bella Twins returned to WWE on the March 11, 2013, episode of Raw in a backstage segment with Team Rhodes Scholars (Cody Rhodes and Damien Sandow). On the March 15 episode of SmackDown, the twins attacked The Funkadactyls (Cameron and Naomi) and the following week interfered in matches between Team Rhodes Scholars and Brodus Clay and Tensai, but were attacked by The Funkadactyls. The twins made their in-ring return defeating The Funkadactyls on the March 27 episode of Main Event after interference from Cody Rhodes. The Bella Twins were scheduled to participate in an eight-person tag team match with Team Rhodes Scholars against Tons of Funk (Clay and Tensai) and The Funkadactyls at WrestleMania 29 on April 7, but the match was canceled due to time restraints and instead took place the following night on Raw, where The Bella Twins and Team Rhodes Scholars were defeated. In June, Nikki suffered a fractured tibia.
Upon the debut of the Total Divas reality television program in July, The Bellas began a feud with their co-star on the show Natalya, with Brie and Natalya trading victories in singles competition on Raw and at SummerSlam on August 18. The cast of Total Divas then transitioned into a scripted feud with Divas Champion AJ Lee, who mocked the show and cast. At Night of Champions on September 15, Brie unsuccessfully challenged Lee for the Divas Championship in a four-way match, which also involved Natalya and Naomi. Continuing their feud into October, Brie and Lee faced off at Battleground and Hell in a Cell for the Divas Championship, but Brie was unsuccessful. Nikki returned to in-ring action on the October 25 episode of SmackDown, losing to Lee. At Survivor Series on November 24, the twins were part of the victorious Team Total Divas. On April 6, they failed to win the Divas Championship again at WrestleMania XXX in the Divas Invitational match, which was won by Lee.
Brief split (2014)
In April 2014, Brie became involved in her real-life husband Daniel Bryan's ongoing storyline with Stephanie McMahon and Kane, whereas part of the storyline McMahon threatened to fire Brie if an injured Bryan did not relinquish the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at Payback on June 1, which forced Brie to "quit" WWE before slapping McMahon in the face. After Brie "quit", McMahon put Nikki in several handicap matches as punishment. After a month absence, Brie returned to WWE television, appearing in the crowd on July 21 and starting a confrontation with McMahon who slapped Brie and was subsequently arrested. In order to have Brie drop the "charges", Brie was rehired and received a match against McMahon at SummerSlam.
Nikki attacked Brie at the event on August 17, which allowed McMahon to win the match. The next several weeks saw the twins fight in several backstage and in-ring segments, including a cameo appearance from Jerry Springer on Raw on September 8. As part of the storyline, McMahon declared Nikki the face of the WWE Divas division and granted her a match at Night of Champions for the Divas Championship, which she failed to win. At Hell in a Cell, Nikki defeated Brie in a match where the loser was forced to become the winner's personal assistant for 30 days.
Nikki and Brie reunited at Survivor Series on November 23 when Nikki defeated AJ Lee with Brie's help to become a two-time Divas Champion. Nikki retained her championship in three separate occasions—against Lee in a rematch at TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs on December 14, against Naomi two days later on SmackDown and against Paige on February 22, 2015, at Fastlane. Paige and Lee then formed an alliance against the Bellas which led to a tag team match at WrestleMania 31 on March 29, which the Bellas lost.
Team Bella (2015)
After Nikki retained her title over Naomi at Extreme Rules on April 26, Nikki started a feud with Naomi after she aligned with the returning Tamina to even the odds against Bellas. This led to a tag team match between the two teams at Payback on May 17, which Naomi and Tamina won. At Elimination Chamber on May 31, Nikki retained her title against Naomi and Paige in a triple threat match, with Brie banned from ringside.
In June, The Bella Twins became villains once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 episode of Raw and at Money in the Bank on June 14. During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina.
After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon called for a "revolution" in the WWE Divas division and introduced the debuting Charlotte and Becky Lynch as Paige's allies while NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks debuted as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, which led to a brawl between the three teams. Nikki then lost to Charlotte in a tag team match on the August 3 episode of Raw and to Banks on the August 17 episode of Raw in a non-title match. On August 23, the three teams faced off at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win.
On the September 14 episode of Raw, Nikki defended her title against Charlotte, who pinned Brie after the twins had switched places to win the match, but she retained the championship since the title cannot change hands by disqualification and in the process became the new longest reigning Divas Champion in history, surpassing AJ Lee's previous record of 295 days.
Injuries, retirements and sporadic appearances (2015–2019)
On September 20, Nikki dropped the championship to Charlotte at Night of Champions, ending her reign at 301 days and failing to regain the title in a rematch at Hell in a Cell on October 25. Shortly after, Nikki went on a hiatus from both television and in-ring competition due to a neck injury which would require surgery, but returned for one night on December 21 to accept the Slammy Award for Diva of the Year. During Nikki's absence, Brie continued to compete in singles competition and in tag team matches with Fox. Brie was unsuccessful in winning the Divas Championship at Fastlane on February 21 in a match against Charlotte. During that time, Team Bella quietly disbanded.
In March 2016, Brie was placed in a feud with Lana, who argued that Brie's fans only supported her out of pity for having a "bad husband". Brie then aligned herself with fellow Total Divas cast members Alicia Fox, Natalya, Paige and Eva Marie while Lana aligned herself with Team B.A.D. (Naomi and Tamina), Summer Rae and Emma (which was officially called Team B.A.D. and Blonde), leading to a 10-woman tag team match on the WrestleMania 32 kickoff show on April 3, which Team Total Divas would win when Naomi submitted to Brie. After the match, Nikki returned and celebrated with her co-stars. On April 6, Brie confirmed that she would be taking an extended break from in-ring competition, citing family reasons while also stating that she will continue working for WWE as an ambassador.
On January 22, 2018, on the Raw 25 Years special episode, The Bella Twins were honored as part of a segment involving women considered legends that contributed to the company's success. At the Royal Rumble on January 28, Brie and Nikki participated in the first ever women's Royal Rumble match at No. 28 and No. 27, respectively, making it into the final four with Asuka and Sasha Banks, with Nikki eliminating Brie before being eliminated herself by the winner Asuka. On the September 3 episode of Raw, The Bella Twins competed for the first time in three years, defeating The Riott Squad (Liv Morgan and Sarah Logan). The Bellas teamed with Ronda Rousey to defeat The Riott Squad at WWE Super Show-Down on October 6, and won the rematch two nights later on Raw. After the rematch, the Bellas attacked Rousey. Nikki received a title opportunity against Rousey at WWE Evolution on October 28, but was unsuccessful. In March 2019, both Bellas announced on Total Bellas that they had retired from in-ring competition with Brie making the announcement on the March 10 episode and Nikki announcing her retirement on the season finale on March 24. At February 21, 2020 edition of SmackDown, it was announced that both Bellas will be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame, during A Moment of Bliss segment. Due to the COVID Pandemic, the ceremony took place the next year.
Other media
Guest appearances
Prior to working with WWE, the twins appeared on Meet My Folks. Both twins also appeared in the music video for "Right Side of the Bed" by the band Atreyu. They were regulars on the VH1 show Best Week Ever. The twins made a guest appearance on the MTV series Ridiculousness in October 2012. They also appeared in the music video for "Na Na" by Trey Songz in 2014.
The twins guest starred on the television series Psych, in the 2014 episode "A Nightmare on State Street". Nikki and Brie are part of the main cast for the reality television show Total Divas, which began airing in July 2013. In April 2016, it was announced that Total Bellas, a spin-off of Total Divas starring the twins, would begin airing in fall 2016.
Nikki and Brie co-starred in the 2014 independent film Confessions of a Womanizer and provided voices for the 2015 movie The Flintstones & WWE: Stone Age SmackDown!.
Nikki appeared at the Miss USA 2013 pageant as one of the celebrity judges. They appeared at the 2014 MTV Europe Music Awards, where they presented the award for Best Female. The twins were both nominated for Choice Female Athlete at the 2015 Teen Choice Awards. The following year at the 2016 Teen Choice Awards, The Bella Twins won Choice Female Athlete. Brie appeared alongside Paige, Natalya, and the Chrisley family on the 88th Academy Awards edition of E! Countdown to the Red Carpet in February 2016.
The Bella Twins have appeared in ten WWE video games, making their in-game debut at WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2010 and appearing in WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2011, WWE '12 (DLC), WWE '13, WWE 2K14 (DLC), WWE 2K15, WWE 2K16, WWE 2K17, WWE 2K18, WWE 2K19, WWE 2K20 and WWE 2K Battlegrounds. Animated versions of the Bella Twins were included in WWE Network's series Camp WWE.
YouTube
Both twins appeared on the WWE YouTube show The JBL & Cole Show.
On November 21, 2016, Nikki and Brie unveiled their new YouTube channel which features daily fashion, beauty, travel, fitness, relationship and health videos along with daily video blogs, created by the twins themselves.
The Bella Twins appeared in YouTuber iiSuperwomanii's video "When Someone Tries to Steal Your BFF" on March 2, 2017.
On April 16, 2020, the twins were featured on the hit YouTube channel "First We Feast", appearing a Truth or Dab edition of Hot Ones.
Lifestyle
On August 21, 2017, Nikki and Brie launched their own wine label called Belle Radici in collaboration with Hill Family Estates and Gauge Branding. Later that year on November 1, 2017, Nikki and Brie launched Birdiebee, a lifestyle intimates and activewear brand. The line includes transitional intimates, activewear and loungewear aimed at "empowering and educating women through mirroring the twins' passion for life, strength, women's health and wellness, and fun".
On January 28, 2019, Nikki and Brie launched Nicole + Brizee, a body and beauty line. On March 27, 2019, Nikki and Brie launched their own podcast.
In March 2020, Nikki and Brie released their memoir Incomparable.
In 2021, Nikki and Brie launched another wine label called Bonita Bonita Wine.
In 2021, Nikki and Brie launched their own baby gear collection in partnership with Colugo. Nikki and Brie also announced that they joined Colugo as investors and creative advisors.
Personal life
On May 9, 2017, Brie gave birth to her first child, a daughter, Birdie Joe Danielson. In January 2020, the twins announced they were both pregnant, with due dates a week and a half apart. On July 31, Nikki gave birth to Matteo Artemovich Chigvintsev. 22 hours later, Brie gave birth to Buddy Dessert Danielson on August 1.
Bibliography
Incomparable (2020)
Filmography
Film
Television
Music videos
Championships and accomplishments
Pro Wrestling Illustrated
PWI ranked Brie Bella No. 12 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2015
PWI ranked Nikki Bella No. 1 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2015
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone named Nikki Bella as the Diva of the Year in 2015
Rolling Stone named Nikki Bella as the Most Improved Wrestler in 2015
Teen Choice Awards
Choice Female Athlete (2016)
WrestleCrap
Gooker Award (2014) Feud between each other (co-winner with Vince McMahon)
Wrestling Observer Newsletter
Worst Feud of the Year (2014) Brie vs. Nikki
Worst Feud of the Year (2015) Team PCB vs. Team B.A.D. vs. Team Bella
Worst Worked Match of the Year (2013) with Cameron, Eva Marie, JoJo, Naomi, and Natalya vs. AJ Lee, Aksana, Alicia Fox, Kaitlyn, Rosa Mendes, Summer Rae and Tamina Snuka on November 24
WWE
WWE Divas Championship (3 times) – Brie Bella (1), Nikki Bella (2)
Slammy Award (4 times)
Couple of the Year (2013, 2014)
Diva of the Year (2013)
Diva of the Year (2015)
WWE Hall of Fame (Class of 2020)
References
External links
1983 births
American female professional wrestlers
American professional wrestlers of Italian descent
American professional wrestlers of Mexican descent
American YouTubers
ECW (WWE) teams and stables
Identical twin females
Living people
Participants in American reality television series
People from San Diego
Sportspeople from Scottsdale, Arizona
Twin people from the United States
Twin sportspeople
Women's wrestling teams and stables
WWE teams and stables
WWE Diva Search contestants
WWE Hall of Fame team inductees
Professional wrestlers from California
21st-century American women
American actresses of Mexican descent | false | [
"Magic Valley Christian School was a private, non-denominational Christian school in Jerome, Idaho serving the Magic Valley region including Jerome, Twin Falls, Idaho and surrounding areas of Southern Idaho. The school closed permanently in 2011.\n\nHistory\nMVCS started in 1996 in the First Christian Church building in Twin Falls, moving to the Twin Falls Reformed Church building three years later. In 2007 it purchased the historic Washington School building in Jerome. Magic Valley Christian School renovated the school to accommodate its 51 students. After several years of declining enrollment and declining donations, Magic Valley Christian School closed permanently on January 3, 2011.\n\nMission statement\n\nThe mission of Magic Valley Christian School, a non-denominational school, was to assist the Christian family and/or the Christian student by providing Bible-based Christ-centered education that inspired each student to pursue excellence in leadership, moral character, academics, and service to others.\n\nAccreditation\n\nMagic Valley Christian School was a fully accredited institution under the following accrediting organizations:\n\nAssociation of Christian Schools International (ACSI)\nThe Northwest Association of Accredited Schools\nThe State of Idaho\n\nSports\nMagic Valley Christian School offered a variety of sports including football, basketball, volleyball, cheerleading, golf, and track. Magic Valley Christian School took 1st (04-05) and 4th (07-08) in boys golf at the Idaho 1A/2A State tournament and 1st (08-09) in girls golf at the Idaho 1A/2A State Tournament.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n \n \n\n1994 establishments in Idaho\nChristian schools in Idaho\nDefunct Christian schools in the United States\nPrivate high schools in Idaho\nSchools in Jerome County, Idaho\nPrivate middle schools in Idaho",
"Ira Burton Perrine (May 7, 1861 – October 2, 1943) was an Idaho farmer, rancher and businessman. Perrine is generally credited as the founder of Twin Falls and other towns in the Magic Valley region.\n\nBorn in Delaware, Indiana, Perrine's parents were George and Sarah Burton Perrine, and he was a descendant of Daniel Perrin, \"The Huguenot.\"\n\nIdaho\nPerrine moved to Idaho Territory in 1884 and established a farm and ranch operation in the Snake River Canyon near present-day Jerome.\n\nHe was a successful farmer and rancher who among other things received a gold medal for his fruit display at the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis. The ranch remained in the Perrine family until 1964, when it was sold and became part of Blue Lakes Country Club.\n\nAlthough Perrine's operation in the canyon received plenty of water, the surrounding area could not be easily irrigated and was therefore largely unproductive. Beginning in 1893, Perrine worked to convince private financiers to build a dam on the Snake River, along with a corresponding canal system to irrigate the area. This work culminated in the 1900 founding of the Twin Falls Land and Water Company and the subsequent completion of Milner Dam in 1905.\n\nAfter Twin Falls was founded in 1904, Perrine served as a bank president and owned a hotel in the new city.\n\nLegacy\n\nPerrine died at age 82 in 1943 and is buried at the family cemetery near his former ranch in Jerome County.\n\nThe Perrine Bridge, carrying U.S. 93 over the Snake River Canyon, is named for him, and a statue of him is outside the city's visitor center. Also named for him are an elementary school in Twin Falls and Perrine Coulee, which runs through the city and ends as a waterfall on the south rim of the canyon, west of the bridge.\n\nVideo\n You Tube – Perrine Coulee Falls\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n South Fork Companion – Irrigation pioneer and Twin Falls developer Ira B. Perrine – May 7, 2015\n Magic Valley.com – Who was I.B. Perrine?\n I.B. Perrine Elementary School – Twin Falls, Idaho\n \n\n1861 births\n1943 deaths\nPeople from Ripley County, Indiana\nPeople from Twin Falls, Idaho\nAmerican city founders\nAmerican people of French descent\nPeople from Jerome County, Idaho"
] |
[
"The Bella Twins",
"Team Bella (2014-2015)",
"What is Team Bella all about ?",
"In June, The Bella Twins became villainess once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1",
"What was the Twin Magic ?",
"I don't know."
] | C_70ae421b29c944d1936f9af142452d7e_0 | What happend after the match on June 1? | 3 | What happend after the match on June 1? | The Bella Twins | Nikki received her title match against AJ Lee on November 23 at Survivor Series, which she won, with Brie's help, to become a two-time Divas Champion. This led to the duo reuniting as a result. Nikki then went on to retain her championship in three separate occasions - against Lee in a rematch on December 14, at TLC: Tables, Ladders and Chairs, against Naomi two days later on SmackDown and against Paige at Fastlane on February 22, 2015. Paige and Lee then formed an alliance against Bellas which led to a tag team match at WrestleMania 31, where Lee and Paige were victorious. On April 26, after Nikki retained her title over Naomi at Extreme Rules, a feud started, with Naomi aligning with the returning Tamina to even the odds against Bellas, who began showing more heroic characteristics. This change in character was criticized as "sudden", "randomly" and "for no reason". This led to a tag team match between the two teams on May 17, at Payback, which Naomi and Tamina won. Two weeks later at Elimination Chamber, Nikki retained her title against Naomi and Paige in a triple threat match, with Brie banned from ringside. In June, The Bella Twins became villainess once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 episode of Raw and at Money in the Bank. During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina. After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi, and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon called for a "revolution" in the WWE Divas division and introduced the debuting Charlotte and Becky Lynch as Paige's allies, while NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks debuted as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, which led to a brawl between the three teams. Nikki then lost to Charlotte in a tag team match on the August 3 episode of Raw, and to Banks on the August 17 episode of Raw in a non-title match. The three teams faced off on August 23 at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match, in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win. On the September 14 episode of Raw, Nikki defended her title against Charlotte, who pinned Brie after the twins had switched places to win the match; however, since the title cannot change hands by disqualification, Nikki retained the championship, and in the process, became the new longest reigning Divas Champion in history, surpassing AJ Lee's previous record of 295 days. CANNOTANSWER | During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. | The Bella Twins were a professional wrestling tag team who performed on WWE and consisted of identical twin sisters Brie Bella and Nikki Bella (real names Brianna and Nicole). The Bella Twins are both former Divas Champions, with Brie becoming the first twin in WWE History to win the WWE Divas Championship once, while Nikki holding it twice. Nikki is also the longest-reigning holder of that title.
Both sisters signed with WWE in 2007 (then known as World Wrestling Entertainment) and were assigned to the farm territory Florida Championship Wrestling. As Brie Bella, Brianna was called up to the main roster in 2008. She began to wrestle and, during her matches, she switched places with her sister to win. Weeks later, it was revealed that they were twins and Nicole began to work as Nikki Bella. During the next years, they worked together as a team and won the WWE Divas Championship one time each one, but in 2012, when they were released. The Bella Twins made their return in 2013 and featured the reality show Total Divas. While in 2014 they disbanded the team and feud between them, they reunited in 2015 and Nikki won the Divas Championship for a second time. She retained the title for 301 days, the longest reign of the title. After 2015, they began to appear less in WWE shows until they announced their retirement in 2019. In 2021, they were inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame as part of the 2020 class.
In November 2015, Nikki was ranked No. 1 in Pro Wrestling Illustrateds Female 50.
Early lives and careers
Nicole and Brianna Garcia-Colace were born sixteen minutes apart on November 21, 1983, in San Diego, California and raised on a farm in the outskirts of Scottsdale, Arizona. They are of Mexican and Italian descent and played soccer in their youth. The twins graduated from Chaparral High School in 2002. They returned to San Diego for college, where Nicole continued playing soccer for Grossmont College, with both twins also working at Hooters. A year later, the twins relocated to Los Angeles in pursuit of acting and modeling opportunities, making ends meet doing various gigs from marketing for a now defunct record label, to cocktail waitressing at the Mondrian Hotel.
They then made their first national TV appearance on the Fox reality show Meet My Folks. Following this appearance, the twins were hired to be the World Cup Twins for Budweiser and were photographed holding the World Cup trophy. They were contestants in the 2006 "International Body Doubles twins search". They participated in the 2006 WWE Diva Search, but did not make the cut.
Professional wrestling career
World Wrestling Entertainment/WWE
Florida Championship Wrestling (2007–2008)
The Bella Twins were signed to developmental contracts by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) in June 2007 and were assigned to Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW), WWE's then-developmental territory, in Tampa, Florida. On September 14, the twins made their in-ring debut defeating Nattie Neidhart and Krissy Vaine with Victoria Crawford as the special guest referee. As a part of their on-screen personas, they switched places behind the referee's back if one of them was hurt. This was called "Twin Magic". They also occasionally competed in mixed tag team matches, teaming with male wrestlers including Kofi Kingston and Robert Anthony. They also made some non-wrestling appearances on Heath Miller's Happy Hour promo segment.
Starting in December 2007, they managed Derrick Linkin, but this storyline was cut short when Linkin was released in January 2008. They then resumed their feud with Neidhart and Crawford, wrestling them throughout much of 2008. In FCW, the twins competed in bikini contests and wrestled against Katie Lea Burchill, Milena Roucka, and Nattie Neidhart. Their last FCW appearance was on September 2, when they competed in a Divas battle royal won by Miss Angela.
Various storylines (2008–2011)
On the August 29 episode of SmackDown, Brianna debuted as Brie Bella and defeated Victoria. She had a series of matches with Victoria and Victoria's accomplice Natalya. In each match, Brie would roll out of the ring and go underneath it, emerging revived as she would then win the match. On the November 7 episode of SmackDown, Brie picked up a win against Victoria and then ran under the ring to escape Natalya and Victoria, but Victoria and Natalya both reached for Brie under the ring, resulting in both Nicole and Brie being pulled out. Nicole was then introduced as Nikki Bella. The twins had their first official match as a team on the November 21 episode of SmackDown, defeating Victoria and Natalya. They continued competing in tag team matches over the following months.
Starting in November, the twins developed an on-screen relationship with The Colóns (Carlito and Primo). In February 2009, the storyline expanded to include John Morrison and The Miz, who flirted with the Bellas and took them on a date for Valentine's Day. The date provoked a rivalry between the teams of The Miz and Morrison and Primo and Carlito, with the four competing for the affection of the twins, who were seemingly unable to choose between them. On March 17 on ECW, Carlito and Primo, aiming for Morrison and The Miz, accidentally spat apples in the face of Brie. Nikki began to laugh at Brie's misfortune, and a fight broke out between the two, which led to Nikki leaving with The Miz and Morrison while Brie stayed with Primo and Carlito. Brie won her first match over Nikki in a six-person intergender tag team match on SmackDown the following week. On ECW on March 31, Nikki pinned Brie in their first singles match against each other after a distraction from Morrison and The Miz.
On April 15, The Bella Twins were both drafted to the Raw brand as part of the 2009 supplemental draft. On April 27, Brie made her Raw in-ring debut in an eight-Diva tag team match, which her team won. Nikki also made an appearance, reuniting with her twin, as she was under the ring to help Brie during the match. Nikki then made her in-ring debut for the brand the following month in a battle royal, but was eliminated by Beth Phoenix.
On June 29, they were both traded to the ECW brand. They debuted on ECW the following night on The Abraham Washington Show, as the special guests. They quickly developed a storyline feud with Katie Lea Burchill, when Nikki defeated her in a match by switching places with Brie behind the referee's back. The following week on Superstars, Brie defeated Burchill after a similar fashion, and the feud ended in September, when Nikki defeated Burchill on Superstars.
On October 12, the Bellas were traded back to Raw as part of a tri-branded Divas trade, where they predominately appeared in backstages segments with the weekly guest stars and only occasionally competed in matches. In June 2010, they developed a feud with Jillian Hall, when Brie defeated her after switching places with Nikki. The following week, Nikki defeated Hall after switching with Brie. The feud was exacerbated when the Bellas acted as the special guest referees during one of Hall's matches. During the match, Hall attacked both twins, but lost the match when Nikki made a fast count, allowing her to be pinned by Gail Kim. The next week on Superstars, the twins defeated Hall and Maryse in a tag team match to end the storyline.
On August 31, The Bella Twins announced they would be part of the all-female third season of NXT, mentoring Jamie. Jamie was the first rookie Diva eliminated on the October 5 episode of NXT. In November, the twins began a storyline with Daniel Bryan, when Brie accompanied him to the ring for his match. Following his win, Nikki ran out and the two fought over Bryan's affection, until Bryan broke it up and had them hug each other. They began to manage Bryan and frequently accompanied him to the ring over the next two months. In January 2011, they discovered Bryan kissing Gail Kim backstage and assaulted her. They continued to attack Kim, both at the Royal Rumble on January 30 and the following night on Raw. On February 7, they teamed with Melina in a losing effort to Kim, Eve Torres and Tamina.
Divas Champions (2011–2012)
The Bellas began feuding with Eve Torres after they appeared as lumberjills during a Divas Championship match between Torres and Natalya on the February 14 episode of Raw. Following the match, they attacked Torres backstage before Gail Kim and Natalya stopped them. The next week on Raw, the twins defeated Torres and Kim in a tag team match. The following week on Raw, Nikki won a battle royal to become the number one contender for the Divas Championship and unsuccessfully challenged Torres for the championship on March 7.
On April 11, Brie defeated Torres to win the Divas Championship, marking the first time either twin had held a championship in WWE. On May 22, Brie went on to successfully defend the championship against Kelly Kelly at Over the Limit after switching places with Nikki. On a special "Power to the People" episode of Raw on June 20, Brie defended her WWE Divas Championship against Kelly (who was selected by voters), losing the title and ending her reign at 70 days. On July 17, Brie challenged Kelly for the championship in a rematch at Money in the Bank on July 17, but she failed to win.
The Bellas began to show friction in March 2012 after both twins lost to AJ Lee in singles competition. After Brie's match with Lee, Nikki revealed that Brie was rooting for Team Johnny in the 12-man tag team match at WrestleMania XXVIII on April 1 whilst Nikki was rooting for Team Teddy, thus furthering their dissension.
On the April 6 episode of SmackDown, Nikki defeated the Divas Champion Beth Phoenix in a non-title match after Kelly Kelly distracted Phoenix. On April 23, Nikki defeated Phoenix in a lumberjill match on Raw to win the Divas Championship for the first time. Brie lost Nikki's championship to Layla at Extreme Rules on April 29 after Twin Magic failed, ending her Divas Championship reign after only a week. The following night on Raw, they competed in their last match with the WWE, failing to win back the Divas Championship from Layla in a triple threat match. Later that night, WWE announced on their website that the twins had been fired by Executive Administrator Eve Torres.
Independent circuit promotions (2012–2013)
On May 1, 2012, the twins appeared at their first independent wrestling show in Newburgh, New York at Northeast Wrestling. They later appeared for CTWE Pro Wrestling at the Season Beatings pay-per-view on December 15, each accompanying a different wrestler to the ring.
Return to WWE
Total Divas storylines (2013–2014)
The Bella Twins returned to WWE on the March 11, 2013, episode of Raw in a backstage segment with Team Rhodes Scholars (Cody Rhodes and Damien Sandow). On the March 15 episode of SmackDown, the twins attacked The Funkadactyls (Cameron and Naomi) and the following week interfered in matches between Team Rhodes Scholars and Brodus Clay and Tensai, but were attacked by The Funkadactyls. The twins made their in-ring return defeating The Funkadactyls on the March 27 episode of Main Event after interference from Cody Rhodes. The Bella Twins were scheduled to participate in an eight-person tag team match with Team Rhodes Scholars against Tons of Funk (Clay and Tensai) and The Funkadactyls at WrestleMania 29 on April 7, but the match was canceled due to time restraints and instead took place the following night on Raw, where The Bella Twins and Team Rhodes Scholars were defeated. In June, Nikki suffered a fractured tibia.
Upon the debut of the Total Divas reality television program in July, The Bellas began a feud with their co-star on the show Natalya, with Brie and Natalya trading victories in singles competition on Raw and at SummerSlam on August 18. The cast of Total Divas then transitioned into a scripted feud with Divas Champion AJ Lee, who mocked the show and cast. At Night of Champions on September 15, Brie unsuccessfully challenged Lee for the Divas Championship in a four-way match, which also involved Natalya and Naomi. Continuing their feud into October, Brie and Lee faced off at Battleground and Hell in a Cell for the Divas Championship, but Brie was unsuccessful. Nikki returned to in-ring action on the October 25 episode of SmackDown, losing to Lee. At Survivor Series on November 24, the twins were part of the victorious Team Total Divas. On April 6, they failed to win the Divas Championship again at WrestleMania XXX in the Divas Invitational match, which was won by Lee.
Brief split (2014)
In April 2014, Brie became involved in her real-life husband Daniel Bryan's ongoing storyline with Stephanie McMahon and Kane, whereas part of the storyline McMahon threatened to fire Brie if an injured Bryan did not relinquish the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at Payback on June 1, which forced Brie to "quit" WWE before slapping McMahon in the face. After Brie "quit", McMahon put Nikki in several handicap matches as punishment. After a month absence, Brie returned to WWE television, appearing in the crowd on July 21 and starting a confrontation with McMahon who slapped Brie and was subsequently arrested. In order to have Brie drop the "charges", Brie was rehired and received a match against McMahon at SummerSlam.
Nikki attacked Brie at the event on August 17, which allowed McMahon to win the match. The next several weeks saw the twins fight in several backstage and in-ring segments, including a cameo appearance from Jerry Springer on Raw on September 8. As part of the storyline, McMahon declared Nikki the face of the WWE Divas division and granted her a match at Night of Champions for the Divas Championship, which she failed to win. At Hell in a Cell, Nikki defeated Brie in a match where the loser was forced to become the winner's personal assistant for 30 days.
Nikki and Brie reunited at Survivor Series on November 23 when Nikki defeated AJ Lee with Brie's help to become a two-time Divas Champion. Nikki retained her championship in three separate occasions—against Lee in a rematch at TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs on December 14, against Naomi two days later on SmackDown and against Paige on February 22, 2015, at Fastlane. Paige and Lee then formed an alliance against the Bellas which led to a tag team match at WrestleMania 31 on March 29, which the Bellas lost.
Team Bella (2015)
After Nikki retained her title over Naomi at Extreme Rules on April 26, Nikki started a feud with Naomi after she aligned with the returning Tamina to even the odds against Bellas. This led to a tag team match between the two teams at Payback on May 17, which Naomi and Tamina won. At Elimination Chamber on May 31, Nikki retained her title against Naomi and Paige in a triple threat match, with Brie banned from ringside.
In June, The Bella Twins became villains once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 episode of Raw and at Money in the Bank on June 14. During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina.
After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon called for a "revolution" in the WWE Divas division and introduced the debuting Charlotte and Becky Lynch as Paige's allies while NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks debuted as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, which led to a brawl between the three teams. Nikki then lost to Charlotte in a tag team match on the August 3 episode of Raw and to Banks on the August 17 episode of Raw in a non-title match. On August 23, the three teams faced off at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win.
On the September 14 episode of Raw, Nikki defended her title against Charlotte, who pinned Brie after the twins had switched places to win the match, but she retained the championship since the title cannot change hands by disqualification and in the process became the new longest reigning Divas Champion in history, surpassing AJ Lee's previous record of 295 days.
Injuries, retirements and sporadic appearances (2015–2019)
On September 20, Nikki dropped the championship to Charlotte at Night of Champions, ending her reign at 301 days and failing to regain the title in a rematch at Hell in a Cell on October 25. Shortly after, Nikki went on a hiatus from both television and in-ring competition due to a neck injury which would require surgery, but returned for one night on December 21 to accept the Slammy Award for Diva of the Year. During Nikki's absence, Brie continued to compete in singles competition and in tag team matches with Fox. Brie was unsuccessful in winning the Divas Championship at Fastlane on February 21 in a match against Charlotte. During that time, Team Bella quietly disbanded.
In March 2016, Brie was placed in a feud with Lana, who argued that Brie's fans only supported her out of pity for having a "bad husband". Brie then aligned herself with fellow Total Divas cast members Alicia Fox, Natalya, Paige and Eva Marie while Lana aligned herself with Team B.A.D. (Naomi and Tamina), Summer Rae and Emma (which was officially called Team B.A.D. and Blonde), leading to a 10-woman tag team match on the WrestleMania 32 kickoff show on April 3, which Team Total Divas would win when Naomi submitted to Brie. After the match, Nikki returned and celebrated with her co-stars. On April 6, Brie confirmed that she would be taking an extended break from in-ring competition, citing family reasons while also stating that she will continue working for WWE as an ambassador.
On January 22, 2018, on the Raw 25 Years special episode, The Bella Twins were honored as part of a segment involving women considered legends that contributed to the company's success. At the Royal Rumble on January 28, Brie and Nikki participated in the first ever women's Royal Rumble match at No. 28 and No. 27, respectively, making it into the final four with Asuka and Sasha Banks, with Nikki eliminating Brie before being eliminated herself by the winner Asuka. On the September 3 episode of Raw, The Bella Twins competed for the first time in three years, defeating The Riott Squad (Liv Morgan and Sarah Logan). The Bellas teamed with Ronda Rousey to defeat The Riott Squad at WWE Super Show-Down on October 6, and won the rematch two nights later on Raw. After the rematch, the Bellas attacked Rousey. Nikki received a title opportunity against Rousey at WWE Evolution on October 28, but was unsuccessful. In March 2019, both Bellas announced on Total Bellas that they had retired from in-ring competition with Brie making the announcement on the March 10 episode and Nikki announcing her retirement on the season finale on March 24. At February 21, 2020 edition of SmackDown, it was announced that both Bellas will be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame, during A Moment of Bliss segment. Due to the COVID Pandemic, the ceremony took place the next year.
Other media
Guest appearances
Prior to working with WWE, the twins appeared on Meet My Folks. Both twins also appeared in the music video for "Right Side of the Bed" by the band Atreyu. They were regulars on the VH1 show Best Week Ever. The twins made a guest appearance on the MTV series Ridiculousness in October 2012. They also appeared in the music video for "Na Na" by Trey Songz in 2014.
The twins guest starred on the television series Psych, in the 2014 episode "A Nightmare on State Street". Nikki and Brie are part of the main cast for the reality television show Total Divas, which began airing in July 2013. In April 2016, it was announced that Total Bellas, a spin-off of Total Divas starring the twins, would begin airing in fall 2016.
Nikki and Brie co-starred in the 2014 independent film Confessions of a Womanizer and provided voices for the 2015 movie The Flintstones & WWE: Stone Age SmackDown!.
Nikki appeared at the Miss USA 2013 pageant as one of the celebrity judges. They appeared at the 2014 MTV Europe Music Awards, where they presented the award for Best Female. The twins were both nominated for Choice Female Athlete at the 2015 Teen Choice Awards. The following year at the 2016 Teen Choice Awards, The Bella Twins won Choice Female Athlete. Brie appeared alongside Paige, Natalya, and the Chrisley family on the 88th Academy Awards edition of E! Countdown to the Red Carpet in February 2016.
The Bella Twins have appeared in ten WWE video games, making their in-game debut at WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2010 and appearing in WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2011, WWE '12 (DLC), WWE '13, WWE 2K14 (DLC), WWE 2K15, WWE 2K16, WWE 2K17, WWE 2K18, WWE 2K19, WWE 2K20 and WWE 2K Battlegrounds. Animated versions of the Bella Twins were included in WWE Network's series Camp WWE.
YouTube
Both twins appeared on the WWE YouTube show The JBL & Cole Show.
On November 21, 2016, Nikki and Brie unveiled their new YouTube channel which features daily fashion, beauty, travel, fitness, relationship and health videos along with daily video blogs, created by the twins themselves.
The Bella Twins appeared in YouTuber iiSuperwomanii's video "When Someone Tries to Steal Your BFF" on March 2, 2017.
On April 16, 2020, the twins were featured on the hit YouTube channel "First We Feast", appearing a Truth or Dab edition of Hot Ones.
Lifestyle
On August 21, 2017, Nikki and Brie launched their own wine label called Belle Radici in collaboration with Hill Family Estates and Gauge Branding. Later that year on November 1, 2017, Nikki and Brie launched Birdiebee, a lifestyle intimates and activewear brand. The line includes transitional intimates, activewear and loungewear aimed at "empowering and educating women through mirroring the twins' passion for life, strength, women's health and wellness, and fun".
On January 28, 2019, Nikki and Brie launched Nicole + Brizee, a body and beauty line. On March 27, 2019, Nikki and Brie launched their own podcast.
In March 2020, Nikki and Brie released their memoir Incomparable.
In 2021, Nikki and Brie launched another wine label called Bonita Bonita Wine.
In 2021, Nikki and Brie launched their own baby gear collection in partnership with Colugo. Nikki and Brie also announced that they joined Colugo as investors and creative advisors.
Personal life
On May 9, 2017, Brie gave birth to her first child, a daughter, Birdie Joe Danielson. In January 2020, the twins announced they were both pregnant, with due dates a week and a half apart. On July 31, Nikki gave birth to Matteo Artemovich Chigvintsev. 22 hours later, Brie gave birth to Buddy Dessert Danielson on August 1.
Bibliography
Incomparable (2020)
Filmography
Film
Television
Music videos
Championships and accomplishments
Pro Wrestling Illustrated
PWI ranked Brie Bella No. 12 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2015
PWI ranked Nikki Bella No. 1 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2015
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone named Nikki Bella as the Diva of the Year in 2015
Rolling Stone named Nikki Bella as the Most Improved Wrestler in 2015
Teen Choice Awards
Choice Female Athlete (2016)
WrestleCrap
Gooker Award (2014) Feud between each other (co-winner with Vince McMahon)
Wrestling Observer Newsletter
Worst Feud of the Year (2014) Brie vs. Nikki
Worst Feud of the Year (2015) Team PCB vs. Team B.A.D. vs. Team Bella
Worst Worked Match of the Year (2013) with Cameron, Eva Marie, JoJo, Naomi, and Natalya vs. AJ Lee, Aksana, Alicia Fox, Kaitlyn, Rosa Mendes, Summer Rae and Tamina Snuka on November 24
WWE
WWE Divas Championship (3 times) – Brie Bella (1), Nikki Bella (2)
Slammy Award (4 times)
Couple of the Year (2013, 2014)
Diva of the Year (2013)
Diva of the Year (2015)
WWE Hall of Fame (Class of 2020)
References
External links
1983 births
American female professional wrestlers
American professional wrestlers of Italian descent
American professional wrestlers of Mexican descent
American YouTubers
ECW (WWE) teams and stables
Identical twin females
Living people
Participants in American reality television series
People from San Diego
Sportspeople from Scottsdale, Arizona
Twin people from the United States
Twin sportspeople
Women's wrestling teams and stables
WWE teams and stables
WWE Diva Search contestants
WWE Hall of Fame team inductees
Professional wrestlers from California
21st-century American women
American actresses of Mexican descent | true | [
"1942 Meistaradeildin was the inaugural season of Meistaradeildin, the top tier of the Faroese football league system. It was performed in knockout rounds rather than in a league format. KÍ Klaksvík defeated TB Tvøroyri by 4–1 in the championship final.\n\nQualifying round\n\nEast\n\nPreliminary\nThe first leg was played on 21 June and the second leg on 28 June.\n\n|}\n\nFinal\nThe first leg was played on 5 July and the second leg on 19 July.\n\n|}\n\nWest\n\nPreliminary\nThe first leg was played on 14 June and the second leg on 28 June.\n\n|}\n\nFinal\nThe first leg was played on 12 July and the second leg on 19 July.\n\n|}\n\nSouth\n\nPreliminary\nThe match was played on 14 June. A second leg was planned to be played on 21 June, but SVB withdrew after the first leg.\n\n|}\n\nFinal\nThe match was played on 28 June. A second leg was planned to be played on 5 July, but Royn withdrew.\n\n|}\n\nSemi-finals\nMatch played on 26 July.\n\n|}\n\nFinal\nThe match was played on 29 July.\n\n|}\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nFaroe Islands Premier League at Faroe Soccer (choose 1942)\nFaroe Islands League final tables 1942–1950 by webalice.it\nFaroese champions list by RSSSF\n\nMeistaradeildin seasons\nFaroe\nFaroe",
"The 2019 King's Cup is an international football tournament that is currently being held in Thailand from 5 to 8 June 2019. The 4 national teams involved in the tournament are required to register a squad of 23 players.\n\nPlayers marked (c) were named as captain for their national squad. Number of caps counts until the start of the tournament, including all FIFA-recognised pre-tournament friendlies. Player's age is their age on the opening day of the tournament.\n\nCoach: Remko Bicentini\n\nThe final squad was announced on 2 June 2019.\nCaps and goals are as of 12 October 2018 after the match against US Virgin Islands.\n\nCoach: Igor Štimac\n\nThe final squad was announced on 2 June 2019.\nCaps and goals are as of 14 January 2019 after the match against Bahrain.\n\nCoach: Sirisak Yodyardthai (caretaker)\n\nThe final squad was announced on 4 June 2019.\nCaps and goals are as of 25 March 2019 after the match against Uruguay.\n\nCoach: Park Hang-seo\n\nThe final squad was announced on 31 May 2019.\nCaps and goals are as of 25 January 2019 after the match against Japan.\n\nReferences \n\nKing's Cup"
] |
[
"The Bella Twins",
"Team Bella (2014-2015)",
"What is Team Bella all about ?",
"In June, The Bella Twins became villainess once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1",
"What was the Twin Magic ?",
"I don't know.",
"What happend after the match on June 1?",
"During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella."
] | C_70ae421b29c944d1936f9af142452d7e_0 | Whom did they fight as Team Bella ? | 4 | Whom did The Bella Twins fight as Team Bella ? | The Bella Twins | Nikki received her title match against AJ Lee on November 23 at Survivor Series, which she won, with Brie's help, to become a two-time Divas Champion. This led to the duo reuniting as a result. Nikki then went on to retain her championship in three separate occasions - against Lee in a rematch on December 14, at TLC: Tables, Ladders and Chairs, against Naomi two days later on SmackDown and against Paige at Fastlane on February 22, 2015. Paige and Lee then formed an alliance against Bellas which led to a tag team match at WrestleMania 31, where Lee and Paige were victorious. On April 26, after Nikki retained her title over Naomi at Extreme Rules, a feud started, with Naomi aligning with the returning Tamina to even the odds against Bellas, who began showing more heroic characteristics. This change in character was criticized as "sudden", "randomly" and "for no reason". This led to a tag team match between the two teams on May 17, at Payback, which Naomi and Tamina won. Two weeks later at Elimination Chamber, Nikki retained her title against Naomi and Paige in a triple threat match, with Brie banned from ringside. In June, The Bella Twins became villainess once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 episode of Raw and at Money in the Bank. During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina. After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi, and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon called for a "revolution" in the WWE Divas division and introduced the debuting Charlotte and Becky Lynch as Paige's allies, while NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks debuted as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, which led to a brawl between the three teams. Nikki then lost to Charlotte in a tag team match on the August 3 episode of Raw, and to Banks on the August 17 episode of Raw in a non-title match. The three teams faced off on August 23 at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match, in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win. On the September 14 episode of Raw, Nikki defended her title against Charlotte, who pinned Brie after the twins had switched places to win the match; however, since the title cannot change hands by disqualification, Nikki retained the championship, and in the process, became the new longest reigning Divas Champion in history, surpassing AJ Lee's previous record of 295 days. CANNOTANSWER | At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina. After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi, and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon | The Bella Twins were a professional wrestling tag team who performed on WWE and consisted of identical twin sisters Brie Bella and Nikki Bella (real names Brianna and Nicole). The Bella Twins are both former Divas Champions, with Brie becoming the first twin in WWE History to win the WWE Divas Championship once, while Nikki holding it twice. Nikki is also the longest-reigning holder of that title.
Both sisters signed with WWE in 2007 (then known as World Wrestling Entertainment) and were assigned to the farm territory Florida Championship Wrestling. As Brie Bella, Brianna was called up to the main roster in 2008. She began to wrestle and, during her matches, she switched places with her sister to win. Weeks later, it was revealed that they were twins and Nicole began to work as Nikki Bella. During the next years, they worked together as a team and won the WWE Divas Championship one time each one, but in 2012, when they were released. The Bella Twins made their return in 2013 and featured the reality show Total Divas. While in 2014 they disbanded the team and feud between them, they reunited in 2015 and Nikki won the Divas Championship for a second time. She retained the title for 301 days, the longest reign of the title. After 2015, they began to appear less in WWE shows until they announced their retirement in 2019. In 2021, they were inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame as part of the 2020 class.
In November 2015, Nikki was ranked No. 1 in Pro Wrestling Illustrateds Female 50.
Early lives and careers
Nicole and Brianna Garcia-Colace were born sixteen minutes apart on November 21, 1983, in San Diego, California and raised on a farm in the outskirts of Scottsdale, Arizona. They are of Mexican and Italian descent and played soccer in their youth. The twins graduated from Chaparral High School in 2002. They returned to San Diego for college, where Nicole continued playing soccer for Grossmont College, with both twins also working at Hooters. A year later, the twins relocated to Los Angeles in pursuit of acting and modeling opportunities, making ends meet doing various gigs from marketing for a now defunct record label, to cocktail waitressing at the Mondrian Hotel.
They then made their first national TV appearance on the Fox reality show Meet My Folks. Following this appearance, the twins were hired to be the World Cup Twins for Budweiser and were photographed holding the World Cup trophy. They were contestants in the 2006 "International Body Doubles twins search". They participated in the 2006 WWE Diva Search, but did not make the cut.
Professional wrestling career
World Wrestling Entertainment/WWE
Florida Championship Wrestling (2007–2008)
The Bella Twins were signed to developmental contracts by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) in June 2007 and were assigned to Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW), WWE's then-developmental territory, in Tampa, Florida. On September 14, the twins made their in-ring debut defeating Nattie Neidhart and Krissy Vaine with Victoria Crawford as the special guest referee. As a part of their on-screen personas, they switched places behind the referee's back if one of them was hurt. This was called "Twin Magic". They also occasionally competed in mixed tag team matches, teaming with male wrestlers including Kofi Kingston and Robert Anthony. They also made some non-wrestling appearances on Heath Miller's Happy Hour promo segment.
Starting in December 2007, they managed Derrick Linkin, but this storyline was cut short when Linkin was released in January 2008. They then resumed their feud with Neidhart and Crawford, wrestling them throughout much of 2008. In FCW, the twins competed in bikini contests and wrestled against Katie Lea Burchill, Milena Roucka, and Nattie Neidhart. Their last FCW appearance was on September 2, when they competed in a Divas battle royal won by Miss Angela.
Various storylines (2008–2011)
On the August 29 episode of SmackDown, Brianna debuted as Brie Bella and defeated Victoria. She had a series of matches with Victoria and Victoria's accomplice Natalya. In each match, Brie would roll out of the ring and go underneath it, emerging revived as she would then win the match. On the November 7 episode of SmackDown, Brie picked up a win against Victoria and then ran under the ring to escape Natalya and Victoria, but Victoria and Natalya both reached for Brie under the ring, resulting in both Nicole and Brie being pulled out. Nicole was then introduced as Nikki Bella. The twins had their first official match as a team on the November 21 episode of SmackDown, defeating Victoria and Natalya. They continued competing in tag team matches over the following months.
Starting in November, the twins developed an on-screen relationship with The Colóns (Carlito and Primo). In February 2009, the storyline expanded to include John Morrison and The Miz, who flirted with the Bellas and took them on a date for Valentine's Day. The date provoked a rivalry between the teams of The Miz and Morrison and Primo and Carlito, with the four competing for the affection of the twins, who were seemingly unable to choose between them. On March 17 on ECW, Carlito and Primo, aiming for Morrison and The Miz, accidentally spat apples in the face of Brie. Nikki began to laugh at Brie's misfortune, and a fight broke out between the two, which led to Nikki leaving with The Miz and Morrison while Brie stayed with Primo and Carlito. Brie won her first match over Nikki in a six-person intergender tag team match on SmackDown the following week. On ECW on March 31, Nikki pinned Brie in their first singles match against each other after a distraction from Morrison and The Miz.
On April 15, The Bella Twins were both drafted to the Raw brand as part of the 2009 supplemental draft. On April 27, Brie made her Raw in-ring debut in an eight-Diva tag team match, which her team won. Nikki also made an appearance, reuniting with her twin, as she was under the ring to help Brie during the match. Nikki then made her in-ring debut for the brand the following month in a battle royal, but was eliminated by Beth Phoenix.
On June 29, they were both traded to the ECW brand. They debuted on ECW the following night on The Abraham Washington Show, as the special guests. They quickly developed a storyline feud with Katie Lea Burchill, when Nikki defeated her in a match by switching places with Brie behind the referee's back. The following week on Superstars, Brie defeated Burchill after a similar fashion, and the feud ended in September, when Nikki defeated Burchill on Superstars.
On October 12, the Bellas were traded back to Raw as part of a tri-branded Divas trade, where they predominately appeared in backstages segments with the weekly guest stars and only occasionally competed in matches. In June 2010, they developed a feud with Jillian Hall, when Brie defeated her after switching places with Nikki. The following week, Nikki defeated Hall after switching with Brie. The feud was exacerbated when the Bellas acted as the special guest referees during one of Hall's matches. During the match, Hall attacked both twins, but lost the match when Nikki made a fast count, allowing her to be pinned by Gail Kim. The next week on Superstars, the twins defeated Hall and Maryse in a tag team match to end the storyline.
On August 31, The Bella Twins announced they would be part of the all-female third season of NXT, mentoring Jamie. Jamie was the first rookie Diva eliminated on the October 5 episode of NXT. In November, the twins began a storyline with Daniel Bryan, when Brie accompanied him to the ring for his match. Following his win, Nikki ran out and the two fought over Bryan's affection, until Bryan broke it up and had them hug each other. They began to manage Bryan and frequently accompanied him to the ring over the next two months. In January 2011, they discovered Bryan kissing Gail Kim backstage and assaulted her. They continued to attack Kim, both at the Royal Rumble on January 30 and the following night on Raw. On February 7, they teamed with Melina in a losing effort to Kim, Eve Torres and Tamina.
Divas Champions (2011–2012)
The Bellas began feuding with Eve Torres after they appeared as lumberjills during a Divas Championship match between Torres and Natalya on the February 14 episode of Raw. Following the match, they attacked Torres backstage before Gail Kim and Natalya stopped them. The next week on Raw, the twins defeated Torres and Kim in a tag team match. The following week on Raw, Nikki won a battle royal to become the number one contender for the Divas Championship and unsuccessfully challenged Torres for the championship on March 7.
On April 11, Brie defeated Torres to win the Divas Championship, marking the first time either twin had held a championship in WWE. On May 22, Brie went on to successfully defend the championship against Kelly Kelly at Over the Limit after switching places with Nikki. On a special "Power to the People" episode of Raw on June 20, Brie defended her WWE Divas Championship against Kelly (who was selected by voters), losing the title and ending her reign at 70 days. On July 17, Brie challenged Kelly for the championship in a rematch at Money in the Bank on July 17, but she failed to win.
The Bellas began to show friction in March 2012 after both twins lost to AJ Lee in singles competition. After Brie's match with Lee, Nikki revealed that Brie was rooting for Team Johnny in the 12-man tag team match at WrestleMania XXVIII on April 1 whilst Nikki was rooting for Team Teddy, thus furthering their dissension.
On the April 6 episode of SmackDown, Nikki defeated the Divas Champion Beth Phoenix in a non-title match after Kelly Kelly distracted Phoenix. On April 23, Nikki defeated Phoenix in a lumberjill match on Raw to win the Divas Championship for the first time. Brie lost Nikki's championship to Layla at Extreme Rules on April 29 after Twin Magic failed, ending her Divas Championship reign after only a week. The following night on Raw, they competed in their last match with the WWE, failing to win back the Divas Championship from Layla in a triple threat match. Later that night, WWE announced on their website that the twins had been fired by Executive Administrator Eve Torres.
Independent circuit promotions (2012–2013)
On May 1, 2012, the twins appeared at their first independent wrestling show in Newburgh, New York at Northeast Wrestling. They later appeared for CTWE Pro Wrestling at the Season Beatings pay-per-view on December 15, each accompanying a different wrestler to the ring.
Return to WWE
Total Divas storylines (2013–2014)
The Bella Twins returned to WWE on the March 11, 2013, episode of Raw in a backstage segment with Team Rhodes Scholars (Cody Rhodes and Damien Sandow). On the March 15 episode of SmackDown, the twins attacked The Funkadactyls (Cameron and Naomi) and the following week interfered in matches between Team Rhodes Scholars and Brodus Clay and Tensai, but were attacked by The Funkadactyls. The twins made their in-ring return defeating The Funkadactyls on the March 27 episode of Main Event after interference from Cody Rhodes. The Bella Twins were scheduled to participate in an eight-person tag team match with Team Rhodes Scholars against Tons of Funk (Clay and Tensai) and The Funkadactyls at WrestleMania 29 on April 7, but the match was canceled due to time restraints and instead took place the following night on Raw, where The Bella Twins and Team Rhodes Scholars were defeated. In June, Nikki suffered a fractured tibia.
Upon the debut of the Total Divas reality television program in July, The Bellas began a feud with their co-star on the show Natalya, with Brie and Natalya trading victories in singles competition on Raw and at SummerSlam on August 18. The cast of Total Divas then transitioned into a scripted feud with Divas Champion AJ Lee, who mocked the show and cast. At Night of Champions on September 15, Brie unsuccessfully challenged Lee for the Divas Championship in a four-way match, which also involved Natalya and Naomi. Continuing their feud into October, Brie and Lee faced off at Battleground and Hell in a Cell for the Divas Championship, but Brie was unsuccessful. Nikki returned to in-ring action on the October 25 episode of SmackDown, losing to Lee. At Survivor Series on November 24, the twins were part of the victorious Team Total Divas. On April 6, they failed to win the Divas Championship again at WrestleMania XXX in the Divas Invitational match, which was won by Lee.
Brief split (2014)
In April 2014, Brie became involved in her real-life husband Daniel Bryan's ongoing storyline with Stephanie McMahon and Kane, whereas part of the storyline McMahon threatened to fire Brie if an injured Bryan did not relinquish the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at Payback on June 1, which forced Brie to "quit" WWE before slapping McMahon in the face. After Brie "quit", McMahon put Nikki in several handicap matches as punishment. After a month absence, Brie returned to WWE television, appearing in the crowd on July 21 and starting a confrontation with McMahon who slapped Brie and was subsequently arrested. In order to have Brie drop the "charges", Brie was rehired and received a match against McMahon at SummerSlam.
Nikki attacked Brie at the event on August 17, which allowed McMahon to win the match. The next several weeks saw the twins fight in several backstage and in-ring segments, including a cameo appearance from Jerry Springer on Raw on September 8. As part of the storyline, McMahon declared Nikki the face of the WWE Divas division and granted her a match at Night of Champions for the Divas Championship, which she failed to win. At Hell in a Cell, Nikki defeated Brie in a match where the loser was forced to become the winner's personal assistant for 30 days.
Nikki and Brie reunited at Survivor Series on November 23 when Nikki defeated AJ Lee with Brie's help to become a two-time Divas Champion. Nikki retained her championship in three separate occasions—against Lee in a rematch at TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs on December 14, against Naomi two days later on SmackDown and against Paige on February 22, 2015, at Fastlane. Paige and Lee then formed an alliance against the Bellas which led to a tag team match at WrestleMania 31 on March 29, which the Bellas lost.
Team Bella (2015)
After Nikki retained her title over Naomi at Extreme Rules on April 26, Nikki started a feud with Naomi after she aligned with the returning Tamina to even the odds against Bellas. This led to a tag team match between the two teams at Payback on May 17, which Naomi and Tamina won. At Elimination Chamber on May 31, Nikki retained her title against Naomi and Paige in a triple threat match, with Brie banned from ringside.
In June, The Bella Twins became villains once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 episode of Raw and at Money in the Bank on June 14. During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina.
After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon called for a "revolution" in the WWE Divas division and introduced the debuting Charlotte and Becky Lynch as Paige's allies while NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks debuted as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, which led to a brawl between the three teams. Nikki then lost to Charlotte in a tag team match on the August 3 episode of Raw and to Banks on the August 17 episode of Raw in a non-title match. On August 23, the three teams faced off at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win.
On the September 14 episode of Raw, Nikki defended her title against Charlotte, who pinned Brie after the twins had switched places to win the match, but she retained the championship since the title cannot change hands by disqualification and in the process became the new longest reigning Divas Champion in history, surpassing AJ Lee's previous record of 295 days.
Injuries, retirements and sporadic appearances (2015–2019)
On September 20, Nikki dropped the championship to Charlotte at Night of Champions, ending her reign at 301 days and failing to regain the title in a rematch at Hell in a Cell on October 25. Shortly after, Nikki went on a hiatus from both television and in-ring competition due to a neck injury which would require surgery, but returned for one night on December 21 to accept the Slammy Award for Diva of the Year. During Nikki's absence, Brie continued to compete in singles competition and in tag team matches with Fox. Brie was unsuccessful in winning the Divas Championship at Fastlane on February 21 in a match against Charlotte. During that time, Team Bella quietly disbanded.
In March 2016, Brie was placed in a feud with Lana, who argued that Brie's fans only supported her out of pity for having a "bad husband". Brie then aligned herself with fellow Total Divas cast members Alicia Fox, Natalya, Paige and Eva Marie while Lana aligned herself with Team B.A.D. (Naomi and Tamina), Summer Rae and Emma (which was officially called Team B.A.D. and Blonde), leading to a 10-woman tag team match on the WrestleMania 32 kickoff show on April 3, which Team Total Divas would win when Naomi submitted to Brie. After the match, Nikki returned and celebrated with her co-stars. On April 6, Brie confirmed that she would be taking an extended break from in-ring competition, citing family reasons while also stating that she will continue working for WWE as an ambassador.
On January 22, 2018, on the Raw 25 Years special episode, The Bella Twins were honored as part of a segment involving women considered legends that contributed to the company's success. At the Royal Rumble on January 28, Brie and Nikki participated in the first ever women's Royal Rumble match at No. 28 and No. 27, respectively, making it into the final four with Asuka and Sasha Banks, with Nikki eliminating Brie before being eliminated herself by the winner Asuka. On the September 3 episode of Raw, The Bella Twins competed for the first time in three years, defeating The Riott Squad (Liv Morgan and Sarah Logan). The Bellas teamed with Ronda Rousey to defeat The Riott Squad at WWE Super Show-Down on October 6, and won the rematch two nights later on Raw. After the rematch, the Bellas attacked Rousey. Nikki received a title opportunity against Rousey at WWE Evolution on October 28, but was unsuccessful. In March 2019, both Bellas announced on Total Bellas that they had retired from in-ring competition with Brie making the announcement on the March 10 episode and Nikki announcing her retirement on the season finale on March 24. At February 21, 2020 edition of SmackDown, it was announced that both Bellas will be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame, during A Moment of Bliss segment. Due to the COVID Pandemic, the ceremony took place the next year.
Other media
Guest appearances
Prior to working with WWE, the twins appeared on Meet My Folks. Both twins also appeared in the music video for "Right Side of the Bed" by the band Atreyu. They were regulars on the VH1 show Best Week Ever. The twins made a guest appearance on the MTV series Ridiculousness in October 2012. They also appeared in the music video for "Na Na" by Trey Songz in 2014.
The twins guest starred on the television series Psych, in the 2014 episode "A Nightmare on State Street". Nikki and Brie are part of the main cast for the reality television show Total Divas, which began airing in July 2013. In April 2016, it was announced that Total Bellas, a spin-off of Total Divas starring the twins, would begin airing in fall 2016.
Nikki and Brie co-starred in the 2014 independent film Confessions of a Womanizer and provided voices for the 2015 movie The Flintstones & WWE: Stone Age SmackDown!.
Nikki appeared at the Miss USA 2013 pageant as one of the celebrity judges. They appeared at the 2014 MTV Europe Music Awards, where they presented the award for Best Female. The twins were both nominated for Choice Female Athlete at the 2015 Teen Choice Awards. The following year at the 2016 Teen Choice Awards, The Bella Twins won Choice Female Athlete. Brie appeared alongside Paige, Natalya, and the Chrisley family on the 88th Academy Awards edition of E! Countdown to the Red Carpet in February 2016.
The Bella Twins have appeared in ten WWE video games, making their in-game debut at WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2010 and appearing in WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2011, WWE '12 (DLC), WWE '13, WWE 2K14 (DLC), WWE 2K15, WWE 2K16, WWE 2K17, WWE 2K18, WWE 2K19, WWE 2K20 and WWE 2K Battlegrounds. Animated versions of the Bella Twins were included in WWE Network's series Camp WWE.
YouTube
Both twins appeared on the WWE YouTube show The JBL & Cole Show.
On November 21, 2016, Nikki and Brie unveiled their new YouTube channel which features daily fashion, beauty, travel, fitness, relationship and health videos along with daily video blogs, created by the twins themselves.
The Bella Twins appeared in YouTuber iiSuperwomanii's video "When Someone Tries to Steal Your BFF" on March 2, 2017.
On April 16, 2020, the twins were featured on the hit YouTube channel "First We Feast", appearing a Truth or Dab edition of Hot Ones.
Lifestyle
On August 21, 2017, Nikki and Brie launched their own wine label called Belle Radici in collaboration with Hill Family Estates and Gauge Branding. Later that year on November 1, 2017, Nikki and Brie launched Birdiebee, a lifestyle intimates and activewear brand. The line includes transitional intimates, activewear and loungewear aimed at "empowering and educating women through mirroring the twins' passion for life, strength, women's health and wellness, and fun".
On January 28, 2019, Nikki and Brie launched Nicole + Brizee, a body and beauty line. On March 27, 2019, Nikki and Brie launched their own podcast.
In March 2020, Nikki and Brie released their memoir Incomparable.
In 2021, Nikki and Brie launched another wine label called Bonita Bonita Wine.
In 2021, Nikki and Brie launched their own baby gear collection in partnership with Colugo. Nikki and Brie also announced that they joined Colugo as investors and creative advisors.
Personal life
On May 9, 2017, Brie gave birth to her first child, a daughter, Birdie Joe Danielson. In January 2020, the twins announced they were both pregnant, with due dates a week and a half apart. On July 31, Nikki gave birth to Matteo Artemovich Chigvintsev. 22 hours later, Brie gave birth to Buddy Dessert Danielson on August 1.
Bibliography
Incomparable (2020)
Filmography
Film
Television
Music videos
Championships and accomplishments
Pro Wrestling Illustrated
PWI ranked Brie Bella No. 12 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2015
PWI ranked Nikki Bella No. 1 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2015
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone named Nikki Bella as the Diva of the Year in 2015
Rolling Stone named Nikki Bella as the Most Improved Wrestler in 2015
Teen Choice Awards
Choice Female Athlete (2016)
WrestleCrap
Gooker Award (2014) Feud between each other (co-winner with Vince McMahon)
Wrestling Observer Newsletter
Worst Feud of the Year (2014) Brie vs. Nikki
Worst Feud of the Year (2015) Team PCB vs. Team B.A.D. vs. Team Bella
Worst Worked Match of the Year (2013) with Cameron, Eva Marie, JoJo, Naomi, and Natalya vs. AJ Lee, Aksana, Alicia Fox, Kaitlyn, Rosa Mendes, Summer Rae and Tamina Snuka on November 24
WWE
WWE Divas Championship (3 times) – Brie Bella (1), Nikki Bella (2)
Slammy Award (4 times)
Couple of the Year (2013, 2014)
Diva of the Year (2013)
Diva of the Year (2015)
WWE Hall of Fame (Class of 2020)
References
External links
1983 births
American female professional wrestlers
American professional wrestlers of Italian descent
American professional wrestlers of Mexican descent
American YouTubers
ECW (WWE) teams and stables
Identical twin females
Living people
Participants in American reality television series
People from San Diego
Sportspeople from Scottsdale, Arizona
Twin people from the United States
Twin sportspeople
Women's wrestling teams and stables
WWE teams and stables
WWE Diva Search contestants
WWE Hall of Fame team inductees
Professional wrestlers from California
21st-century American women
American actresses of Mexican descent | false | [
"Carmelo Di Bella (January 30, 1921 – September 9, 1992) was an Italian football player and manager. Di Bella spent the vast majority of his career in Sicily where he was a prominent figure in the footballing scene, especially in relation to the island's most successful clubs; Catania and Palermo.\n\nPlaying career\nDi Bella, a left wing, started his professional career for his native city team Catania. From 1941 he played for Juventina Palermo, then renamed to Palermo in 1946. He also played a Serie A season with the rosanero, making nine appearances and scoring a goal in 1948–49. He retired from playing football in 1954, after two seasons as player/manager for minor team Akragas from Agrigento.\n\nManaging career\nAfter two seasons as coach of minor team Termitana from Termini Imerese, Di Bella was appointed as Catania's youth team coach in 1957. In 1958–59, with just twelve matches remaining, Di Bella was called to replace Blagoje Marjanović with the goal to save the club from relegation to Serie C, with the initial support of technical director Felice Borel. Di Bella ended the season with a sixteenth place which allowed Catania to avoid relegation, and he was consequently confirmed at the helm of Catania. Di Bella coached Catania till 1966, when he resigned from his office, obtaining a Serie A promotion in 1960 and leading the Sicilian club to the Italian top division until his resignations. Di Bella then signed for Catanzaro, narrowly missing promotion to Serie A. In 1967, he became head coach of Palermo, where he immediately won Serie B bringing the rosanero back to Serie A. He left Palermo in 1971 to return to Catania, where however did not repeat his previous triumphs with the rossoblù (eighth, then fifth, in Serie B). In 1974, he became coach of Reggiana of Serie B: he avoided relegation in his first season, but not in the second. In 1976–77 he coached again Catania, but without being able to avoid relegation.\n\nHis last coaching effort, in 1981, was as Palermo boss: called to coach the rosanero since the 28th matchday, he helped the club to avoid relegation from Serie B.\n\nDi Bella died in 1992 in Palermo.\n\nHonours\n\nPlayer\n1941–42 Serie C (Palermo)\n1947–48 Serie B (Palermo)\n\nManager\n1967–68 Serie B (Palermo)\n\nExternal links\nProfile at Enciclopedia Del Calcio\n\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nDi Bella, Carmelo\nFootballers from Sicily\nU.S. Catanzaro 1929 managers",
"Final Fight: Streetwise is a 2006 3D beat-'em-up produced by Capcom, released in North America and the PAL region for the PlayStation 2 and Xbox. It is a sequel to Final Fight 3 developed by the American team of Capcom Production Studio 8 (the developers of Final Fight Revenge and the Maximo series). It is the fourth and final installment of the Final Fight series as well as the only Final Fight video game to not be released in Japan. An PlayStation Portable version was also planned but ultimately cancelled. \n\nThe game returned the series to its beat-'em-up roots, casting players as Kyle Travers, brother of Cody from the first game. Series regulars Haggar and Guy also make appearances in the game's story mode, which has Kyle battling a maniacal priest named Father Bella and the illegal drug \"glow\".\n\nGameplay\nFinal Fight: Streetwise is a 3D beat 'em up game. The story mode, which is exclusively single player, has ten minigames, including cockroach stomping, arm-wrestling, slide puzzles, shooting contests and the classic car bash. Players earn money through pit fights and side missions, upgrading Kyle's moveset by training in various gyms in Metro City while progressing through the game. An 'instinct' system allows you to counter opponents' attacks, as well as make your attacks more powerful.\n\nThe arcade mode is a no-frills 3D brawler for 1 or 2 players. It does not have upgradable movesets, counters or instinct abilities. Kyle, Cody, Guy and Haggar are all playable characters in arcade mode. However, the game is over when the life bar is empty.\n\nThe game's save system can only be used once the player decides to quit the game. Progress will resume at the last checkpoint rather than the character's last position.\n\nPlot\nStreetwise is set several years after Final Fight 3, and focuses on Kyle Travers (voiced by Trent Kaniuga), Cody's younger brother. In Streetwise, Kyle roams the streets of his hometown, doing detective work, on the search for his captured brother. Kyle will run into familiar faces, as well as new ones.\n\nStory\nKyle and Cody Travers are brothers who take part in the sport of underground fighting. As Cody Travers' younger brother, Kyle is the star of the underground Metro City fight club, spending nights fighting various other fighters in order to earn enough quick cash to make ends meet. After the end of a fight one evening, Kyle and Cody decide to meet at the local bar to celebrate with some beers and a round of pool; however, Cody has some unspoken business that delays his arrival for an hour. After Kyle arrives at the bar, he plays a game with his girlfriend and bar owner Vanessa Sims (whose brother is a member of the police department), while waiting for Cody. Kyle later finds out that Cody is using a powerful strength-enhancing drug called \"glow\", which helps the arthritis in his knees. Kyle later discovers that glow is being made by a psychotic priest named Father Bella, who hopes to use the drug to bring about the apocalypse. When Kyle finds Bella on the roof of his church, Cody is with him, mutated by a concentrated dose of glow. It is later revealed that Bella is actually the younger brother of Belger, the antagonist of the original game, just before he and Kyle begin to fight.\n\nDuring the battle, Cody regains his senses, and throws himself and Bella off the roof landing in the courtyard. Bella regains consciousness from the fall and begins to reach for his handgun but is stopped by Kyle. Bella utters his last words \"I am your savior,\" before Kyle fires a fatal shot directly to the former's head, replying \"You're nothing.\" Afterward he finds Cody unconscious from the fall.\n\nSome time later, Kyle and Cody wake up in the hospital, where they meet with Vanessa whose brother was killed during the final battles; she holds onto her late brother's badge in his memory. Cody's arthritis is now gone and he seems eager to resume fighting. Kyle notices Dr. Chang, the creator of \"glow\", leaving the police station on the local news and mentions he has a feeling this might not be over quite yet.\n\nCharacters\nThe game's protagonist is Kyle Travers, younger brother of Cody Travers from the original Final Fight. He is a 27-year-old former Marine who has lived on the streets of Metro City, along with Cody, since childhood. Coming from a broken family, Kyle was brought up by his brother, who taught him how to survive life on the streets and earn respect. Haggar reveals that Kyle was a troublemaker and hoodlum prior to joining the military, calling him a \"skinny legged punk\". Later, as a skilled hand-to-hand fighter, Kyle uses his talent to support himself in the local pit fighting club. He goes in search of Cody after he is abducted from Kyle's girlfriend's bar. His girlfriend, Vanessa Sims, and her brother, Sergeant Sims, aid Kyle in his search by providing him with information as they get it.\n\nEnemies include 2P, Andore (voiced by Gerardo Sprigg) and Cammy. The game's antagonist is Father Bella. He has been distributing a new drug called GLOW throughout Metro City. It is later revealed that he is the younger brother of Belger, the antagonist of the original Final Fight.\n\nDevelopment\nBefore Streetwise entered development, Capcom Studio 8 worked on a separate game for the PlayStation 2, titled Final Fight: Seven Sons, which had different characters, a different gameplay system, a simulated \"railcam\" and cel-shaded graphics, the latter two of which served to mimic the aesthetics of Final Fight and its SNES sequels.\n\nA promotional comic that contained concept art, illustrated by artist and lead voice actor Trent Kaniuga, was included with preorders of the game.\n\nAs seen in the promotional comic, Sodom and Poison, both of whom were from the original Final Fight as well as Final Fight Revenge, were initially planned to be in Streetwise. It is unknown what their intended roles in the game were, or why they were cut from the final version. Additionally, Mike Haggar and Guy were supposed to have more screen-time, but several cutscenes featuring them were eventually removed.\n\nSoundtrack\nAs well as remixes of the original game's themes, the soundtrack was provided by RZA, Mos Def, Fear Factory, Slipknot, Soulfly, Dub Pistols, Shadows Fall, Opeth, Lil' Flip, Nappy Roots, Dujeous and Gizmachi.\n\nReception\n\nFinal Fight: Streetwise was widely panned by critics on both platforms according to the review aggregator website Metacritic. The game received an average score of 47% at GameRankings and failed to achieve mainstream success. Many video game review websites and magazines, including IGN, GameSpot GameSpy and Game Informer, have made several complaints about flaws in the game, usually ending with an unfavorable review. Many reviewers claimed that, while the game offers a simple and functional gameplay in the same vein of the original arcade game, it is easily overshadowed by the flaws in other departments. ScrewAttack named Final Fight: Streetwise as 6th on their list of \"Top 10 Worst 2D to 3D Games\" and also placed the game in the number five spot on their \"Top 10 Worst Reboots or Remakes\" list.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nHardcore Gaming 101 Final Fight series review, including a different view on Final Fight: Streetwise\n\n2006 video games\n3D beat 'em ups\nCancelled PlayStation Portable games\nCapcom beat 'em ups\nCooperative video games\nFinal Fight games\nVideo games about ninja\nOrganized crime video games\nPlayStation 2 games\nVideo games developed in the United States\nVideo games set in the United States\nVideo game sequels\nXbox games\nMultiplayer and single-player video games"
] |
[
"The Bella Twins",
"Team Bella (2014-2015)",
"What is Team Bella all about ?",
"In June, The Bella Twins became villainess once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1",
"What was the Twin Magic ?",
"I don't know.",
"What happend after the match on June 1?",
"During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella.",
"Whom did they fight as Team Bella ?",
"At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina. After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi, and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon"
] | C_70ae421b29c944d1936f9af142452d7e_0 | Was team Bella ever defeated ? | 5 | Was team Bella ever defeated ? | The Bella Twins | Nikki received her title match against AJ Lee on November 23 at Survivor Series, which she won, with Brie's help, to become a two-time Divas Champion. This led to the duo reuniting as a result. Nikki then went on to retain her championship in three separate occasions - against Lee in a rematch on December 14, at TLC: Tables, Ladders and Chairs, against Naomi two days later on SmackDown and against Paige at Fastlane on February 22, 2015. Paige and Lee then formed an alliance against Bellas which led to a tag team match at WrestleMania 31, where Lee and Paige were victorious. On April 26, after Nikki retained her title over Naomi at Extreme Rules, a feud started, with Naomi aligning with the returning Tamina to even the odds against Bellas, who began showing more heroic characteristics. This change in character was criticized as "sudden", "randomly" and "for no reason". This led to a tag team match between the two teams on May 17, at Payback, which Naomi and Tamina won. Two weeks later at Elimination Chamber, Nikki retained her title against Naomi and Paige in a triple threat match, with Brie banned from ringside. In June, The Bella Twins became villainess once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 episode of Raw and at Money in the Bank. During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina. After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi, and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon called for a "revolution" in the WWE Divas division and introduced the debuting Charlotte and Becky Lynch as Paige's allies, while NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks debuted as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, which led to a brawl between the three teams. Nikki then lost to Charlotte in a tag team match on the August 3 episode of Raw, and to Banks on the August 17 episode of Raw in a non-title match. The three teams faced off on August 23 at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match, in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win. On the September 14 episode of Raw, Nikki defended her title against Charlotte, who pinned Brie after the twins had switched places to win the match; however, since the title cannot change hands by disqualification, Nikki retained the championship, and in the process, became the new longest reigning Divas Champion in history, surpassing AJ Lee's previous record of 295 days. CANNOTANSWER | The three teams faced off on August 23 at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match, in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win. | The Bella Twins were a professional wrestling tag team who performed on WWE and consisted of identical twin sisters Brie Bella and Nikki Bella (real names Brianna and Nicole). The Bella Twins are both former Divas Champions, with Brie becoming the first twin in WWE History to win the WWE Divas Championship once, while Nikki holding it twice. Nikki is also the longest-reigning holder of that title.
Both sisters signed with WWE in 2007 (then known as World Wrestling Entertainment) and were assigned to the farm territory Florida Championship Wrestling. As Brie Bella, Brianna was called up to the main roster in 2008. She began to wrestle and, during her matches, she switched places with her sister to win. Weeks later, it was revealed that they were twins and Nicole began to work as Nikki Bella. During the next years, they worked together as a team and won the WWE Divas Championship one time each one, but in 2012, when they were released. The Bella Twins made their return in 2013 and featured the reality show Total Divas. While in 2014 they disbanded the team and feud between them, they reunited in 2015 and Nikki won the Divas Championship for a second time. She retained the title for 301 days, the longest reign of the title. After 2015, they began to appear less in WWE shows until they announced their retirement in 2019. In 2021, they were inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame as part of the 2020 class.
In November 2015, Nikki was ranked No. 1 in Pro Wrestling Illustrateds Female 50.
Early lives and careers
Nicole and Brianna Garcia-Colace were born sixteen minutes apart on November 21, 1983, in San Diego, California and raised on a farm in the outskirts of Scottsdale, Arizona. They are of Mexican and Italian descent and played soccer in their youth. The twins graduated from Chaparral High School in 2002. They returned to San Diego for college, where Nicole continued playing soccer for Grossmont College, with both twins also working at Hooters. A year later, the twins relocated to Los Angeles in pursuit of acting and modeling opportunities, making ends meet doing various gigs from marketing for a now defunct record label, to cocktail waitressing at the Mondrian Hotel.
They then made their first national TV appearance on the Fox reality show Meet My Folks. Following this appearance, the twins were hired to be the World Cup Twins for Budweiser and were photographed holding the World Cup trophy. They were contestants in the 2006 "International Body Doubles twins search". They participated in the 2006 WWE Diva Search, but did not make the cut.
Professional wrestling career
World Wrestling Entertainment/WWE
Florida Championship Wrestling (2007–2008)
The Bella Twins were signed to developmental contracts by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) in June 2007 and were assigned to Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW), WWE's then-developmental territory, in Tampa, Florida. On September 14, the twins made their in-ring debut defeating Nattie Neidhart and Krissy Vaine with Victoria Crawford as the special guest referee. As a part of their on-screen personas, they switched places behind the referee's back if one of them was hurt. This was called "Twin Magic". They also occasionally competed in mixed tag team matches, teaming with male wrestlers including Kofi Kingston and Robert Anthony. They also made some non-wrestling appearances on Heath Miller's Happy Hour promo segment.
Starting in December 2007, they managed Derrick Linkin, but this storyline was cut short when Linkin was released in January 2008. They then resumed their feud with Neidhart and Crawford, wrestling them throughout much of 2008. In FCW, the twins competed in bikini contests and wrestled against Katie Lea Burchill, Milena Roucka, and Nattie Neidhart. Their last FCW appearance was on September 2, when they competed in a Divas battle royal won by Miss Angela.
Various storylines (2008–2011)
On the August 29 episode of SmackDown, Brianna debuted as Brie Bella and defeated Victoria. She had a series of matches with Victoria and Victoria's accomplice Natalya. In each match, Brie would roll out of the ring and go underneath it, emerging revived as she would then win the match. On the November 7 episode of SmackDown, Brie picked up a win against Victoria and then ran under the ring to escape Natalya and Victoria, but Victoria and Natalya both reached for Brie under the ring, resulting in both Nicole and Brie being pulled out. Nicole was then introduced as Nikki Bella. The twins had their first official match as a team on the November 21 episode of SmackDown, defeating Victoria and Natalya. They continued competing in tag team matches over the following months.
Starting in November, the twins developed an on-screen relationship with The Colóns (Carlito and Primo). In February 2009, the storyline expanded to include John Morrison and The Miz, who flirted with the Bellas and took them on a date for Valentine's Day. The date provoked a rivalry between the teams of The Miz and Morrison and Primo and Carlito, with the four competing for the affection of the twins, who were seemingly unable to choose between them. On March 17 on ECW, Carlito and Primo, aiming for Morrison and The Miz, accidentally spat apples in the face of Brie. Nikki began to laugh at Brie's misfortune, and a fight broke out between the two, which led to Nikki leaving with The Miz and Morrison while Brie stayed with Primo and Carlito. Brie won her first match over Nikki in a six-person intergender tag team match on SmackDown the following week. On ECW on March 31, Nikki pinned Brie in their first singles match against each other after a distraction from Morrison and The Miz.
On April 15, The Bella Twins were both drafted to the Raw brand as part of the 2009 supplemental draft. On April 27, Brie made her Raw in-ring debut in an eight-Diva tag team match, which her team won. Nikki also made an appearance, reuniting with her twin, as she was under the ring to help Brie during the match. Nikki then made her in-ring debut for the brand the following month in a battle royal, but was eliminated by Beth Phoenix.
On June 29, they were both traded to the ECW brand. They debuted on ECW the following night on The Abraham Washington Show, as the special guests. They quickly developed a storyline feud with Katie Lea Burchill, when Nikki defeated her in a match by switching places with Brie behind the referee's back. The following week on Superstars, Brie defeated Burchill after a similar fashion, and the feud ended in September, when Nikki defeated Burchill on Superstars.
On October 12, the Bellas were traded back to Raw as part of a tri-branded Divas trade, where they predominately appeared in backstages segments with the weekly guest stars and only occasionally competed in matches. In June 2010, they developed a feud with Jillian Hall, when Brie defeated her after switching places with Nikki. The following week, Nikki defeated Hall after switching with Brie. The feud was exacerbated when the Bellas acted as the special guest referees during one of Hall's matches. During the match, Hall attacked both twins, but lost the match when Nikki made a fast count, allowing her to be pinned by Gail Kim. The next week on Superstars, the twins defeated Hall and Maryse in a tag team match to end the storyline.
On August 31, The Bella Twins announced they would be part of the all-female third season of NXT, mentoring Jamie. Jamie was the first rookie Diva eliminated on the October 5 episode of NXT. In November, the twins began a storyline with Daniel Bryan, when Brie accompanied him to the ring for his match. Following his win, Nikki ran out and the two fought over Bryan's affection, until Bryan broke it up and had them hug each other. They began to manage Bryan and frequently accompanied him to the ring over the next two months. In January 2011, they discovered Bryan kissing Gail Kim backstage and assaulted her. They continued to attack Kim, both at the Royal Rumble on January 30 and the following night on Raw. On February 7, they teamed with Melina in a losing effort to Kim, Eve Torres and Tamina.
Divas Champions (2011–2012)
The Bellas began feuding with Eve Torres after they appeared as lumberjills during a Divas Championship match between Torres and Natalya on the February 14 episode of Raw. Following the match, they attacked Torres backstage before Gail Kim and Natalya stopped them. The next week on Raw, the twins defeated Torres and Kim in a tag team match. The following week on Raw, Nikki won a battle royal to become the number one contender for the Divas Championship and unsuccessfully challenged Torres for the championship on March 7.
On April 11, Brie defeated Torres to win the Divas Championship, marking the first time either twin had held a championship in WWE. On May 22, Brie went on to successfully defend the championship against Kelly Kelly at Over the Limit after switching places with Nikki. On a special "Power to the People" episode of Raw on June 20, Brie defended her WWE Divas Championship against Kelly (who was selected by voters), losing the title and ending her reign at 70 days. On July 17, Brie challenged Kelly for the championship in a rematch at Money in the Bank on July 17, but she failed to win.
The Bellas began to show friction in March 2012 after both twins lost to AJ Lee in singles competition. After Brie's match with Lee, Nikki revealed that Brie was rooting for Team Johnny in the 12-man tag team match at WrestleMania XXVIII on April 1 whilst Nikki was rooting for Team Teddy, thus furthering their dissension.
On the April 6 episode of SmackDown, Nikki defeated the Divas Champion Beth Phoenix in a non-title match after Kelly Kelly distracted Phoenix. On April 23, Nikki defeated Phoenix in a lumberjill match on Raw to win the Divas Championship for the first time. Brie lost Nikki's championship to Layla at Extreme Rules on April 29 after Twin Magic failed, ending her Divas Championship reign after only a week. The following night on Raw, they competed in their last match with the WWE, failing to win back the Divas Championship from Layla in a triple threat match. Later that night, WWE announced on their website that the twins had been fired by Executive Administrator Eve Torres.
Independent circuit promotions (2012–2013)
On May 1, 2012, the twins appeared at their first independent wrestling show in Newburgh, New York at Northeast Wrestling. They later appeared for CTWE Pro Wrestling at the Season Beatings pay-per-view on December 15, each accompanying a different wrestler to the ring.
Return to WWE
Total Divas storylines (2013–2014)
The Bella Twins returned to WWE on the March 11, 2013, episode of Raw in a backstage segment with Team Rhodes Scholars (Cody Rhodes and Damien Sandow). On the March 15 episode of SmackDown, the twins attacked The Funkadactyls (Cameron and Naomi) and the following week interfered in matches between Team Rhodes Scholars and Brodus Clay and Tensai, but were attacked by The Funkadactyls. The twins made their in-ring return defeating The Funkadactyls on the March 27 episode of Main Event after interference from Cody Rhodes. The Bella Twins were scheduled to participate in an eight-person tag team match with Team Rhodes Scholars against Tons of Funk (Clay and Tensai) and The Funkadactyls at WrestleMania 29 on April 7, but the match was canceled due to time restraints and instead took place the following night on Raw, where The Bella Twins and Team Rhodes Scholars were defeated. In June, Nikki suffered a fractured tibia.
Upon the debut of the Total Divas reality television program in July, The Bellas began a feud with their co-star on the show Natalya, with Brie and Natalya trading victories in singles competition on Raw and at SummerSlam on August 18. The cast of Total Divas then transitioned into a scripted feud with Divas Champion AJ Lee, who mocked the show and cast. At Night of Champions on September 15, Brie unsuccessfully challenged Lee for the Divas Championship in a four-way match, which also involved Natalya and Naomi. Continuing their feud into October, Brie and Lee faced off at Battleground and Hell in a Cell for the Divas Championship, but Brie was unsuccessful. Nikki returned to in-ring action on the October 25 episode of SmackDown, losing to Lee. At Survivor Series on November 24, the twins were part of the victorious Team Total Divas. On April 6, they failed to win the Divas Championship again at WrestleMania XXX in the Divas Invitational match, which was won by Lee.
Brief split (2014)
In April 2014, Brie became involved in her real-life husband Daniel Bryan's ongoing storyline with Stephanie McMahon and Kane, whereas part of the storyline McMahon threatened to fire Brie if an injured Bryan did not relinquish the WWE World Heavyweight Championship at Payback on June 1, which forced Brie to "quit" WWE before slapping McMahon in the face. After Brie "quit", McMahon put Nikki in several handicap matches as punishment. After a month absence, Brie returned to WWE television, appearing in the crowd on July 21 and starting a confrontation with McMahon who slapped Brie and was subsequently arrested. In order to have Brie drop the "charges", Brie was rehired and received a match against McMahon at SummerSlam.
Nikki attacked Brie at the event on August 17, which allowed McMahon to win the match. The next several weeks saw the twins fight in several backstage and in-ring segments, including a cameo appearance from Jerry Springer on Raw on September 8. As part of the storyline, McMahon declared Nikki the face of the WWE Divas division and granted her a match at Night of Champions for the Divas Championship, which she failed to win. At Hell in a Cell, Nikki defeated Brie in a match where the loser was forced to become the winner's personal assistant for 30 days.
Nikki and Brie reunited at Survivor Series on November 23 when Nikki defeated AJ Lee with Brie's help to become a two-time Divas Champion. Nikki retained her championship in three separate occasions—against Lee in a rematch at TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs on December 14, against Naomi two days later on SmackDown and against Paige on February 22, 2015, at Fastlane. Paige and Lee then formed an alliance against the Bellas which led to a tag team match at WrestleMania 31 on March 29, which the Bellas lost.
Team Bella (2015)
After Nikki retained her title over Naomi at Extreme Rules on April 26, Nikki started a feud with Naomi after she aligned with the returning Tamina to even the odds against Bellas. This led to a tag team match between the two teams at Payback on May 17, which Naomi and Tamina won. At Elimination Chamber on May 31, Nikki retained her title against Naomi and Paige in a triple threat match, with Brie banned from ringside.
In June, The Bella Twins became villains once again by employing Twin Magic, which helped Nikki retain the title against Paige on the June 1 episode of Raw and at Money in the Bank on June 14. During the feud with Paige, Alicia Fox allied with them to form Team Bella. At The Beast in the East on July 4, Nikki retained the title against Paige and Tamina.
After weeks of Team Bella outnumbering Paige, Naomi and Tamina, Stephanie McMahon called for a "revolution" in the WWE Divas division and introduced the debuting Charlotte and Becky Lynch as Paige's allies while NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks debuted as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, which led to a brawl between the three teams. Nikki then lost to Charlotte in a tag team match on the August 3 episode of Raw and to Banks on the August 17 episode of Raw in a non-title match. On August 23, the three teams faced off at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match in which Team Bella first eliminated Team B.A.D. before Team PCB's win.
On the September 14 episode of Raw, Nikki defended her title against Charlotte, who pinned Brie after the twins had switched places to win the match, but she retained the championship since the title cannot change hands by disqualification and in the process became the new longest reigning Divas Champion in history, surpassing AJ Lee's previous record of 295 days.
Injuries, retirements and sporadic appearances (2015–2019)
On September 20, Nikki dropped the championship to Charlotte at Night of Champions, ending her reign at 301 days and failing to regain the title in a rematch at Hell in a Cell on October 25. Shortly after, Nikki went on a hiatus from both television and in-ring competition due to a neck injury which would require surgery, but returned for one night on December 21 to accept the Slammy Award for Diva of the Year. During Nikki's absence, Brie continued to compete in singles competition and in tag team matches with Fox. Brie was unsuccessful in winning the Divas Championship at Fastlane on February 21 in a match against Charlotte. During that time, Team Bella quietly disbanded.
In March 2016, Brie was placed in a feud with Lana, who argued that Brie's fans only supported her out of pity for having a "bad husband". Brie then aligned herself with fellow Total Divas cast members Alicia Fox, Natalya, Paige and Eva Marie while Lana aligned herself with Team B.A.D. (Naomi and Tamina), Summer Rae and Emma (which was officially called Team B.A.D. and Blonde), leading to a 10-woman tag team match on the WrestleMania 32 kickoff show on April 3, which Team Total Divas would win when Naomi submitted to Brie. After the match, Nikki returned and celebrated with her co-stars. On April 6, Brie confirmed that she would be taking an extended break from in-ring competition, citing family reasons while also stating that she will continue working for WWE as an ambassador.
On January 22, 2018, on the Raw 25 Years special episode, The Bella Twins were honored as part of a segment involving women considered legends that contributed to the company's success. At the Royal Rumble on January 28, Brie and Nikki participated in the first ever women's Royal Rumble match at No. 28 and No. 27, respectively, making it into the final four with Asuka and Sasha Banks, with Nikki eliminating Brie before being eliminated herself by the winner Asuka. On the September 3 episode of Raw, The Bella Twins competed for the first time in three years, defeating The Riott Squad (Liv Morgan and Sarah Logan). The Bellas teamed with Ronda Rousey to defeat The Riott Squad at WWE Super Show-Down on October 6, and won the rematch two nights later on Raw. After the rematch, the Bellas attacked Rousey. Nikki received a title opportunity against Rousey at WWE Evolution on October 28, but was unsuccessful. In March 2019, both Bellas announced on Total Bellas that they had retired from in-ring competition with Brie making the announcement on the March 10 episode and Nikki announcing her retirement on the season finale on March 24. At February 21, 2020 edition of SmackDown, it was announced that both Bellas will be inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame, during A Moment of Bliss segment. Due to the COVID Pandemic, the ceremony took place the next year.
Other media
Guest appearances
Prior to working with WWE, the twins appeared on Meet My Folks. Both twins also appeared in the music video for "Right Side of the Bed" by the band Atreyu. They were regulars on the VH1 show Best Week Ever. The twins made a guest appearance on the MTV series Ridiculousness in October 2012. They also appeared in the music video for "Na Na" by Trey Songz in 2014.
The twins guest starred on the television series Psych, in the 2014 episode "A Nightmare on State Street". Nikki and Brie are part of the main cast for the reality television show Total Divas, which began airing in July 2013. In April 2016, it was announced that Total Bellas, a spin-off of Total Divas starring the twins, would begin airing in fall 2016.
Nikki and Brie co-starred in the 2014 independent film Confessions of a Womanizer and provided voices for the 2015 movie The Flintstones & WWE: Stone Age SmackDown!.
Nikki appeared at the Miss USA 2013 pageant as one of the celebrity judges. They appeared at the 2014 MTV Europe Music Awards, where they presented the award for Best Female. The twins were both nominated for Choice Female Athlete at the 2015 Teen Choice Awards. The following year at the 2016 Teen Choice Awards, The Bella Twins won Choice Female Athlete. Brie appeared alongside Paige, Natalya, and the Chrisley family on the 88th Academy Awards edition of E! Countdown to the Red Carpet in February 2016.
The Bella Twins have appeared in ten WWE video games, making their in-game debut at WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2010 and appearing in WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2011, WWE '12 (DLC), WWE '13, WWE 2K14 (DLC), WWE 2K15, WWE 2K16, WWE 2K17, WWE 2K18, WWE 2K19, WWE 2K20 and WWE 2K Battlegrounds. Animated versions of the Bella Twins were included in WWE Network's series Camp WWE.
YouTube
Both twins appeared on the WWE YouTube show The JBL & Cole Show.
On November 21, 2016, Nikki and Brie unveiled their new YouTube channel which features daily fashion, beauty, travel, fitness, relationship and health videos along with daily video blogs, created by the twins themselves.
The Bella Twins appeared in YouTuber iiSuperwomanii's video "When Someone Tries to Steal Your BFF" on March 2, 2017.
On April 16, 2020, the twins were featured on the hit YouTube channel "First We Feast", appearing a Truth or Dab edition of Hot Ones.
Lifestyle
On August 21, 2017, Nikki and Brie launched their own wine label called Belle Radici in collaboration with Hill Family Estates and Gauge Branding. Later that year on November 1, 2017, Nikki and Brie launched Birdiebee, a lifestyle intimates and activewear brand. The line includes transitional intimates, activewear and loungewear aimed at "empowering and educating women through mirroring the twins' passion for life, strength, women's health and wellness, and fun".
On January 28, 2019, Nikki and Brie launched Nicole + Brizee, a body and beauty line. On March 27, 2019, Nikki and Brie launched their own podcast.
In March 2020, Nikki and Brie released their memoir Incomparable.
In 2021, Nikki and Brie launched another wine label called Bonita Bonita Wine.
In 2021, Nikki and Brie launched their own baby gear collection in partnership with Colugo. Nikki and Brie also announced that they joined Colugo as investors and creative advisors.
Personal life
On May 9, 2017, Brie gave birth to her first child, a daughter, Birdie Joe Danielson. In January 2020, the twins announced they were both pregnant, with due dates a week and a half apart. On July 31, Nikki gave birth to Matteo Artemovich Chigvintsev. 22 hours later, Brie gave birth to Buddy Dessert Danielson on August 1.
Bibliography
Incomparable (2020)
Filmography
Film
Television
Music videos
Championships and accomplishments
Pro Wrestling Illustrated
PWI ranked Brie Bella No. 12 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2015
PWI ranked Nikki Bella No. 1 of the top 50 female wrestlers in the PWI Female 50 in 2015
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone named Nikki Bella as the Diva of the Year in 2015
Rolling Stone named Nikki Bella as the Most Improved Wrestler in 2015
Teen Choice Awards
Choice Female Athlete (2016)
WrestleCrap
Gooker Award (2014) Feud between each other (co-winner with Vince McMahon)
Wrestling Observer Newsletter
Worst Feud of the Year (2014) Brie vs. Nikki
Worst Feud of the Year (2015) Team PCB vs. Team B.A.D. vs. Team Bella
Worst Worked Match of the Year (2013) with Cameron, Eva Marie, JoJo, Naomi, and Natalya vs. AJ Lee, Aksana, Alicia Fox, Kaitlyn, Rosa Mendes, Summer Rae and Tamina Snuka on November 24
WWE
WWE Divas Championship (3 times) – Brie Bella (1), Nikki Bella (2)
Slammy Award (4 times)
Couple of the Year (2013, 2014)
Diva of the Year (2013)
Diva of the Year (2015)
WWE Hall of Fame (Class of 2020)
References
External links
1983 births
American female professional wrestlers
American professional wrestlers of Italian descent
American professional wrestlers of Mexican descent
American YouTubers
ECW (WWE) teams and stables
Identical twin females
Living people
Participants in American reality television series
People from San Diego
Sportspeople from Scottsdale, Arizona
Twin people from the United States
Twin sportspeople
Women's wrestling teams and stables
WWE teams and stables
WWE Diva Search contestants
WWE Hall of Fame team inductees
Professional wrestlers from California
21st-century American women
American actresses of Mexican descent | false | [
"Club de Regatas Bella Vista is an Argentine sports club from the Bella Vista district of Greater Buenos Aires. Founded in 1895 as a rowing club, Regatas later developed other sports activities, such as rugby union, field hockey, football and tennis.\n\nThe rugby team currently plays at the Top 12, the first division of the Unión de Rugby de Buenos Aires league system. On the other hand, the hockey sections compete in tournaments organised by the Buenos Aires Hockey Association (AHBA).\n\nHistory\nClub de Regatas Bella Vista was founded on February 14, 1895, by former members of the Buenos Aires Rowing Club who wanted to develop the sport of rowing in the city of Bella Vista. Most inhabitants of Bella Vista at the time had French origins; one of them, Enrique Goubat is credited as being the founding father of the club.\n\nRugby has always been played at the club but it has only been since the 1960s, with the acquisition of new lands and the construction of several new rugby pitches that the club became strong in the Unión de Rugby de Buenos Aires championship.\n\nRegatas' best performance ever was during the 2002 championship, when the team reached the finals but was later defeated by San Isidro Club. On November, 2011, Bella Vista was relegated to the second division.\n\nRegatas has achieved more success in the rugby sevens version of the game, winning the provincial tournament in 1985. The club underaged teams have also earned some success since the 1990s, winning the Under-19 title in 1999 and finishing second in the 2008 Under-22 championship. In 2005, the club won both the URBA U15 and U16 titles. In 2011 Regatas was relegated to Grupo II (second division) but just one year later the club returned to the top division of Argentine rugby league system.\n\nRegatas returned to the top division (then \"Grupo I\") after defeating San Albano by 20–15 on November, 2012.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\nr\nR\nr\nR\nR\nR",
"Team B.A.D. are a professional wrestling tag team that performs in WWE. The inceptive variation of the team began and ended as a duo consisting of Naomi and Tamina, but for most of its time was a trio also including Sasha Banks, who joined in July 2015 as part of the Divas Revolution storyline and left the team in February 2016. Both Naomi and Tamina are members of the Anoaʻi professional wrestling family. In 2022, Naomi and Banks would reunite the team as a duo.\n\nHistory\n\nFormation and beginnings \nIn May 2015, Naomi aligned herself with her real life cousin-in-law Tamina Snuka, after having been outnumbered by The Bella Twins (Brie and Nikki Bella) on multiple occasions. Tamina and Naomi went on to defeat The Bella Twins in a tag team match at Payback.\n\nDivas Revolution \nOn the July 13 episode of Raw, after weeks of being outnumbered by The Bella Twins and their ally Alicia Fox, WWE authority figure Stephanie McMahon called for a \"revolution\" in the WWE Divas division and introduced then debuting NXT Women's Champion Sasha Banks as an ally to Naomi and Tamina, after bringing in Charlotte and Becky Lynch to ally with Paige, leading to a brawl between the three teams.\n\nAt Battleground, a triple threat match took place with Sasha Banks representing Team B.A.D. against Charlotte of Team Paige (later known as Team PCB), and Brie Bella for Team Bella in a losing effort while Charlotte picked up the victory. The following night on the July 20 episode of Raw, Naomi and Sasha Banks were victorious in a tag team match against Paige and Becky Lynch. The three teams would ultimately face off at SummerSlam in a three team elimination match, where Team B.A.D. were the first team to be eliminated courtesy of Team Bella when Tamina was pinned by Brie, and Team PCB would win the match.\n\nAfter defeating then Divas Champion Nikki Bella by submission in a non-title match on the August 17 episode of Raw, Banks participated in the first ever Divas number one contender's Beat the Clock challenge, in which she fought Paige to a time limit draw and Charlotte was named the number one contender. Following this, Banks began a short feud with Paige and defeated her twice on the September 7 and 14 episodes of Raw, and fought to a no contest on the September 10 episode of SmackDown.\n\nAlthough she lost in a fatal four-way number one contender's match for Charlotte's Divas Championship in November, Banks started a winning streak, defeating the likes of Brie Bella Alicia Fox, and Becky Lynch, whom she again defeated after distractions by Naomi and Tamina on the TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs kickoff show on December 13.\n\nBanks' split and dissolution \nBanks returned at the Royal Rumble pay-per-view on January 24, 2016 after about a month off television, attacking Charlotte and Becky Lynch after their Divas Championship match, showing her intentions to challenge for the championship. Prior to a match with Lynch on the February 1 episode of Raw, Banks claimed that she was \"on her own\", signaling that she had moved on from the group, at which Naomi and Tamina declared that there were no hard feelings; however, during Sasha's match with Lynch, the duo attacked Banks until she was saved by Lynch, turning Banks into a face in the process. The feud between Banks, Naomi and Tamina would continue throughout February, and would lead to a tag team match at Fastlane on February 21, where Naomi and Tamina lost.\n\nAfter their feud with Banks, Team B.A.D. formed a brief alliance with Lana, Emma and Summer Rae, and on the March 14 episode of Raw, they defeated Alicia Fox and Brie Bella after a distraction by Lana. Team B.A.D. allied with her later in a segment backstage after confronting Paige, and later allied with Emma and Rae the week after on Main Event. The following week on Raw, they accompanied Emma to her match against Paige, where Emma won, after which they attacked Paige's allies (Alicia Fox, Brie Bella and Natalya) before they were saved by a returning Eva Marie. As a result, a 10-Diva tag team match between the two newly dubbed alliances, \"Team Total Divas\" and \"Team B.A.D. & Blonde\", was announced for the WrestleMania 32's pay-per-view pre-show. At the event on April 3, they were defeated by Team Total Divas after Naomi submitted to Brie Bella. After appearing sporadically since WrestleMania, Team B.A.D. disbanded in early May, when Tamina underwent knee surgery in order to repair torn ligaments, and Naomi began filming The Marine 5: Battleground, and was injured with a torn ankle tendon. Both Naomi and Tamina would be drafted to SmackDown (Naomi during 2016 WWE draft, and Tamina during the 2017 WWE Superstar Shake-up).\n\nReunion \nOn the February 25, 2022 edition of SmackDown, Naomi announced that her and Sasha Banks were going to challenge for the WWE Women's Tag Team Championship, thus reuniting the team as a duo. On the following episode of Raw, reigning champions Carmella and Queen Zelina would accept their challenge, consequently setting up the bout for WrestleMania 38.\n\nChampionships and accomplishments \n Wrestling Observer Newsletter\n Worst Feud of the Year (2015) Team PCB vs. Team B.A.D. vs. Team Bella\n NXT\n NXT Women's Championship (1 time) – Sasha Banks\n NXT Year-End Award (1 time)\n Match of the Year (2015) – Sasha Banks\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n \n \n \n\nWWE teams and stables\nWomen's wrestling teams and stables\nAnoa'i family"
] |
[
"Jerry Garcia",
"Death"
] | C_a95583dc963548a79d885ace2c196575_0 | When was he found | 1 | When was Jerry Garcia found dead? | Jerry Garcia | On August 9, 1995, at 4:23 am, eight days after his 53rd birthday, Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes--all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb; I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred Garcia's former wives from the ceremony. On August 13, approximately 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn. On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons, accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges River at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes. CANNOTANSWER | August 9, 1995, | Jerome John Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known for being a principal songwriter, the lead guitarist and a vocalist with the rock band the Grateful Dead, of which he was a founding member and which came to prominence during the counterculture of the 1960s. Although he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader of the band.
As one of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead for their entire 30-year career (1965–1995). Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), the Jerry Garcia Band, Old & In the Way, the Garcia/Grisman and Garcia/Kahn acoustic duos, Legion of Mary, and New Riders of the Purple Sage (which he co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known for his distinctive guitar playing, and was ranked 13th in Rolling Stones "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" cover story in 2003. In the 2015 version of the list he was ranked at #46.
Garcia was also renowned for his musical and technical ability, particularly his ability to play a variety of instruments and sustain long improvisations with the Grateful Dead. Garcia believed that improvisation took stress away from his playing and allowed him to make spur of the moment decisions that he would not have made intentionally. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Garcia noted that "my own preferences are for improvisation, for making it up as I go along. The idea of picking, of eliminating possibilities by deciding, that's difficult for me". Originating from the days of the "acid tests", these improvisations were a form of exploration rather than playing a song already written.
Later in life, Garcia struggled with diabetes and in 1986, went into a diabetic coma that nearly cost him his life. Although his overall health improved somewhat after that, he continued to struggle with obesity, smoking, and longstanding heroin and cocaine addictions. He was staying in a California drug rehabilitation facility when he died of a heart attack on August 9, 1995, at the age of 53.
Early life
Garcia's ancestors on his father's side were from Galicia in northwest Spain. His mother's ancestors were Irish and Swedish. He was born in the Excelsior District of San Francisco, California, on August 1, 1942, to Jose Ramon "Joe" Garcia and Ruth Marie "Bobbie" (née Clifford) Garcia, who was herself born in San Francisco. His parents named him after composer Jerome Kern. Jerome John was their second child, preceded by Clifford Ramon "Tiff", who was born in 1937. Shortly before Clifford's birth, their father and a partner leased a building in downtown San Francisco and turned it into a bar, partly in response to Jose being blackballed from a musicians' union for moonlighting.
Garcia was influenced by music at an early age, taking piano lessons for much of his childhood. His father was a retired professional musician and his mother enjoyed playing the piano. His father's extended family—which had immigrated from Spain in 1919—would often sing during reunions.
In 1946, two-thirds of four-year-old Garcia's right middle finger was cut off by his brother in a wood splitting accident, while the family was vacationing in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Garcia later confessed that he often used it to his advantage in his youth, showing it off to other children in his neighborhood.
Less than a year after this incident his father died in a fly fishing accident when the family was vacationing near Arcata in Northern California. He slipped after entering the Trinity River, part of the Six Rivers National Forest, and drowned before other fishermen could reach him. Although Garcia claimed he saw the incident, Dennis McNally, author of the book A Long Strange Trip: The Inside Story of the Grateful Dead, argues Garcia formed the memory after hearing others repeat the story. Blair Jackson, who wrote Garcia: An American Life, notes that a local newspaper article describing Jose's death did not mention Jerry being present when he died.
Excelsior District
Following his father's death, Garcia's mother Ruth took over her husband's bar, buying out his partner for full ownership. She began working full-time there, sending Jerry and his brother to live nearby with her parents, Tillie and William Clifford. During the five-year period in which he lived with his grandparents, Garcia enjoyed a large amount of autonomy and attended Monroe Elementary School. At the school, Garcia was greatly encouraged in his artistic abilities by his third grade teacher: through her, he discovered that "being a creative person was a viable possibility in life." According to Garcia, it was around this time that he was opened up to country and bluegrass music by his grandmother, whom he recalled enjoyed listening to the Grand Ole Opry. His elder brother, Clifford, however, staunchly believed the contrary, insisting that Garcia was "fantasizing all [that] ... she'd been to Opry, but she didn't listen to it on the radio." It was at this point that Garcia started playing the banjo, his first stringed instrument.
Menlo Park
In 1953, Garcia's mother married Wally Matusiewicz. Subsequently, Garcia and his brother moved back home with their mother and new stepfather. However, due to the roughneck reputation of their neighborhood at the time, Garcia's mother moved their family to Menlo Park. During their stay in Menlo Park, Garcia became acquainted with racism and antisemitism, things he disliked intensely. The same year, Garcia was also introduced to rock and roll and rhythm and blues by his brother, and enjoyed listening to Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, B. B. King, Hank Ballard, and, later, Chuck Berry. Clifford often memorized the vocals for his favorite songs, and would then make Garcia learn the harmony parts, a move to which Garcia later attributed much of his early ear training.
In mid-1957, Garcia began smoking cigarettes and was introduced to marijuana. Garcia would later reminisce about the first time he smoked marijuana: "Me and a friend of mine went up into the hills with two joints, the San Francisco foothills, and smoked these joints and just got so high and laughed and roared and went skipping down the streets doing funny things and just having a helluva time". During this time, Garcia also studied at what is now the San Francisco Art Institute. The teacher there was Wally Hedrick, an artist who came to prominence during the 1960s. During the classes, he often encouraged Garcia in his drawing and painting skills. Hedrick also introduced Garcia to the fiction of Jack Kerouac, whom Garcia later cited as a major influence.
San Francisco
In June, Garcia graduated from the local Menlo Oaks school. He then moved with his family back to San Francisco, where they lived in an apartment above the family bar, a newly built replacement for the original, that had been torn down to make way for a freeway entrance. Two months later, on Garcia's fifteenth birthday, his mother bought an accordion for him, to his great disappointment. Garcia had long been captivated by many rhythm and blues artists, especially Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, leaving him craving an electric guitar. After some pleading, his mother exchanged the accordion for a Danelectro with a small amplifier at a local pawnshop. Garcia's stepfather, who was somewhat proficient with instruments, helped tune his guitar to an unusual open tuning.
Cazadero
After a short stint at Denman Junior High School, Garcia attended tenth grade at Balboa High School in 1958, where he often got into trouble for skipping classes and fighting. Consequently, in 1959, Garcia's mother again moved the family to a safer environment, to Cazadero, a small town in Sonoma County, north of San Francisco. This turn of events did not sit well with Garcia, who had to travel by bus to Analy High School in Sebastopol, the nearest school. Garcia did, however, join a band at his school known as the Chords. After performing in and winning a contest, the band's reward was recording a song. They chose "Raunchy" by Bill Justis.
Recording career
Relocation and band beginnings
Garcia stole his mother's car in 1960, and was given the option of joining the United States Army in lieu of prison. He received basic training at Fort Ord. After training, he was transferred to Fort Winfield Scott in the Presidio of San Francisco. Garcia spent most of his time in the army at his leisure, missing roll call and accruing many counts of being AWOL. As a result, Garcia was given a general discharge on December 14, 1960.
In January 1961, Garcia drove down to East Palo Alto to see Laird Grant, an old friend from middle school. He had bought a 1950 Cadillac sedan from a cook in the army, which barely made it to Grant's residence before it broke down. Garcia spent the next few weeks sleeping where friends would allow, eventually using his car as a home. Through Grant, Garcia met Dave McQueen in February, who, after hearing Garcia perform some blues music, introduced him to local people and to the Chateau, a rooming house located near Stanford University which was then a popular hangout.
On February 20, 1961, Garcia got into a car with Paul Speegle, a sixteen-year-old artist and acquaintance of Garcia; Lee Adams, the house manager of the Chateau and driver of the car; and Alan Trist, a companion of theirs. After speeding past the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital, the driver encountered a curve and, speeding around , crashed into the guard rail, sending the car rolling turbulently. Garcia was hurled through the windshield of the car into a nearby field with such force he was literally thrown out of his shoes and would later be unable to recall the ejection. Lee Adams, the driver, and Alan Trist, who was seated in the back, were thrown from the car as well, suffering from abdominal injuries and a spine fracture, respectively. Garcia escaped with a broken collarbone, while Speegle, still in the car, was fatally injured.
Lee's reckless driving and crash served as an awakening for Garcia, who later commented: "That's where my life began. Before then I was always living at less than capacity. I was idling. That was the slingshot for the rest of my life. It was like a second chance. Then I got serious". It was at this time that Garcia began to realize that he needed to begin playing the guitar in earnest—a move which meant giving up his love of drawing and painting.
In April 1961, Garcia first met Robert Hunter, who would become a long-time friend of and lyricist for the Grateful Dead, collaborating principally with Garcia. The two involved themselves in the South Bay and San Francisco art and music scenes, sometimes playing at Menlo Park's Kepler's Books. Garcia performed his first concert with Hunter, each earning five dollars. Garcia and Hunter also played in bands (the Wildwood Boys and the Hart Valley Drifters) with David Nelson, who would later play with Garcia in the New Riders of the Purple Sage and contribute to several Grateful Dead album songs.
In 1962, Garcia met Phil Lesh, the eventual bassist of the Grateful Dead, during a party in Menlo Park's bohemian Perry Lane neighborhood (where author Ken Kesey lived). Lesh would later write in his autobiography that Garcia reminded him of pictures he had seen of the composer Claude Debussy, with his "dark, curly hair, goatee, Impressionist eyes". While attending another party in Palo Alto, Lesh approached Garcia to suggest they record Garcia on Lesh's tape recorder and produce a radio show for the progressive, community-supported Berkeley radio station KPFA. Using an old Wollensak tape recorder, they recorded "Matty Groves" and "The Long Black Veil", among several other tunes. The recordings became a central feature of a 90-minute KPFA special broadcast, "The Long Black Veil and Other Ballads: An Evening with Jerry Garcia". The link between KPFA and the Grateful Dead continues to this day, having included many fundraisers, interviews, live concert broadcasts, taped band performances and all-day or all-weekend "Dead-only" marathons.
Garcia soon began playing and teaching acoustic guitar and banjo. One of Garcia's students was Bob Matthews, who later engineered many of the Grateful Dead's albums. Matthews attended Menlo-Atherton High School and was friends with Bob Weir, and on New Year's Eve 1963, he introduced Weir and Garcia.
Between 1962 and 1964, Garcia sang and performed mainly bluegrass, old-time, and folk music. One of the bands Garcia performed with was the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers, a bluegrass act. The group consisted of Garcia on guitar, banjo, vocals, and harmonica, Marshall Leicester on banjo, guitar, and vocals, and Dick Arnold on fiddle and vocals. Soon after this, Garcia, Weir, Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, and several of their friends formed a jug band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions. Around this time, the psychedelic drug LSD was gaining popularity. Garcia first began using LSD in 1964; later, when asked how it changed his life, he remarked: "Well, it changed everything [...] the effect was that it freed me because I suddenly realized that my little attempt at having a straight life and doing that was really a fiction and just wasn't going to work out. Luckily I wasn't far enough into it for it to be shattering or anything; it was like a realization that just made me feel immensely relieved."
In 1965, Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions evolved into the Warlocks, with the addition of Phil Lesh on bass guitar and Bill Kreutzmann on percussion. However, the band discovered that another group (which would later become the Velvet Underground) had recently selected the same name. In response, Garcia came up with "Grateful Dead" by opening a Funk & Wagnalls dictionary to an entry for "Grateful dead". The definition for "Grateful dead" was "a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". The band's first reaction was disapproval. Garcia later explained the group's reaction: "I didn't like it really, I just found it to be really powerful. [Bob] Weir didn't like it, [Bill] Kreutzmann didn't like it and nobody really wanted to hear about it." Despite their dislike of the name, it quickly spread by word of mouth, and soon became their official title.
Career with the Grateful Dead
Garcia served as lead guitarist, as well as one of the principal vocalists and songwriters of the Grateful Dead for its entire career. Garcia composed such songs as "Dark Star", "Franklin's Tower", and "Scarlet Begonias", among many others. Robert Hunter, an ardent collaborator with the band, wrote the lyrics to all but a few of Garcia's songs.
Garcia was well-noted for his "soulful extended guitar improvisations", which would frequently feature interplay between him and his fellow band members. His fame, as well as the band's, arguably rested on their ability to never play a song the same way twice. Often, Garcia would take cues from rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, remarking that "there are some [...] kinds of ideas that would really throw me if I had to create a harmonic bridge between all the things going on rhythmically with two drums and Phil [Lesh's] innovative bass playing. Weir's ability to solve that sort of problem is extraordinary. [...] Harmonically, I take a lot of my solo cues from Bob."
When asked to describe his approach to soloing, Garcia commented: "It keeps on changing. I still basically revolve around the melody and the way it's broken up into phrases as I perceive them. With most solos, I tend to play something that phrases the way the melody does; my phrases may be more dense or have different value, but they'll occur in the same places in the song. [...]"
Garcia and the band toured almost constantly from their formation in 1965 until Garcia's death in 1995. Periodically, there were breaks due to exhaustion or health problems, often due to Garcia's drug use. During their three-decade span, the Grateful Dead played 2,314 shows.
Garcia's guitar-playing was eclectic. He melded elements from the various kinds of music that influenced him. Echoes of bluegrass playing (such as Arthur Smith and Doc Watson) could be heard. There was also early rock (like Lonnie Mack, James Burton, and Chuck Berry), contemporary blues (Freddie King and Lowell Fulsom), country and western (Roy Nichols and Don Rich), and jazz (Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt) to be heard in Garcia's style. Don Rich was the sparkling country guitar player in Buck Owens's "the Buckaroos" band of the 1960s, but besides Rich's style, both Garcia's pedal steel guitar playing (on Grateful Dead records and others) and his standard electric guitar work, were influenced by another of Owens's Buckaroos of that time, pedal steel player Tom Brumley. And as an improvisational soloist, John Coltrane was one of his greatest personal and musical influences.
Garcia later described his playing style as having "descended from barroom rock and roll, country guitar. Just 'cause that's where all my stuff comes from. It's like that blues instrumental stuff that was happening in the late Fifties and early Sixties, like Freddie King." Garcia's style could vary with the song being played and the instrument he was using, but his playing had a number of so-called "signatures". Among these were lead lines based on rhythmic triplets (examples include the songs "Good Morning Little School Girl", "New Speedway Boogie", "Brokedown Palace", "Deal", "Loser", "Truckin'", "That's It for the Other One", "U.S. Blues", "Sugaree", and "Don't Ease Me In").
Side projects
In addition to the Grateful Dead, Garcia had numerous side projects, the most notable being the Jerry Garcia Band. He was also involved with various acoustic projects such as Old & In the Way and other bluegrass bands, including collaborations with noted bluegrass mandolinist David Grisman. The documentary film Grateful Dawg, co-produced by Gillian Grisman and former NBC producer Pamela Hamilton chronicles the deep, long-term friendship between Garcia and Grisman. When Garcia and Grisman released Not For Kids Only, Hamilton produced their interview and concert for NBC. After several years of producing stories on the Grateful Dead and band members' side projects, Hamilton interviewed Bob Weir for a feature on Garcia's death marking the end of an era.
Other groups of which Garcia was a member at one time or another include the Black Mountain Boys, Legion of Mary, Reconstruction, and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. Garcia was also a fan of jazz artists and improvisation: he played with jazz keyboardists Merl Saunders and Howard Wales for many years in various groups and jam sessions, and he appeared on saxophonist Ornette Coleman's 1988 album, Virgin Beauty. His collaboration with Merl Saunders and Muruga Booker on the world music album Blues From the Rainforest launched the Rainforest Band.
Garcia also spent a lot of time in the recording studio helping out fellow musician friends in session work, often adding guitar, vocals, pedal steel, sometimes banjo and piano and even producing. He played on over 50 studio albums, the styles of which were eclectic and varied, including bluegrass, rock, folk, blues, country, jazz, electronic music, gospel, funk, and reggae. Artists who sought Garcia's help included the likes of Jefferson Airplane (most notably Surrealistic Pillow, Garcia being listed as their "spiritual advisor"). Garcia himself recalled in a mid-1967 interview that he'd played the high lead on "Today," played on "Plastic Fantastic Lover" and "Comin' Back to Me" on that album. Others include Tom Fogerty, David Bromberg, Robert Hunter (Liberty, on Relix Records), Paul Pena, Peter Rowan, Warren Zevon, Country Joe McDonald, Pete Sears, Ken Nordine, Ornette Coleman, Bruce Hornsby, Bob Dylan, It's a Beautiful Day, and many more. In 1995 Garcia played on three tracks for the CD Blue Incantation by guitarist Sanjay Mishra, making it his last studio collaboration.
Throughout the early 1970s, Garcia, Lesh, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, and David Crosby collaborated intermittently with MIT-educated composer and biologist Ned Lagin on several projects in the realm of early ambient music; these include the album Seastones (released by the Ned Lagin on the Round Records subsidiary) and L, an unfinished dance work composed by Ned Lagin. In 1970, Garcia participated in the soundtrack for the film Zabriskie Point.
Garcia also played pedal steel guitar for fellow-San Francisco musicians New Riders of the Purple Sage from their initial dates in 1969 to October 1971, when increased commitments with the Dead forced him to opt out of the group. He appears as a band member on their debut album New Riders of the Purple Sage, and produced Home, Home on the Road, a 1974 live album by the band. He also contributed pedal steel guitar to the enduring hit "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. Garcia also played steel guitar licks on Brewer & Shipley's 1970 album Tarkio. Despite considering himself a novice on the pedal steel, Garcia routinely ranked high in player polls. After a long lapse from playing the pedal steel, he played it once more during several of the Dead's concerts with Bob Dylan in the summer of 1987.
In 1988, Garcia agreed to perform at several major benefits including the "Soviet American Peace Walk" concert at the Band Shell, in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, that drew 25,000 people. He was asked to play by longtime friend and fellow musician, Pete Sears, who played piano with all the bands that day, and also procured all the other musicians. Garcia, Mickey Hart and Steve Parish played the show, then were given a police escort to a Grateful Dead show across the bay later that night. Garcia also played with Nick Gravenites and Pete Sears at a benefit given for Vietnam Veteran and peace activist Brian Willson, who lost both legs below the knee when he attempted to block a train carrying weapons to military dictatorships in El Salvador.
Having previously studied at the San Francisco Art Institute as a teenager, Garcia embarked on a second career in the visual arts in the late 1980s. He created a number of drawings, etchings, and water colors. Garcia's artistic endeavors were represented by the Weir Gallery in Berkeley, California from 1989 to 1996. During this period, Roberta Weir (unrelated to Garcia's bandmate Bob Weir) provided Garcia with new art techniques to use, sponsored his first solo show in 1990, and prepared blank etching plates for him to draw on. These would then be processed and printed by gallery staff and brought back to Garcia for approval and signature, usually with a passing of stacks of paper backstage at a Dead show. His annual shows at the Weir Gallery garnered much attention, leading to further shows in New York and other cities. Garcia was an early adopter of digital art media; his artistic style was as varied as his musical output, and he carried small notebooks for pen and ink sketches wherever he toured. Roberta Weir continues to maintain an archive of the artwork of Jerry Garcia. Perhaps the most widely seen pieces of Jerry Garcia's art are the many editions of men's neckties produced by Stonehenge Ltd. and Mulberry Neckware. Some began as etchings, other designs came from his drawings, paintings, and digital art. Garcia's artwork has since expanded into everything from hotel rooms, wet suits, men's sport shirts, a women's wear line, boxer shorts, hair accessories, cummerbunds, silk scarves and wool rugs.
Personal life
Garcia met his first wife, Sara Ruppenthal, in 1963. She was working at the coffee house in the back of Kepler's Books, where Garcia, Hunter, and Nelson regularly performed. They married on April 23, 1963, and on December 8 of that year their daughter Heather was born.
Carolyn Adams, a Merry Prankster also known as "Mountain Girl" or "M.G.," had a daughter, Sunshine, with Ken Kesey. Mountain Girl married another Prankster, George Walker, but they soon separated. She and Sunshine then moved into 710 Ashbury with Garcia in late 1966 where they would ultimately live together until 1975. In 1994, Sara and Jerry officially divorced after a long separation. Adams gave birth to Garcia's second and third daughters, Annabelle Walker Garcia (February 2, 1970) and Theresa Adams "Trixie" Garcia (September 21, 1974).
In August 1970, Garcia's mother Ruth was involved in a car crash near Twin Peaks in San Francisco. Garcia, who was recording the album American Beauty at the time, often left the sessions to visit his mother with his brother Clifford. She died on September 28, 1970.
In the midst of a March 1973 Grateful Dead engagement at Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, Garcia met Deborah Koons, an aspiring filmmaker from a wealthy Cincinnati, Ohio-based family who would much later marry him and become his widow. After a brief correspondence, he began his relationship with her in mid-1974. This gradually strained his relationship with Adams and culminated in Garcia leaving Adams for Koons in late 1975. The end of his relationship with Koons in 1977 precipitated a brief reconciliation with Adams, including the reestablishment of their household. However, she did not agree with the guitarist's persistent use of narcotics and moved with the children to the Eugene, Oregon area, living near Kesey, in 1978.
Following Adams' departure, Garcia had an affair with Amy Moore. She was a Kentucky-born member of the extended "Grateful Dead family", and the mistress of Texas oil heir Roy Cullen. Their affair lasted circa 1980–1981, and inspired the Garcia-Hunter song "Run for the Roses."
Adams and Garcia were married on December 31, 1981, largely as a result of mutual tax exigencies. Despite the legal codification of their union, she remained in Oregon, while Garcia continued to live near the Grateful Dead's offices in San Rafael, California. Garcia lived with a variety of housemates, including longtime Grateful Dead employee and Jerry Garcia Band manager Rock Scully. Scully, who co-managed the Grateful Dead throughout the mid-to-late 1960s before serving as the band's "advance man" and publicist, was dismissed by the group in 1984 for enabling Garcia's addictions and for allegedly embezzling the Garcia Band's profits. Another housemate was Nora Sage, a Deadhead who became Garcia's housekeeper while studying at the Golden Gate University School of Law. The exact nature of their relationship remains unclear, although it is believed to have been platonic due to Garcia's addictions. She later became his art representative.
While they would briefly reunite following his diabetic coma, Garcia and Adams ultimately divorced in 1994. Phil Lesh has subsequently stated that he rarely saw Adams on any of the band tours. In a 1991 Rolling Stone interview, Garcia stated that "we haven't really lived together since the Seventies".
During the autumn of 1978, Garcia developed a friendship with Shimer College student Manasha Matheson, an artist and music enthusiast. They remained friends over the following nine years before initiating a romantic relationship in Hartford, Connecticut on the Grateful Dead's spring 1987 tour. Jerry and Manasha became parents with the birth of their daughter, Keelin Noel Garcia, on December 20, 1987. On August 17, 1990, Jerry and Manasha married at their San Anselmo, California home in a spiritual ceremony free of legal convention. In 1991, Garcia expressed his delight in finding the time to "actually be a father" to Keelin in contrast to his past relationships with his children. A year later, Garcia dedicated his first art book, Paintings, Drawings and Sketches, "For Manasha, with love, Jerry."
In January 1993, Barbara "Brigid" Meier, a former girlfriend from the early 1960s, reentered Garcia's life for a brief period. Meier claimed, Garcia had considered her to be the "love of his life" and proposed to her during a Hawaiian vacation shortly after their relationship recommenced. Garcia's "love of his life" sentiment was not reserved for one lover, as he expressed the same feelings to several other women in his life. At Garcia's 1995 funeral, Koons declared that she was "the love of his life" while paying her final respects, whereupon Meier and Ruppenthal, who were both in attendance, simultaneously exclaimed, "He said that to me!"
The affair with Meier marked the breakup of Jerry's family life with Manasha and Keelin. Garcia ended the affair with Meier forty-five days later while on tour in Chicago with the Grateful Dead after she confronted him about his drug use.
Shortly thereafter, Garcia renewed his acquaintance with Deborah Koons in the spring of 1993. They married on February 14, 1994, in Sausalito, California. Garcia and Koons were married at the time of his death.
Lifestyle and health
Because of their public profile, Garcia and his collaborators were occasionally singled out in the American government's war on drugs. On October 2, 1967, 710 Ashbury Street in San Francisco (where the Grateful Dead had taken up residence the year before) was raided after a police tip-off. Grateful Dead members Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Ron "Pigpen" McKernan were apprehended on marijuana charges which were later dropped, although Garcia himself was not arrested. The following year, Garcia's picture was used in a defamatory context in a campaign commercial for Richard Nixon.
Most of the band were arrested again in January 1970, after they flew to New Orleans from Hawaii. After returning to their hotel from a performance, the band checked into their rooms, only to be quickly raided by police. Approximately fifteen people were arrested on the spot, including many of the road crew, management, and nearly all of the Grateful Dead except for Garcia, who arrived later, outgoing keyboardist Tom Constanten, who abstained from all drugs as a member of the Church of Scientology, and McKernan, who eschewed illegal drugs in favor of alcohol.
According to Bill Kreutzmann, the band's use of cocaine accelerated throughout the early 1970s. After using heroin in a brothel in 1974 (likely on the band's second European tour), Garcia was introduced to a smokeable form of the drug (initially advertised as refined opium) colloquially known as "Persian" or "Persian Base" during the group's 1975 hiatus. Influenced by the stresses of creating and releasing The Grateful Dead Movie and the acrimonious collapse of the band's independent record labels over the next two years, Garcia became increasingly dependent upon both substances. These factors, combined with the alcohol and drug abuse of several other members of the Grateful Dead, resulted in a turbulent atmosphere. By 1978, the band's chemistry began "cracking and crumbling", resulting in poor group cohesion. As a result, Keith and Donna Jean Godchaux left the band in February 1979.
With the addition of keyboardist/vocalist Brent Mydland that year amid the ongoing coalescence of the Deadhead subculture, the band reached new commercial heights as a touring group on the American arena circuit in the early 1980s, enabling them to forsake studio recording for several years. Nevertheless, this was offset by such factors as the band's atypically large payroll and Garcia's $700-a-day () drug addiction, resulting in the guitarist taking on a frenetic slate of solo touring outside of the Grateful Dead's rigorous schedule, including abbreviated acoustic duo concerts with Jerry Garcia Band bassist John Kahn that were widely rumored to be a funding conduit for their respective addictions.
Though things seemed to be getting better for the band, Garcia's health was declining. By 1983, Garcia's demeanor onstage had appeared to change. Despite still playing the guitar with great passion and intensity, there were times that he would appear disengaged; as such, shows were often inconsistent. Years of heavy tobacco smoking had affected his voice, and he gained considerable weight. By 1984, he would often rest his chin on the microphone during performances. The so-called "endless tour"—the result of years of financial risks, drug use, and poor business decisions—had taken its toll.
Garcia's decade-long heroin addiction culminated in the rest of the band holding an intervention in January 1985. Given the choice between the band or the drugs, Garcia agreed to check into a rehabilitation center in Oakland, California. A few days later in January, before the start of his program in Oakland, Garcia was arrested for drug possession in Golden Gate Park; he subsequently attended a drug diversion program. Throughout 1985, he tapered his drug use on tour and at home with the assistance of Nora Sage; by the spring of 1986, he was completely abstinent.
Precipitated by an unhealthy weight, dehydration, bad eating habits, and a recent relapse on the Grateful Dead's first stadium tour, Garcia collapsed into a diabetic coma in July 1986, waking up five days later. He later spoke about this period of unconsciousness as surreal: "Well, I had some very weird experiences. My main experience was one of furious activity and tremendous struggle in a sort of futuristic, space-ship vehicle with insectoid presences. After I came out of my coma, I had this image of myself as these little hunks of protoplasm that were stuck together kind of like stamps with perforations between them that you could snap off." Garcia's coma had a profound effect on him: it forced him to have to relearn how to play the guitar, as well as other, more basic skills. Within a handful of months, he had recovered, playing with the Jerry Garcia Band and the Grateful Dead again later that year.
After Garcia's recovery, the band released a comeback album In the Dark in 1987, which became their best-selling studio album. Inspired by Garcia's improved health, a successful album and the continuing emergence of Mydland as a third frontman, the band's energy and chemistry reached a new peak in the late 1980s.
Amid a litany of personal problems, Mydland died of a speedball overdose in July 1990. His death greatly affected Garcia, leading him to believe that the band's chemistry would never be the same. Before beginning the fall tour, the band acquired keyboardists Vince Welnick and Bruce Hornsby. The power of Hornsby's performances drove Garcia to new heights on stage. However, as the band continued through 1991, Garcia became concerned with the band's future. He was exhausted from five straight years of touring. He thought a break was necessary, mainly so that the band could come back with fresh material. The idea was put off by the pressures of management, and the touring continued. Garcia began using heroin again after several years of intermittent prescription opiate use. Though his relapse was brief, the band was quick to react. Soon after the last show of the tour in Denver, Garcia was confronted by the band with another intervention. After a disastrous meeting, Garcia invited Phil Lesh over to his home in San Rafael, California, where he explained that after the meeting he would start attending a methadone clinic. Garcia said that he wanted to clean up in his own way, and return to making music.
After returning from the band's 1992 summer tour, Garcia became sick, a throwback to his diabetic coma in 1986. Manasha Garcia nursed Jerry back to health and organized a team of health professionals which included acupuncturist Yen Wei Choong and Randy Baker, MD, a holistic family physician to treat him at home. Garcia recovered over the following days, despite the Grateful Dead having to cancel their fall tour to allow him time to recuperate. Garcia reduced his cigarette smoking and began losing weight. He also became a vegetarian.
Despite these improvements, Garcia's physical and mental condition continued to decline throughout 1993 and 1994. He began to use narcotics again to dull the pain.
In light of his second drug relapse and current condition, Garcia checked himself into the Betty Ford Center during July 1995. His stay was limited, lasting only two weeks. Motivated by the experience, he then checked into the Serenity Knolls treatment center in Forest Knolls, California, where he died.
Death
Garcia died in his room at the rehabilitation clinic on August 9, 1995. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes—all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that, upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb. I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former pro basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred two of Garcia's former wives from the ceremony.
On August 13, about 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Haight-Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn.
On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes.
Musical equipment
Garcia played many guitars during his career, which ranged from student and budget models to custom-made instruments. During his thirty-five year career as a professional musician, Garcia used about 25 guitars.
In 1965, when Garcia was playing with the Warlocks, he used a Guild Starfire, which he also used on the début album of the Grateful Dead. Beginning in late 1967 and ending in 1968, Garcia played black or gold mid-1950s Gibson Les Paul guitars with P-90 pickups. In 1969, he picked up the Gibson SG and used it for most of that year and 1970, except for a small period in between where he used a sunburst Fender Stratocaster.
During Garcia's "pedal steel flirtation period" (as Bob Weir referred to it in Anthem to Beauty), from approximately 1969 to 1972, he initially played a Fender instrument before upgrading to the ZB Custom D-10, especially in his earlier public performances. Although this was a double neck guitar, Garcia used the "E9 neck and the three pedals to raise the tone and two levers to lower it." He employed an Emmons D-10 at the Grateful Dead's and New Riders of the Purple Sage's final appearances at the Fillmore East in April 1971.
In 1969, Garcia played pedal steel on three notable outside recordings: the track "The Farm" on the Jefferson Airplane album Volunteers, the track "Oh Mommy" by Brewer and Shipley and the hit single "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young from their album Déjà Vu, released in 1970. Garcia played on the latter album in exchange for harmony lessons for the Grateful Dead, who were at the time recording Workingman's Dead.
In 1971, Garcia began playing a sunburst Les Paul. In March and April 1971 – the time period during which the Grateful Dead recorded its second live album, Grateful Dead – Garcia played the "Peanut," a guitar he had received from Rick Turner, who had custom built the guitar's body and incorporated the neck, pickups, and hardware from an early '60s Les Paul.
In May, Garcia began using a 1957 natural finish Stratocaster that had been given to him by Graham Nash. Garcia added an alligator sticker to the pickguard in the fall of that year. "Alligator" would remain Garcia's principal electric guitar until August 1973.
In the summer of 1971, Garcia also played a double-cutaway Les Paul TV Junior.
While Alligator was in the shop in the summer of 1972, he briefly reverted to the sunburst Stratocaster; this can be seen in Sunshine Daydream.
In late 1972, Garcia purchased the first guitar ("Eagle") made by Alembic luthier Doug Irwin for $850 (). Enamored of Irwin's talents, he immediately commissioned his own custom instrument. This guitar, nicknamed "Wolf" for a memorable sticker Garcia added below the tailpiece, was delivered in May 1973 and replaced Alligator on stage in September. It cost $1,500 (), an extremely high price for the era.
Wolf was made with an ebony fingerboard and featured numerous embellishments like alternating grain designs in the headstock, ivory inlays, and fret marker dots made of sterling silver. The body was composed of western maple wood which had a core of purpleheart. Garcia later had Irwin (who ultimately left Alembic to start his own business) replace the electronics inside the guitar, at which point he added his own logo to the headstock alongside the Alembic logo. The system included two interchangeable plates for configuring pickups: one was made for strictly single coils, while the other accommodated humbuckers. Shortly after receiving the modified instrument, Garcia commissioned another custom guitar from Irwin with one caveat: "Don't hold back."
During the Grateful Dead's 1974 European tour, Wolf was dropped on several occasions, one of which caused a minor crack in the headstock. Following filming of The Grateful Dead Movie (in which the guitar is prominently visible) a month later, Garcia returned it to Irwin for repairs. Throughout its absence, Garcia predominantly played several Travis Bean guitars, including the TB1000A (1975) and the TB500 (1976-1977). On September 28, 1977, Irwin delivered the refurbished Wolf back to Garcia. The wolf sticker which gave the guitar its name had now been inlaid into the instrument; it also featured an effects loop between the pick-ups and controls (so inline effects would "see" the same signal at all times) which was bypassable. Irwin also put a new face on the headstock with only his logo (he later claimed to have built the guitar himself, though pictures through time clearly show the progression of logos, from Alembic, to Alembic & Irwin, to only Irwin).
Nearly seven years after he commissioned it, Garcia received his second custom guitar ("Tiger") from Irwin in the summer of 1979.
He first employed the instrument in concert at a Grateful Dead performance at the Oakland Auditorium Arena on August 4, 1979. Its name was derived from the inlay on the preamp cover.
The body of Tiger was of rich quality: the top layer was cocobolo, with the preceding layers being maple stripe, vermilion, and flame maple, in that order. The neck was made of western maple with an ebony fingerboard. The pickups consisted of a single coil DiMarzio SDS-1 and two humbucker DiMarzio Super IIs which were easily removable due to Garcia's preference for replacing his pickups every year or two. The electronics were composed of an effects bypass loop, which allowed Garcia to control the sound of his effects through the tone and volume controls on the guitar, and a preamplifier/buffer which rested behind a plate in the back of the guitar. Fully outfitted, Tiger weighed . This was Garcia's principal guitar for the next eleven years, and most played.
In the late 1980s Garcia, Weir and CSN (along with many others) endorsed Alvarez Yairi acoustic guitars. There are many photographs circulating (mostly promotional) of Garcia playing a DY99 Virtuoso Custom with a Modulus Graphite neck. He opted to play with the less decorated model but the promotional photo from the Alvarez Yairi catalog has him holding the "tree of life" model. This hand-built guitar was notable for the collaboration between Japanese luthier Kazuo Yairi and Modulus Graphite of San Rafael. As with most things Garcia, with his passing, the DY99 model is highly valued among collectors.
In 1990, Irwin completed "Rosebud", Garcia's fourth custom guitar. It was similar to his previous guitar Tiger in many respects, but featured different inlays and electronics, tone and volume controls, and weight. Rosebud, unlike Tiger, was configured with three humbuckers; the neck and bridge pickups shared a tone control, while the middle had its own. Atop the guitar was a Roland GK-2 pickup which fed the controller set inside the guitar. The GK2 was used in junction with the Roland GR-50 rack mount synthesizer. The GR-50 synthesizer in turn drove a Korg M1R synthesizer producing the MIDI effects heard during live performances of this period as heard on the Grateful Dead recording Without a Net. Sections of the guitar were hollowed out to bring the weight down to . The inlay, a dancing skeleton holding a rose, covers a plate just below the bridge. The final cost of the instrument was $11,000 ().
In 1993, carpenter-turned-luthier Stephen Cripe tried his hand at making an instrument for Garcia. After researching Tiger through pictures and films, Cripe set out on what would soon become known as "Lightning Bolt", again named for its inlay.
The guitar used Brazilian rosewood for the fingerboard and East Indian rosewood for the body, which, with admitted irony from Cripe, had been taken from a 19th-century bed used by opium smokers. Built purely from guesswork, Lightning Bolt was a hit with Garcia, who began using the guitar exclusively. Soon after, Garcia requested that Cripe build a backup of the guitar. Cripe, who had not measured or photographed the original, was told simply to "wing it."
Cripe later delivered the backup, which was known by the name "Top Hat". Garcia bought it from him for $6,500, making it the first guitar that Cripe had ever sold. However, infatuated with Lightning Bolt, Garcia rarely used the backup.
After Garcia's death, the ownership of Wolf and Tiger came into question. According to Garcia's will, his guitars were bequeathed to Doug Irwin, who had constructed them.
The remaining Grateful Dead members disagreed – they considered his guitars to be property of the band, leading to a lawsuit between the two parties. In 2001, Irwin won the case. However, nearly having been left destitute from a traffic accident in 1998, he decided to place the guitars up for auction in hopes of being able to start another guitar workshop.
On May 8, 2002, Wolf and Tiger, among other memorabilia, were placed for auction at Studio 54 in New York City. Tiger was sold for $957,500, and Wolf for $789,500. Together, the pair sold for $1.74 million, setting a new world record. Wolf went into in the private collection of Daniel Pritzker who kept it in a secure climate controlled room in a private residence at Utica, N.Y. Tiger went to the private collection of Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.
In May 2017, Wolf was again auctioned, but this time for charity. Pritzker decided to sell the guitar and donate all proceeds to the Montgomery, Alabama based Southern Poverty Law Center.
Brian Halligan placed the winning bid totaling $1.9M.
For the majority of 2019 Wolf and Tiger were included in the Play it Loud exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. On June 23, 2019 John Mayer played Wolf with Dead & Co. at Citi Field.
Legacy
Garcia was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Grateful Dead in 1994. He declined to attend the ceremony; the band jokingly brought a cardboard cutout of Garcia out on stage in his absence.
In 1987, Vermont ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's introduced their Cherry Garcia flavor dedicated to him. It was the first ice cream flavor dedicated to a musician.
In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Jerry Garcia 13th in their list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
According to fellow Bay Area guitar player Henry Kaiser, Garcia is "the most recorded guitarist in history. With more than 2,200 Grateful Dead concerts, and 1,000 Jerry Garcia Band concerts captured on tape – as well as numerous studio sessions – there are about 15,000 hours of his guitar work preserved for the ages."
On July 30, 2004, Melvin Seals was the first Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) member to headline an outdoor music and camping festival called "The Grateful Garcia Gathering". Jerry Garcia Band drummer David Kemper joined Melvin Seals and JGB in 2007. Other musicians and friends of Garcia include Donna Jean Godchaux, Mookie Siegel, Pete Sears, G.E. Smith, Chuck Hammer, Barry Sless, Jackie Greene, Brian Lesh, Sanjay Mishra, and Mark Karan.
On July 21, 2005, the San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission passed a resolution to name the amphitheater in McLaren Park "The Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." The amphitheater is located in the Excelsior District, where Garcia grew up. The first show to happen at the Jerry Garcia Amphitheater was Jerry Day 2005 on August 7, 2005. Jerry's brother, Tiff Garcia, was the first person to welcome everybody to the "Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." Jerry Day is an annual celebration of Garcia in his childhood neighborhood. The dedication ceremony (Jerry Day 2) on October 29, 2005, was officiated by mayor Gavin Newsom.
On September 24, 2005, the Comes a Time: A Celebration of the Music & Spirit of Jerry Garcia tribute concert was held at the Hearst Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California. The concert featured Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, Bruce Hornsby, Trey Anastasio, Warren Haynes, Jimmy Herring, Michael Kang, Jay Lane, Jeff Chimenti, Mark Karan, Robin Sylvester, Kenny Brooks, Melvin Seals, Merl Saunders, Marty Holland, Stu Allen, Gloria Jones, and Jackie LaBranch.
Georgia-based composer Lee Johnson released an orchestral tribute to the music of the Grateful Dead, recorded with the Russian National Orchestra, entitled "Dead Symphony: Lee Johnson Symphony No. 6." Johnson was interviewed on NPR on the July 26, 2008 broadcast of Weekend Edition, and gave much credit to the genius and craft of Garcia's songwriting. A live performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Johnson himself, was held Friday, August 1.
In 2010 the Santa Barbara Bowl in California opened Jerry Garcia Glen along the walk up to the venue. There is a statue of Garcia's right hand along the way.
Seattle rock band Soundgarden wrote and recorded the instrumental song "Jerry Garcia's Finger", dedicated to the singer, which was released as a b-side with their single "Pretty Noose".
Numerous music festivals across the United States and Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK hold annual events in memory of Jerry Garcia.
On May 14, 2015, an all-star lineup held a tribute concert for Garcia at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. The event was called "Dear Jerry".
In 2015, Hunter and Garcia were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Hunter accepted the award along with Garcia's daughter, Trixie Garcia, who accepted on behalf of her father.
In 2015, Jerry Garcia's wife, Manasha Garcia and their daughter, Keelin Garcia launched The Jerry Garcia Foundation, a nonprofit charity that supports projects for artistic, environmental, and humanitarian causes. The Foundation's Board members are Bob Weir, Peter Shapiro, Glenn Fischer, Irwin Sternberg, Daniel Shiner, TRI Studios CEO, Christopher McCutcheon and Fender Music Foundation Executive Director,
Lynn Robison. Keelin Garcia said, "It is a tremendous honor to participate in nonprofit work that is in accordance with my father's values."
In 2018, Jerry Garcia family members, Keelin Garcia and Manasha Garcia launched the Jerry Garcia Music Arts independent music label.
On November 18, 2021, it was announced Jonah Hill would portray Garcia in a forthcoming Grateful Dead biopic written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski directed by Martin Scorsese for Apple TV+.
Discography
New Riders of the Purple Sage – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1971
Hooteroll? – Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia – 1971
Garcia – Jerry Garcia – 1972
Live at Keystone – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1973
Compliments – Jerry Garcia – 1974
Old & In the Way – Old & In the Way – 1975
Reflections – Jerry Garcia – 1976
Cats Under the Stars – Jerry Garcia Band – 1978
Run for the Roses – Jerry Garcia – 1982
Vintage NRPS – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1986
Keystone Encores – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1988
Almost Acoustic – Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band – 1988
Jerry Garcia / David Grisman – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1991
Jerry Garcia Band – Jerry Garcia Band – 1991
Not for Kids Only – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1993
Notes
References
Sources
External links
The official homepage of Jerry Garcia
Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jerry Garcia on Fretbase
The Jerry Site
Official Grateful Dead website
Jerry Garcia discography at deaddisc.com
Jerry Garcia autopsy
Jerry Day: A Civic and Cultural Celebration of Jerry Garcia held in San Francisco
FBI Records: The Vault - Jerry Garcia at vault.fbi.gov
Jerry Garcia's Army personnel file at the National Archives
TEAM
Garcia's Guitars & Gear Directory
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"Stathi Katsidis (19 February 1979 – 19 October 2010) was an Australian jockey.\n\nDeath \n\nKatsidis was found dead at his Brisbane home a fortnight before he was due to ride in the Melbourne Cup. A coroner's report showed that the Champion jockey had a cocktail of drugs and alcohol in his system when he was found dead.\n\nReferences\n\n1979 births\n2010 deaths\nAustralian jockeys\nAustralian people of Greek descent"
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[
"Jerry Garcia",
"Death",
"When was he found",
"August 9, 1995,"
] | C_a95583dc963548a79d885ace2c196575_0 | what time | 2 | What time on August 9, 1995 was Jerry Garcia found dead? | Jerry Garcia | On August 9, 1995, at 4:23 am, eight days after his 53rd birthday, Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes--all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb; I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred Garcia's former wives from the ceremony. On August 13, approximately 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn. On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons, accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges River at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes. CANNOTANSWER | 4:23 am, | Jerome John Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known for being a principal songwriter, the lead guitarist and a vocalist with the rock band the Grateful Dead, of which he was a founding member and which came to prominence during the counterculture of the 1960s. Although he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader of the band.
As one of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead for their entire 30-year career (1965–1995). Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), the Jerry Garcia Band, Old & In the Way, the Garcia/Grisman and Garcia/Kahn acoustic duos, Legion of Mary, and New Riders of the Purple Sage (which he co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known for his distinctive guitar playing, and was ranked 13th in Rolling Stones "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" cover story in 2003. In the 2015 version of the list he was ranked at #46.
Garcia was also renowned for his musical and technical ability, particularly his ability to play a variety of instruments and sustain long improvisations with the Grateful Dead. Garcia believed that improvisation took stress away from his playing and allowed him to make spur of the moment decisions that he would not have made intentionally. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Garcia noted that "my own preferences are for improvisation, for making it up as I go along. The idea of picking, of eliminating possibilities by deciding, that's difficult for me". Originating from the days of the "acid tests", these improvisations were a form of exploration rather than playing a song already written.
Later in life, Garcia struggled with diabetes and in 1986, went into a diabetic coma that nearly cost him his life. Although his overall health improved somewhat after that, he continued to struggle with obesity, smoking, and longstanding heroin and cocaine addictions. He was staying in a California drug rehabilitation facility when he died of a heart attack on August 9, 1995, at the age of 53.
Early life
Garcia's ancestors on his father's side were from Galicia in northwest Spain. His mother's ancestors were Irish and Swedish. He was born in the Excelsior District of San Francisco, California, on August 1, 1942, to Jose Ramon "Joe" Garcia and Ruth Marie "Bobbie" (née Clifford) Garcia, who was herself born in San Francisco. His parents named him after composer Jerome Kern. Jerome John was their second child, preceded by Clifford Ramon "Tiff", who was born in 1937. Shortly before Clifford's birth, their father and a partner leased a building in downtown San Francisco and turned it into a bar, partly in response to Jose being blackballed from a musicians' union for moonlighting.
Garcia was influenced by music at an early age, taking piano lessons for much of his childhood. His father was a retired professional musician and his mother enjoyed playing the piano. His father's extended family—which had immigrated from Spain in 1919—would often sing during reunions.
In 1946, two-thirds of four-year-old Garcia's right middle finger was cut off by his brother in a wood splitting accident, while the family was vacationing in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Garcia later confessed that he often used it to his advantage in his youth, showing it off to other children in his neighborhood.
Less than a year after this incident his father died in a fly fishing accident when the family was vacationing near Arcata in Northern California. He slipped after entering the Trinity River, part of the Six Rivers National Forest, and drowned before other fishermen could reach him. Although Garcia claimed he saw the incident, Dennis McNally, author of the book A Long Strange Trip: The Inside Story of the Grateful Dead, argues Garcia formed the memory after hearing others repeat the story. Blair Jackson, who wrote Garcia: An American Life, notes that a local newspaper article describing Jose's death did not mention Jerry being present when he died.
Excelsior District
Following his father's death, Garcia's mother Ruth took over her husband's bar, buying out his partner for full ownership. She began working full-time there, sending Jerry and his brother to live nearby with her parents, Tillie and William Clifford. During the five-year period in which he lived with his grandparents, Garcia enjoyed a large amount of autonomy and attended Monroe Elementary School. At the school, Garcia was greatly encouraged in his artistic abilities by his third grade teacher: through her, he discovered that "being a creative person was a viable possibility in life." According to Garcia, it was around this time that he was opened up to country and bluegrass music by his grandmother, whom he recalled enjoyed listening to the Grand Ole Opry. His elder brother, Clifford, however, staunchly believed the contrary, insisting that Garcia was "fantasizing all [that] ... she'd been to Opry, but she didn't listen to it on the radio." It was at this point that Garcia started playing the banjo, his first stringed instrument.
Menlo Park
In 1953, Garcia's mother married Wally Matusiewicz. Subsequently, Garcia and his brother moved back home with their mother and new stepfather. However, due to the roughneck reputation of their neighborhood at the time, Garcia's mother moved their family to Menlo Park. During their stay in Menlo Park, Garcia became acquainted with racism and antisemitism, things he disliked intensely. The same year, Garcia was also introduced to rock and roll and rhythm and blues by his brother, and enjoyed listening to Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, B. B. King, Hank Ballard, and, later, Chuck Berry. Clifford often memorized the vocals for his favorite songs, and would then make Garcia learn the harmony parts, a move to which Garcia later attributed much of his early ear training.
In mid-1957, Garcia began smoking cigarettes and was introduced to marijuana. Garcia would later reminisce about the first time he smoked marijuana: "Me and a friend of mine went up into the hills with two joints, the San Francisco foothills, and smoked these joints and just got so high and laughed and roared and went skipping down the streets doing funny things and just having a helluva time". During this time, Garcia also studied at what is now the San Francisco Art Institute. The teacher there was Wally Hedrick, an artist who came to prominence during the 1960s. During the classes, he often encouraged Garcia in his drawing and painting skills. Hedrick also introduced Garcia to the fiction of Jack Kerouac, whom Garcia later cited as a major influence.
San Francisco
In June, Garcia graduated from the local Menlo Oaks school. He then moved with his family back to San Francisco, where they lived in an apartment above the family bar, a newly built replacement for the original, that had been torn down to make way for a freeway entrance. Two months later, on Garcia's fifteenth birthday, his mother bought an accordion for him, to his great disappointment. Garcia had long been captivated by many rhythm and blues artists, especially Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, leaving him craving an electric guitar. After some pleading, his mother exchanged the accordion for a Danelectro with a small amplifier at a local pawnshop. Garcia's stepfather, who was somewhat proficient with instruments, helped tune his guitar to an unusual open tuning.
Cazadero
After a short stint at Denman Junior High School, Garcia attended tenth grade at Balboa High School in 1958, where he often got into trouble for skipping classes and fighting. Consequently, in 1959, Garcia's mother again moved the family to a safer environment, to Cazadero, a small town in Sonoma County, north of San Francisco. This turn of events did not sit well with Garcia, who had to travel by bus to Analy High School in Sebastopol, the nearest school. Garcia did, however, join a band at his school known as the Chords. After performing in and winning a contest, the band's reward was recording a song. They chose "Raunchy" by Bill Justis.
Recording career
Relocation and band beginnings
Garcia stole his mother's car in 1960, and was given the option of joining the United States Army in lieu of prison. He received basic training at Fort Ord. After training, he was transferred to Fort Winfield Scott in the Presidio of San Francisco. Garcia spent most of his time in the army at his leisure, missing roll call and accruing many counts of being AWOL. As a result, Garcia was given a general discharge on December 14, 1960.
In January 1961, Garcia drove down to East Palo Alto to see Laird Grant, an old friend from middle school. He had bought a 1950 Cadillac sedan from a cook in the army, which barely made it to Grant's residence before it broke down. Garcia spent the next few weeks sleeping where friends would allow, eventually using his car as a home. Through Grant, Garcia met Dave McQueen in February, who, after hearing Garcia perform some blues music, introduced him to local people and to the Chateau, a rooming house located near Stanford University which was then a popular hangout.
On February 20, 1961, Garcia got into a car with Paul Speegle, a sixteen-year-old artist and acquaintance of Garcia; Lee Adams, the house manager of the Chateau and driver of the car; and Alan Trist, a companion of theirs. After speeding past the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital, the driver encountered a curve and, speeding around , crashed into the guard rail, sending the car rolling turbulently. Garcia was hurled through the windshield of the car into a nearby field with such force he was literally thrown out of his shoes and would later be unable to recall the ejection. Lee Adams, the driver, and Alan Trist, who was seated in the back, were thrown from the car as well, suffering from abdominal injuries and a spine fracture, respectively. Garcia escaped with a broken collarbone, while Speegle, still in the car, was fatally injured.
Lee's reckless driving and crash served as an awakening for Garcia, who later commented: "That's where my life began. Before then I was always living at less than capacity. I was idling. That was the slingshot for the rest of my life. It was like a second chance. Then I got serious". It was at this time that Garcia began to realize that he needed to begin playing the guitar in earnest—a move which meant giving up his love of drawing and painting.
In April 1961, Garcia first met Robert Hunter, who would become a long-time friend of and lyricist for the Grateful Dead, collaborating principally with Garcia. The two involved themselves in the South Bay and San Francisco art and music scenes, sometimes playing at Menlo Park's Kepler's Books. Garcia performed his first concert with Hunter, each earning five dollars. Garcia and Hunter also played in bands (the Wildwood Boys and the Hart Valley Drifters) with David Nelson, who would later play with Garcia in the New Riders of the Purple Sage and contribute to several Grateful Dead album songs.
In 1962, Garcia met Phil Lesh, the eventual bassist of the Grateful Dead, during a party in Menlo Park's bohemian Perry Lane neighborhood (where author Ken Kesey lived). Lesh would later write in his autobiography that Garcia reminded him of pictures he had seen of the composer Claude Debussy, with his "dark, curly hair, goatee, Impressionist eyes". While attending another party in Palo Alto, Lesh approached Garcia to suggest they record Garcia on Lesh's tape recorder and produce a radio show for the progressive, community-supported Berkeley radio station KPFA. Using an old Wollensak tape recorder, they recorded "Matty Groves" and "The Long Black Veil", among several other tunes. The recordings became a central feature of a 90-minute KPFA special broadcast, "The Long Black Veil and Other Ballads: An Evening with Jerry Garcia". The link between KPFA and the Grateful Dead continues to this day, having included many fundraisers, interviews, live concert broadcasts, taped band performances and all-day or all-weekend "Dead-only" marathons.
Garcia soon began playing and teaching acoustic guitar and banjo. One of Garcia's students was Bob Matthews, who later engineered many of the Grateful Dead's albums. Matthews attended Menlo-Atherton High School and was friends with Bob Weir, and on New Year's Eve 1963, he introduced Weir and Garcia.
Between 1962 and 1964, Garcia sang and performed mainly bluegrass, old-time, and folk music. One of the bands Garcia performed with was the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers, a bluegrass act. The group consisted of Garcia on guitar, banjo, vocals, and harmonica, Marshall Leicester on banjo, guitar, and vocals, and Dick Arnold on fiddle and vocals. Soon after this, Garcia, Weir, Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, and several of their friends formed a jug band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions. Around this time, the psychedelic drug LSD was gaining popularity. Garcia first began using LSD in 1964; later, when asked how it changed his life, he remarked: "Well, it changed everything [...] the effect was that it freed me because I suddenly realized that my little attempt at having a straight life and doing that was really a fiction and just wasn't going to work out. Luckily I wasn't far enough into it for it to be shattering or anything; it was like a realization that just made me feel immensely relieved."
In 1965, Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions evolved into the Warlocks, with the addition of Phil Lesh on bass guitar and Bill Kreutzmann on percussion. However, the band discovered that another group (which would later become the Velvet Underground) had recently selected the same name. In response, Garcia came up with "Grateful Dead" by opening a Funk & Wagnalls dictionary to an entry for "Grateful dead". The definition for "Grateful dead" was "a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". The band's first reaction was disapproval. Garcia later explained the group's reaction: "I didn't like it really, I just found it to be really powerful. [Bob] Weir didn't like it, [Bill] Kreutzmann didn't like it and nobody really wanted to hear about it." Despite their dislike of the name, it quickly spread by word of mouth, and soon became their official title.
Career with the Grateful Dead
Garcia served as lead guitarist, as well as one of the principal vocalists and songwriters of the Grateful Dead for its entire career. Garcia composed such songs as "Dark Star", "Franklin's Tower", and "Scarlet Begonias", among many others. Robert Hunter, an ardent collaborator with the band, wrote the lyrics to all but a few of Garcia's songs.
Garcia was well-noted for his "soulful extended guitar improvisations", which would frequently feature interplay between him and his fellow band members. His fame, as well as the band's, arguably rested on their ability to never play a song the same way twice. Often, Garcia would take cues from rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, remarking that "there are some [...] kinds of ideas that would really throw me if I had to create a harmonic bridge between all the things going on rhythmically with two drums and Phil [Lesh's] innovative bass playing. Weir's ability to solve that sort of problem is extraordinary. [...] Harmonically, I take a lot of my solo cues from Bob."
When asked to describe his approach to soloing, Garcia commented: "It keeps on changing. I still basically revolve around the melody and the way it's broken up into phrases as I perceive them. With most solos, I tend to play something that phrases the way the melody does; my phrases may be more dense or have different value, but they'll occur in the same places in the song. [...]"
Garcia and the band toured almost constantly from their formation in 1965 until Garcia's death in 1995. Periodically, there were breaks due to exhaustion or health problems, often due to Garcia's drug use. During their three-decade span, the Grateful Dead played 2,314 shows.
Garcia's guitar-playing was eclectic. He melded elements from the various kinds of music that influenced him. Echoes of bluegrass playing (such as Arthur Smith and Doc Watson) could be heard. There was also early rock (like Lonnie Mack, James Burton, and Chuck Berry), contemporary blues (Freddie King and Lowell Fulsom), country and western (Roy Nichols and Don Rich), and jazz (Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt) to be heard in Garcia's style. Don Rich was the sparkling country guitar player in Buck Owens's "the Buckaroos" band of the 1960s, but besides Rich's style, both Garcia's pedal steel guitar playing (on Grateful Dead records and others) and his standard electric guitar work, were influenced by another of Owens's Buckaroos of that time, pedal steel player Tom Brumley. And as an improvisational soloist, John Coltrane was one of his greatest personal and musical influences.
Garcia later described his playing style as having "descended from barroom rock and roll, country guitar. Just 'cause that's where all my stuff comes from. It's like that blues instrumental stuff that was happening in the late Fifties and early Sixties, like Freddie King." Garcia's style could vary with the song being played and the instrument he was using, but his playing had a number of so-called "signatures". Among these were lead lines based on rhythmic triplets (examples include the songs "Good Morning Little School Girl", "New Speedway Boogie", "Brokedown Palace", "Deal", "Loser", "Truckin'", "That's It for the Other One", "U.S. Blues", "Sugaree", and "Don't Ease Me In").
Side projects
In addition to the Grateful Dead, Garcia had numerous side projects, the most notable being the Jerry Garcia Band. He was also involved with various acoustic projects such as Old & In the Way and other bluegrass bands, including collaborations with noted bluegrass mandolinist David Grisman. The documentary film Grateful Dawg, co-produced by Gillian Grisman and former NBC producer Pamela Hamilton chronicles the deep, long-term friendship between Garcia and Grisman. When Garcia and Grisman released Not For Kids Only, Hamilton produced their interview and concert for NBC. After several years of producing stories on the Grateful Dead and band members' side projects, Hamilton interviewed Bob Weir for a feature on Garcia's death marking the end of an era.
Other groups of which Garcia was a member at one time or another include the Black Mountain Boys, Legion of Mary, Reconstruction, and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. Garcia was also a fan of jazz artists and improvisation: he played with jazz keyboardists Merl Saunders and Howard Wales for many years in various groups and jam sessions, and he appeared on saxophonist Ornette Coleman's 1988 album, Virgin Beauty. His collaboration with Merl Saunders and Muruga Booker on the world music album Blues From the Rainforest launched the Rainforest Band.
Garcia also spent a lot of time in the recording studio helping out fellow musician friends in session work, often adding guitar, vocals, pedal steel, sometimes banjo and piano and even producing. He played on over 50 studio albums, the styles of which were eclectic and varied, including bluegrass, rock, folk, blues, country, jazz, electronic music, gospel, funk, and reggae. Artists who sought Garcia's help included the likes of Jefferson Airplane (most notably Surrealistic Pillow, Garcia being listed as their "spiritual advisor"). Garcia himself recalled in a mid-1967 interview that he'd played the high lead on "Today," played on "Plastic Fantastic Lover" and "Comin' Back to Me" on that album. Others include Tom Fogerty, David Bromberg, Robert Hunter (Liberty, on Relix Records), Paul Pena, Peter Rowan, Warren Zevon, Country Joe McDonald, Pete Sears, Ken Nordine, Ornette Coleman, Bruce Hornsby, Bob Dylan, It's a Beautiful Day, and many more. In 1995 Garcia played on three tracks for the CD Blue Incantation by guitarist Sanjay Mishra, making it his last studio collaboration.
Throughout the early 1970s, Garcia, Lesh, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, and David Crosby collaborated intermittently with MIT-educated composer and biologist Ned Lagin on several projects in the realm of early ambient music; these include the album Seastones (released by the Ned Lagin on the Round Records subsidiary) and L, an unfinished dance work composed by Ned Lagin. In 1970, Garcia participated in the soundtrack for the film Zabriskie Point.
Garcia also played pedal steel guitar for fellow-San Francisco musicians New Riders of the Purple Sage from their initial dates in 1969 to October 1971, when increased commitments with the Dead forced him to opt out of the group. He appears as a band member on their debut album New Riders of the Purple Sage, and produced Home, Home on the Road, a 1974 live album by the band. He also contributed pedal steel guitar to the enduring hit "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. Garcia also played steel guitar licks on Brewer & Shipley's 1970 album Tarkio. Despite considering himself a novice on the pedal steel, Garcia routinely ranked high in player polls. After a long lapse from playing the pedal steel, he played it once more during several of the Dead's concerts with Bob Dylan in the summer of 1987.
In 1988, Garcia agreed to perform at several major benefits including the "Soviet American Peace Walk" concert at the Band Shell, in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, that drew 25,000 people. He was asked to play by longtime friend and fellow musician, Pete Sears, who played piano with all the bands that day, and also procured all the other musicians. Garcia, Mickey Hart and Steve Parish played the show, then were given a police escort to a Grateful Dead show across the bay later that night. Garcia also played with Nick Gravenites and Pete Sears at a benefit given for Vietnam Veteran and peace activist Brian Willson, who lost both legs below the knee when he attempted to block a train carrying weapons to military dictatorships in El Salvador.
Having previously studied at the San Francisco Art Institute as a teenager, Garcia embarked on a second career in the visual arts in the late 1980s. He created a number of drawings, etchings, and water colors. Garcia's artistic endeavors were represented by the Weir Gallery in Berkeley, California from 1989 to 1996. During this period, Roberta Weir (unrelated to Garcia's bandmate Bob Weir) provided Garcia with new art techniques to use, sponsored his first solo show in 1990, and prepared blank etching plates for him to draw on. These would then be processed and printed by gallery staff and brought back to Garcia for approval and signature, usually with a passing of stacks of paper backstage at a Dead show. His annual shows at the Weir Gallery garnered much attention, leading to further shows in New York and other cities. Garcia was an early adopter of digital art media; his artistic style was as varied as his musical output, and he carried small notebooks for pen and ink sketches wherever he toured. Roberta Weir continues to maintain an archive of the artwork of Jerry Garcia. Perhaps the most widely seen pieces of Jerry Garcia's art are the many editions of men's neckties produced by Stonehenge Ltd. and Mulberry Neckware. Some began as etchings, other designs came from his drawings, paintings, and digital art. Garcia's artwork has since expanded into everything from hotel rooms, wet suits, men's sport shirts, a women's wear line, boxer shorts, hair accessories, cummerbunds, silk scarves and wool rugs.
Personal life
Garcia met his first wife, Sara Ruppenthal, in 1963. She was working at the coffee house in the back of Kepler's Books, where Garcia, Hunter, and Nelson regularly performed. They married on April 23, 1963, and on December 8 of that year their daughter Heather was born.
Carolyn Adams, a Merry Prankster also known as "Mountain Girl" or "M.G.," had a daughter, Sunshine, with Ken Kesey. Mountain Girl married another Prankster, George Walker, but they soon separated. She and Sunshine then moved into 710 Ashbury with Garcia in late 1966 where they would ultimately live together until 1975. In 1994, Sara and Jerry officially divorced after a long separation. Adams gave birth to Garcia's second and third daughters, Annabelle Walker Garcia (February 2, 1970) and Theresa Adams "Trixie" Garcia (September 21, 1974).
In August 1970, Garcia's mother Ruth was involved in a car crash near Twin Peaks in San Francisco. Garcia, who was recording the album American Beauty at the time, often left the sessions to visit his mother with his brother Clifford. She died on September 28, 1970.
In the midst of a March 1973 Grateful Dead engagement at Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, Garcia met Deborah Koons, an aspiring filmmaker from a wealthy Cincinnati, Ohio-based family who would much later marry him and become his widow. After a brief correspondence, he began his relationship with her in mid-1974. This gradually strained his relationship with Adams and culminated in Garcia leaving Adams for Koons in late 1975. The end of his relationship with Koons in 1977 precipitated a brief reconciliation with Adams, including the reestablishment of their household. However, she did not agree with the guitarist's persistent use of narcotics and moved with the children to the Eugene, Oregon area, living near Kesey, in 1978.
Following Adams' departure, Garcia had an affair with Amy Moore. She was a Kentucky-born member of the extended "Grateful Dead family", and the mistress of Texas oil heir Roy Cullen. Their affair lasted circa 1980–1981, and inspired the Garcia-Hunter song "Run for the Roses."
Adams and Garcia were married on December 31, 1981, largely as a result of mutual tax exigencies. Despite the legal codification of their union, she remained in Oregon, while Garcia continued to live near the Grateful Dead's offices in San Rafael, California. Garcia lived with a variety of housemates, including longtime Grateful Dead employee and Jerry Garcia Band manager Rock Scully. Scully, who co-managed the Grateful Dead throughout the mid-to-late 1960s before serving as the band's "advance man" and publicist, was dismissed by the group in 1984 for enabling Garcia's addictions and for allegedly embezzling the Garcia Band's profits. Another housemate was Nora Sage, a Deadhead who became Garcia's housekeeper while studying at the Golden Gate University School of Law. The exact nature of their relationship remains unclear, although it is believed to have been platonic due to Garcia's addictions. She later became his art representative.
While they would briefly reunite following his diabetic coma, Garcia and Adams ultimately divorced in 1994. Phil Lesh has subsequently stated that he rarely saw Adams on any of the band tours. In a 1991 Rolling Stone interview, Garcia stated that "we haven't really lived together since the Seventies".
During the autumn of 1978, Garcia developed a friendship with Shimer College student Manasha Matheson, an artist and music enthusiast. They remained friends over the following nine years before initiating a romantic relationship in Hartford, Connecticut on the Grateful Dead's spring 1987 tour. Jerry and Manasha became parents with the birth of their daughter, Keelin Noel Garcia, on December 20, 1987. On August 17, 1990, Jerry and Manasha married at their San Anselmo, California home in a spiritual ceremony free of legal convention. In 1991, Garcia expressed his delight in finding the time to "actually be a father" to Keelin in contrast to his past relationships with his children. A year later, Garcia dedicated his first art book, Paintings, Drawings and Sketches, "For Manasha, with love, Jerry."
In January 1993, Barbara "Brigid" Meier, a former girlfriend from the early 1960s, reentered Garcia's life for a brief period. Meier claimed, Garcia had considered her to be the "love of his life" and proposed to her during a Hawaiian vacation shortly after their relationship recommenced. Garcia's "love of his life" sentiment was not reserved for one lover, as he expressed the same feelings to several other women in his life. At Garcia's 1995 funeral, Koons declared that she was "the love of his life" while paying her final respects, whereupon Meier and Ruppenthal, who were both in attendance, simultaneously exclaimed, "He said that to me!"
The affair with Meier marked the breakup of Jerry's family life with Manasha and Keelin. Garcia ended the affair with Meier forty-five days later while on tour in Chicago with the Grateful Dead after she confronted him about his drug use.
Shortly thereafter, Garcia renewed his acquaintance with Deborah Koons in the spring of 1993. They married on February 14, 1994, in Sausalito, California. Garcia and Koons were married at the time of his death.
Lifestyle and health
Because of their public profile, Garcia and his collaborators were occasionally singled out in the American government's war on drugs. On October 2, 1967, 710 Ashbury Street in San Francisco (where the Grateful Dead had taken up residence the year before) was raided after a police tip-off. Grateful Dead members Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Ron "Pigpen" McKernan were apprehended on marijuana charges which were later dropped, although Garcia himself was not arrested. The following year, Garcia's picture was used in a defamatory context in a campaign commercial for Richard Nixon.
Most of the band were arrested again in January 1970, after they flew to New Orleans from Hawaii. After returning to their hotel from a performance, the band checked into their rooms, only to be quickly raided by police. Approximately fifteen people were arrested on the spot, including many of the road crew, management, and nearly all of the Grateful Dead except for Garcia, who arrived later, outgoing keyboardist Tom Constanten, who abstained from all drugs as a member of the Church of Scientology, and McKernan, who eschewed illegal drugs in favor of alcohol.
According to Bill Kreutzmann, the band's use of cocaine accelerated throughout the early 1970s. After using heroin in a brothel in 1974 (likely on the band's second European tour), Garcia was introduced to a smokeable form of the drug (initially advertised as refined opium) colloquially known as "Persian" or "Persian Base" during the group's 1975 hiatus. Influenced by the stresses of creating and releasing The Grateful Dead Movie and the acrimonious collapse of the band's independent record labels over the next two years, Garcia became increasingly dependent upon both substances. These factors, combined with the alcohol and drug abuse of several other members of the Grateful Dead, resulted in a turbulent atmosphere. By 1978, the band's chemistry began "cracking and crumbling", resulting in poor group cohesion. As a result, Keith and Donna Jean Godchaux left the band in February 1979.
With the addition of keyboardist/vocalist Brent Mydland that year amid the ongoing coalescence of the Deadhead subculture, the band reached new commercial heights as a touring group on the American arena circuit in the early 1980s, enabling them to forsake studio recording for several years. Nevertheless, this was offset by such factors as the band's atypically large payroll and Garcia's $700-a-day () drug addiction, resulting in the guitarist taking on a frenetic slate of solo touring outside of the Grateful Dead's rigorous schedule, including abbreviated acoustic duo concerts with Jerry Garcia Band bassist John Kahn that were widely rumored to be a funding conduit for their respective addictions.
Though things seemed to be getting better for the band, Garcia's health was declining. By 1983, Garcia's demeanor onstage had appeared to change. Despite still playing the guitar with great passion and intensity, there were times that he would appear disengaged; as such, shows were often inconsistent. Years of heavy tobacco smoking had affected his voice, and he gained considerable weight. By 1984, he would often rest his chin on the microphone during performances. The so-called "endless tour"—the result of years of financial risks, drug use, and poor business decisions—had taken its toll.
Garcia's decade-long heroin addiction culminated in the rest of the band holding an intervention in January 1985. Given the choice between the band or the drugs, Garcia agreed to check into a rehabilitation center in Oakland, California. A few days later in January, before the start of his program in Oakland, Garcia was arrested for drug possession in Golden Gate Park; he subsequently attended a drug diversion program. Throughout 1985, he tapered his drug use on tour and at home with the assistance of Nora Sage; by the spring of 1986, he was completely abstinent.
Precipitated by an unhealthy weight, dehydration, bad eating habits, and a recent relapse on the Grateful Dead's first stadium tour, Garcia collapsed into a diabetic coma in July 1986, waking up five days later. He later spoke about this period of unconsciousness as surreal: "Well, I had some very weird experiences. My main experience was one of furious activity and tremendous struggle in a sort of futuristic, space-ship vehicle with insectoid presences. After I came out of my coma, I had this image of myself as these little hunks of protoplasm that were stuck together kind of like stamps with perforations between them that you could snap off." Garcia's coma had a profound effect on him: it forced him to have to relearn how to play the guitar, as well as other, more basic skills. Within a handful of months, he had recovered, playing with the Jerry Garcia Band and the Grateful Dead again later that year.
After Garcia's recovery, the band released a comeback album In the Dark in 1987, which became their best-selling studio album. Inspired by Garcia's improved health, a successful album and the continuing emergence of Mydland as a third frontman, the band's energy and chemistry reached a new peak in the late 1980s.
Amid a litany of personal problems, Mydland died of a speedball overdose in July 1990. His death greatly affected Garcia, leading him to believe that the band's chemistry would never be the same. Before beginning the fall tour, the band acquired keyboardists Vince Welnick and Bruce Hornsby. The power of Hornsby's performances drove Garcia to new heights on stage. However, as the band continued through 1991, Garcia became concerned with the band's future. He was exhausted from five straight years of touring. He thought a break was necessary, mainly so that the band could come back with fresh material. The idea was put off by the pressures of management, and the touring continued. Garcia began using heroin again after several years of intermittent prescription opiate use. Though his relapse was brief, the band was quick to react. Soon after the last show of the tour in Denver, Garcia was confronted by the band with another intervention. After a disastrous meeting, Garcia invited Phil Lesh over to his home in San Rafael, California, where he explained that after the meeting he would start attending a methadone clinic. Garcia said that he wanted to clean up in his own way, and return to making music.
After returning from the band's 1992 summer tour, Garcia became sick, a throwback to his diabetic coma in 1986. Manasha Garcia nursed Jerry back to health and organized a team of health professionals which included acupuncturist Yen Wei Choong and Randy Baker, MD, a holistic family physician to treat him at home. Garcia recovered over the following days, despite the Grateful Dead having to cancel their fall tour to allow him time to recuperate. Garcia reduced his cigarette smoking and began losing weight. He also became a vegetarian.
Despite these improvements, Garcia's physical and mental condition continued to decline throughout 1993 and 1994. He began to use narcotics again to dull the pain.
In light of his second drug relapse and current condition, Garcia checked himself into the Betty Ford Center during July 1995. His stay was limited, lasting only two weeks. Motivated by the experience, he then checked into the Serenity Knolls treatment center in Forest Knolls, California, where he died.
Death
Garcia died in his room at the rehabilitation clinic on August 9, 1995. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes—all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that, upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb. I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former pro basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred two of Garcia's former wives from the ceremony.
On August 13, about 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Haight-Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn.
On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes.
Musical equipment
Garcia played many guitars during his career, which ranged from student and budget models to custom-made instruments. During his thirty-five year career as a professional musician, Garcia used about 25 guitars.
In 1965, when Garcia was playing with the Warlocks, he used a Guild Starfire, which he also used on the début album of the Grateful Dead. Beginning in late 1967 and ending in 1968, Garcia played black or gold mid-1950s Gibson Les Paul guitars with P-90 pickups. In 1969, he picked up the Gibson SG and used it for most of that year and 1970, except for a small period in between where he used a sunburst Fender Stratocaster.
During Garcia's "pedal steel flirtation period" (as Bob Weir referred to it in Anthem to Beauty), from approximately 1969 to 1972, he initially played a Fender instrument before upgrading to the ZB Custom D-10, especially in his earlier public performances. Although this was a double neck guitar, Garcia used the "E9 neck and the three pedals to raise the tone and two levers to lower it." He employed an Emmons D-10 at the Grateful Dead's and New Riders of the Purple Sage's final appearances at the Fillmore East in April 1971.
In 1969, Garcia played pedal steel on three notable outside recordings: the track "The Farm" on the Jefferson Airplane album Volunteers, the track "Oh Mommy" by Brewer and Shipley and the hit single "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young from their album Déjà Vu, released in 1970. Garcia played on the latter album in exchange for harmony lessons for the Grateful Dead, who were at the time recording Workingman's Dead.
In 1971, Garcia began playing a sunburst Les Paul. In March and April 1971 – the time period during which the Grateful Dead recorded its second live album, Grateful Dead – Garcia played the "Peanut," a guitar he had received from Rick Turner, who had custom built the guitar's body and incorporated the neck, pickups, and hardware from an early '60s Les Paul.
In May, Garcia began using a 1957 natural finish Stratocaster that had been given to him by Graham Nash. Garcia added an alligator sticker to the pickguard in the fall of that year. "Alligator" would remain Garcia's principal electric guitar until August 1973.
In the summer of 1971, Garcia also played a double-cutaway Les Paul TV Junior.
While Alligator was in the shop in the summer of 1972, he briefly reverted to the sunburst Stratocaster; this can be seen in Sunshine Daydream.
In late 1972, Garcia purchased the first guitar ("Eagle") made by Alembic luthier Doug Irwin for $850 (). Enamored of Irwin's talents, he immediately commissioned his own custom instrument. This guitar, nicknamed "Wolf" for a memorable sticker Garcia added below the tailpiece, was delivered in May 1973 and replaced Alligator on stage in September. It cost $1,500 (), an extremely high price for the era.
Wolf was made with an ebony fingerboard and featured numerous embellishments like alternating grain designs in the headstock, ivory inlays, and fret marker dots made of sterling silver. The body was composed of western maple wood which had a core of purpleheart. Garcia later had Irwin (who ultimately left Alembic to start his own business) replace the electronics inside the guitar, at which point he added his own logo to the headstock alongside the Alembic logo. The system included two interchangeable plates for configuring pickups: one was made for strictly single coils, while the other accommodated humbuckers. Shortly after receiving the modified instrument, Garcia commissioned another custom guitar from Irwin with one caveat: "Don't hold back."
During the Grateful Dead's 1974 European tour, Wolf was dropped on several occasions, one of which caused a minor crack in the headstock. Following filming of The Grateful Dead Movie (in which the guitar is prominently visible) a month later, Garcia returned it to Irwin for repairs. Throughout its absence, Garcia predominantly played several Travis Bean guitars, including the TB1000A (1975) and the TB500 (1976-1977). On September 28, 1977, Irwin delivered the refurbished Wolf back to Garcia. The wolf sticker which gave the guitar its name had now been inlaid into the instrument; it also featured an effects loop between the pick-ups and controls (so inline effects would "see" the same signal at all times) which was bypassable. Irwin also put a new face on the headstock with only his logo (he later claimed to have built the guitar himself, though pictures through time clearly show the progression of logos, from Alembic, to Alembic & Irwin, to only Irwin).
Nearly seven years after he commissioned it, Garcia received his second custom guitar ("Tiger") from Irwin in the summer of 1979.
He first employed the instrument in concert at a Grateful Dead performance at the Oakland Auditorium Arena on August 4, 1979. Its name was derived from the inlay on the preamp cover.
The body of Tiger was of rich quality: the top layer was cocobolo, with the preceding layers being maple stripe, vermilion, and flame maple, in that order. The neck was made of western maple with an ebony fingerboard. The pickups consisted of a single coil DiMarzio SDS-1 and two humbucker DiMarzio Super IIs which were easily removable due to Garcia's preference for replacing his pickups every year or two. The electronics were composed of an effects bypass loop, which allowed Garcia to control the sound of his effects through the tone and volume controls on the guitar, and a preamplifier/buffer which rested behind a plate in the back of the guitar. Fully outfitted, Tiger weighed . This was Garcia's principal guitar for the next eleven years, and most played.
In the late 1980s Garcia, Weir and CSN (along with many others) endorsed Alvarez Yairi acoustic guitars. There are many photographs circulating (mostly promotional) of Garcia playing a DY99 Virtuoso Custom with a Modulus Graphite neck. He opted to play with the less decorated model but the promotional photo from the Alvarez Yairi catalog has him holding the "tree of life" model. This hand-built guitar was notable for the collaboration between Japanese luthier Kazuo Yairi and Modulus Graphite of San Rafael. As with most things Garcia, with his passing, the DY99 model is highly valued among collectors.
In 1990, Irwin completed "Rosebud", Garcia's fourth custom guitar. It was similar to his previous guitar Tiger in many respects, but featured different inlays and electronics, tone and volume controls, and weight. Rosebud, unlike Tiger, was configured with three humbuckers; the neck and bridge pickups shared a tone control, while the middle had its own. Atop the guitar was a Roland GK-2 pickup which fed the controller set inside the guitar. The GK2 was used in junction with the Roland GR-50 rack mount synthesizer. The GR-50 synthesizer in turn drove a Korg M1R synthesizer producing the MIDI effects heard during live performances of this period as heard on the Grateful Dead recording Without a Net. Sections of the guitar were hollowed out to bring the weight down to . The inlay, a dancing skeleton holding a rose, covers a plate just below the bridge. The final cost of the instrument was $11,000 ().
In 1993, carpenter-turned-luthier Stephen Cripe tried his hand at making an instrument for Garcia. After researching Tiger through pictures and films, Cripe set out on what would soon become known as "Lightning Bolt", again named for its inlay.
The guitar used Brazilian rosewood for the fingerboard and East Indian rosewood for the body, which, with admitted irony from Cripe, had been taken from a 19th-century bed used by opium smokers. Built purely from guesswork, Lightning Bolt was a hit with Garcia, who began using the guitar exclusively. Soon after, Garcia requested that Cripe build a backup of the guitar. Cripe, who had not measured or photographed the original, was told simply to "wing it."
Cripe later delivered the backup, which was known by the name "Top Hat". Garcia bought it from him for $6,500, making it the first guitar that Cripe had ever sold. However, infatuated with Lightning Bolt, Garcia rarely used the backup.
After Garcia's death, the ownership of Wolf and Tiger came into question. According to Garcia's will, his guitars were bequeathed to Doug Irwin, who had constructed them.
The remaining Grateful Dead members disagreed – they considered his guitars to be property of the band, leading to a lawsuit between the two parties. In 2001, Irwin won the case. However, nearly having been left destitute from a traffic accident in 1998, he decided to place the guitars up for auction in hopes of being able to start another guitar workshop.
On May 8, 2002, Wolf and Tiger, among other memorabilia, were placed for auction at Studio 54 in New York City. Tiger was sold for $957,500, and Wolf for $789,500. Together, the pair sold for $1.74 million, setting a new world record. Wolf went into in the private collection of Daniel Pritzker who kept it in a secure climate controlled room in a private residence at Utica, N.Y. Tiger went to the private collection of Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.
In May 2017, Wolf was again auctioned, but this time for charity. Pritzker decided to sell the guitar and donate all proceeds to the Montgomery, Alabama based Southern Poverty Law Center.
Brian Halligan placed the winning bid totaling $1.9M.
For the majority of 2019 Wolf and Tiger were included in the Play it Loud exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. On June 23, 2019 John Mayer played Wolf with Dead & Co. at Citi Field.
Legacy
Garcia was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Grateful Dead in 1994. He declined to attend the ceremony; the band jokingly brought a cardboard cutout of Garcia out on stage in his absence.
In 1987, Vermont ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's introduced their Cherry Garcia flavor dedicated to him. It was the first ice cream flavor dedicated to a musician.
In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Jerry Garcia 13th in their list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
According to fellow Bay Area guitar player Henry Kaiser, Garcia is "the most recorded guitarist in history. With more than 2,200 Grateful Dead concerts, and 1,000 Jerry Garcia Band concerts captured on tape – as well as numerous studio sessions – there are about 15,000 hours of his guitar work preserved for the ages."
On July 30, 2004, Melvin Seals was the first Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) member to headline an outdoor music and camping festival called "The Grateful Garcia Gathering". Jerry Garcia Band drummer David Kemper joined Melvin Seals and JGB in 2007. Other musicians and friends of Garcia include Donna Jean Godchaux, Mookie Siegel, Pete Sears, G.E. Smith, Chuck Hammer, Barry Sless, Jackie Greene, Brian Lesh, Sanjay Mishra, and Mark Karan.
On July 21, 2005, the San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission passed a resolution to name the amphitheater in McLaren Park "The Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." The amphitheater is located in the Excelsior District, where Garcia grew up. The first show to happen at the Jerry Garcia Amphitheater was Jerry Day 2005 on August 7, 2005. Jerry's brother, Tiff Garcia, was the first person to welcome everybody to the "Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." Jerry Day is an annual celebration of Garcia in his childhood neighborhood. The dedication ceremony (Jerry Day 2) on October 29, 2005, was officiated by mayor Gavin Newsom.
On September 24, 2005, the Comes a Time: A Celebration of the Music & Spirit of Jerry Garcia tribute concert was held at the Hearst Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California. The concert featured Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, Bruce Hornsby, Trey Anastasio, Warren Haynes, Jimmy Herring, Michael Kang, Jay Lane, Jeff Chimenti, Mark Karan, Robin Sylvester, Kenny Brooks, Melvin Seals, Merl Saunders, Marty Holland, Stu Allen, Gloria Jones, and Jackie LaBranch.
Georgia-based composer Lee Johnson released an orchestral tribute to the music of the Grateful Dead, recorded with the Russian National Orchestra, entitled "Dead Symphony: Lee Johnson Symphony No. 6." Johnson was interviewed on NPR on the July 26, 2008 broadcast of Weekend Edition, and gave much credit to the genius and craft of Garcia's songwriting. A live performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Johnson himself, was held Friday, August 1.
In 2010 the Santa Barbara Bowl in California opened Jerry Garcia Glen along the walk up to the venue. There is a statue of Garcia's right hand along the way.
Seattle rock band Soundgarden wrote and recorded the instrumental song "Jerry Garcia's Finger", dedicated to the singer, which was released as a b-side with their single "Pretty Noose".
Numerous music festivals across the United States and Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK hold annual events in memory of Jerry Garcia.
On May 14, 2015, an all-star lineup held a tribute concert for Garcia at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. The event was called "Dear Jerry".
In 2015, Hunter and Garcia were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Hunter accepted the award along with Garcia's daughter, Trixie Garcia, who accepted on behalf of her father.
In 2015, Jerry Garcia's wife, Manasha Garcia and their daughter, Keelin Garcia launched The Jerry Garcia Foundation, a nonprofit charity that supports projects for artistic, environmental, and humanitarian causes. The Foundation's Board members are Bob Weir, Peter Shapiro, Glenn Fischer, Irwin Sternberg, Daniel Shiner, TRI Studios CEO, Christopher McCutcheon and Fender Music Foundation Executive Director,
Lynn Robison. Keelin Garcia said, "It is a tremendous honor to participate in nonprofit work that is in accordance with my father's values."
In 2018, Jerry Garcia family members, Keelin Garcia and Manasha Garcia launched the Jerry Garcia Music Arts independent music label.
On November 18, 2021, it was announced Jonah Hill would portray Garcia in a forthcoming Grateful Dead biopic written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski directed by Martin Scorsese for Apple TV+.
Discography
New Riders of the Purple Sage – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1971
Hooteroll? – Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia – 1971
Garcia – Jerry Garcia – 1972
Live at Keystone – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1973
Compliments – Jerry Garcia – 1974
Old & In the Way – Old & In the Way – 1975
Reflections – Jerry Garcia – 1976
Cats Under the Stars – Jerry Garcia Band – 1978
Run for the Roses – Jerry Garcia – 1982
Vintage NRPS – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1986
Keystone Encores – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1988
Almost Acoustic – Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band – 1988
Jerry Garcia / David Grisman – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1991
Jerry Garcia Band – Jerry Garcia Band – 1991
Not for Kids Only – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1993
Notes
References
Sources
External links
The official homepage of Jerry Garcia
Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jerry Garcia on Fretbase
The Jerry Site
Official Grateful Dead website
Jerry Garcia discography at deaddisc.com
Jerry Garcia autopsy
Jerry Day: A Civic and Cultural Celebration of Jerry Garcia held in San Francisco
FBI Records: The Vault - Jerry Garcia at vault.fbi.gov
Jerry Garcia's Army personnel file at the National Archives
TEAM
Garcia's Guitars & Gear Directory
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"What Time Is It? may refer to:\n\n What Time Is It? (film) (Che ora è?), a 1989 Italian film starring Marcello Mastroianni\n What Time Is It? (album), a 1982 album by The Time\n \"What Time Is It?\" (song), a song from the film High School Musical 2 (2007)\n \"What Time Is It?\", a song by Spin Doctors from Pocket Full of Kryptonite (1991)\n What Time Is It?, a children's book by P. D. Eastman\n \"What Time Is It?\", a short story by Isaac Asimov, included in the collection Casebook of the Black Widowers (1980)",
"What a Time to Be Alive is a 2015 mixtape by Drake and Future.\n\nWhat a Time to Be Alive may also refer to:\n What a Time to Be Alive (Superchunk album), 2018, or the title song\n What a Time to Be Alive (Tom Walker album), 2019\n \"What a Time to Be Alive\", song by Ryan Joseph Burns from Anna and the Apocalypse"
] |
[
"Jerry Garcia",
"Death",
"When was he found",
"August 9, 1995,",
"what time",
"4:23 am,"
] | C_a95583dc963548a79d885ace2c196575_0 | what was this close too | 3 | What was Jerry Garcia's death date close to? | Jerry Garcia | On August 9, 1995, at 4:23 am, eight days after his 53rd birthday, Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes--all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb; I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred Garcia's former wives from the ceremony. On August 13, approximately 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn. On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons, accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges River at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes. CANNOTANSWER | 53rd birthday, | Jerome John Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known for being a principal songwriter, the lead guitarist and a vocalist with the rock band the Grateful Dead, of which he was a founding member and which came to prominence during the counterculture of the 1960s. Although he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader of the band.
As one of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead for their entire 30-year career (1965–1995). Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), the Jerry Garcia Band, Old & In the Way, the Garcia/Grisman and Garcia/Kahn acoustic duos, Legion of Mary, and New Riders of the Purple Sage (which he co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known for his distinctive guitar playing, and was ranked 13th in Rolling Stones "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" cover story in 2003. In the 2015 version of the list he was ranked at #46.
Garcia was also renowned for his musical and technical ability, particularly his ability to play a variety of instruments and sustain long improvisations with the Grateful Dead. Garcia believed that improvisation took stress away from his playing and allowed him to make spur of the moment decisions that he would not have made intentionally. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Garcia noted that "my own preferences are for improvisation, for making it up as I go along. The idea of picking, of eliminating possibilities by deciding, that's difficult for me". Originating from the days of the "acid tests", these improvisations were a form of exploration rather than playing a song already written.
Later in life, Garcia struggled with diabetes and in 1986, went into a diabetic coma that nearly cost him his life. Although his overall health improved somewhat after that, he continued to struggle with obesity, smoking, and longstanding heroin and cocaine addictions. He was staying in a California drug rehabilitation facility when he died of a heart attack on August 9, 1995, at the age of 53.
Early life
Garcia's ancestors on his father's side were from Galicia in northwest Spain. His mother's ancestors were Irish and Swedish. He was born in the Excelsior District of San Francisco, California, on August 1, 1942, to Jose Ramon "Joe" Garcia and Ruth Marie "Bobbie" (née Clifford) Garcia, who was herself born in San Francisco. His parents named him after composer Jerome Kern. Jerome John was their second child, preceded by Clifford Ramon "Tiff", who was born in 1937. Shortly before Clifford's birth, their father and a partner leased a building in downtown San Francisco and turned it into a bar, partly in response to Jose being blackballed from a musicians' union for moonlighting.
Garcia was influenced by music at an early age, taking piano lessons for much of his childhood. His father was a retired professional musician and his mother enjoyed playing the piano. His father's extended family—which had immigrated from Spain in 1919—would often sing during reunions.
In 1946, two-thirds of four-year-old Garcia's right middle finger was cut off by his brother in a wood splitting accident, while the family was vacationing in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Garcia later confessed that he often used it to his advantage in his youth, showing it off to other children in his neighborhood.
Less than a year after this incident his father died in a fly fishing accident when the family was vacationing near Arcata in Northern California. He slipped after entering the Trinity River, part of the Six Rivers National Forest, and drowned before other fishermen could reach him. Although Garcia claimed he saw the incident, Dennis McNally, author of the book A Long Strange Trip: The Inside Story of the Grateful Dead, argues Garcia formed the memory after hearing others repeat the story. Blair Jackson, who wrote Garcia: An American Life, notes that a local newspaper article describing Jose's death did not mention Jerry being present when he died.
Excelsior District
Following his father's death, Garcia's mother Ruth took over her husband's bar, buying out his partner for full ownership. She began working full-time there, sending Jerry and his brother to live nearby with her parents, Tillie and William Clifford. During the five-year period in which he lived with his grandparents, Garcia enjoyed a large amount of autonomy and attended Monroe Elementary School. At the school, Garcia was greatly encouraged in his artistic abilities by his third grade teacher: through her, he discovered that "being a creative person was a viable possibility in life." According to Garcia, it was around this time that he was opened up to country and bluegrass music by his grandmother, whom he recalled enjoyed listening to the Grand Ole Opry. His elder brother, Clifford, however, staunchly believed the contrary, insisting that Garcia was "fantasizing all [that] ... she'd been to Opry, but she didn't listen to it on the radio." It was at this point that Garcia started playing the banjo, his first stringed instrument.
Menlo Park
In 1953, Garcia's mother married Wally Matusiewicz. Subsequently, Garcia and his brother moved back home with their mother and new stepfather. However, due to the roughneck reputation of their neighborhood at the time, Garcia's mother moved their family to Menlo Park. During their stay in Menlo Park, Garcia became acquainted with racism and antisemitism, things he disliked intensely. The same year, Garcia was also introduced to rock and roll and rhythm and blues by his brother, and enjoyed listening to Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, B. B. King, Hank Ballard, and, later, Chuck Berry. Clifford often memorized the vocals for his favorite songs, and would then make Garcia learn the harmony parts, a move to which Garcia later attributed much of his early ear training.
In mid-1957, Garcia began smoking cigarettes and was introduced to marijuana. Garcia would later reminisce about the first time he smoked marijuana: "Me and a friend of mine went up into the hills with two joints, the San Francisco foothills, and smoked these joints and just got so high and laughed and roared and went skipping down the streets doing funny things and just having a helluva time". During this time, Garcia also studied at what is now the San Francisco Art Institute. The teacher there was Wally Hedrick, an artist who came to prominence during the 1960s. During the classes, he often encouraged Garcia in his drawing and painting skills. Hedrick also introduced Garcia to the fiction of Jack Kerouac, whom Garcia later cited as a major influence.
San Francisco
In June, Garcia graduated from the local Menlo Oaks school. He then moved with his family back to San Francisco, where they lived in an apartment above the family bar, a newly built replacement for the original, that had been torn down to make way for a freeway entrance. Two months later, on Garcia's fifteenth birthday, his mother bought an accordion for him, to his great disappointment. Garcia had long been captivated by many rhythm and blues artists, especially Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, leaving him craving an electric guitar. After some pleading, his mother exchanged the accordion for a Danelectro with a small amplifier at a local pawnshop. Garcia's stepfather, who was somewhat proficient with instruments, helped tune his guitar to an unusual open tuning.
Cazadero
After a short stint at Denman Junior High School, Garcia attended tenth grade at Balboa High School in 1958, where he often got into trouble for skipping classes and fighting. Consequently, in 1959, Garcia's mother again moved the family to a safer environment, to Cazadero, a small town in Sonoma County, north of San Francisco. This turn of events did not sit well with Garcia, who had to travel by bus to Analy High School in Sebastopol, the nearest school. Garcia did, however, join a band at his school known as the Chords. After performing in and winning a contest, the band's reward was recording a song. They chose "Raunchy" by Bill Justis.
Recording career
Relocation and band beginnings
Garcia stole his mother's car in 1960, and was given the option of joining the United States Army in lieu of prison. He received basic training at Fort Ord. After training, he was transferred to Fort Winfield Scott in the Presidio of San Francisco. Garcia spent most of his time in the army at his leisure, missing roll call and accruing many counts of being AWOL. As a result, Garcia was given a general discharge on December 14, 1960.
In January 1961, Garcia drove down to East Palo Alto to see Laird Grant, an old friend from middle school. He had bought a 1950 Cadillac sedan from a cook in the army, which barely made it to Grant's residence before it broke down. Garcia spent the next few weeks sleeping where friends would allow, eventually using his car as a home. Through Grant, Garcia met Dave McQueen in February, who, after hearing Garcia perform some blues music, introduced him to local people and to the Chateau, a rooming house located near Stanford University which was then a popular hangout.
On February 20, 1961, Garcia got into a car with Paul Speegle, a sixteen-year-old artist and acquaintance of Garcia; Lee Adams, the house manager of the Chateau and driver of the car; and Alan Trist, a companion of theirs. After speeding past the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital, the driver encountered a curve and, speeding around , crashed into the guard rail, sending the car rolling turbulently. Garcia was hurled through the windshield of the car into a nearby field with such force he was literally thrown out of his shoes and would later be unable to recall the ejection. Lee Adams, the driver, and Alan Trist, who was seated in the back, were thrown from the car as well, suffering from abdominal injuries and a spine fracture, respectively. Garcia escaped with a broken collarbone, while Speegle, still in the car, was fatally injured.
Lee's reckless driving and crash served as an awakening for Garcia, who later commented: "That's where my life began. Before then I was always living at less than capacity. I was idling. That was the slingshot for the rest of my life. It was like a second chance. Then I got serious". It was at this time that Garcia began to realize that he needed to begin playing the guitar in earnest—a move which meant giving up his love of drawing and painting.
In April 1961, Garcia first met Robert Hunter, who would become a long-time friend of and lyricist for the Grateful Dead, collaborating principally with Garcia. The two involved themselves in the South Bay and San Francisco art and music scenes, sometimes playing at Menlo Park's Kepler's Books. Garcia performed his first concert with Hunter, each earning five dollars. Garcia and Hunter also played in bands (the Wildwood Boys and the Hart Valley Drifters) with David Nelson, who would later play with Garcia in the New Riders of the Purple Sage and contribute to several Grateful Dead album songs.
In 1962, Garcia met Phil Lesh, the eventual bassist of the Grateful Dead, during a party in Menlo Park's bohemian Perry Lane neighborhood (where author Ken Kesey lived). Lesh would later write in his autobiography that Garcia reminded him of pictures he had seen of the composer Claude Debussy, with his "dark, curly hair, goatee, Impressionist eyes". While attending another party in Palo Alto, Lesh approached Garcia to suggest they record Garcia on Lesh's tape recorder and produce a radio show for the progressive, community-supported Berkeley radio station KPFA. Using an old Wollensak tape recorder, they recorded "Matty Groves" and "The Long Black Veil", among several other tunes. The recordings became a central feature of a 90-minute KPFA special broadcast, "The Long Black Veil and Other Ballads: An Evening with Jerry Garcia". The link between KPFA and the Grateful Dead continues to this day, having included many fundraisers, interviews, live concert broadcasts, taped band performances and all-day or all-weekend "Dead-only" marathons.
Garcia soon began playing and teaching acoustic guitar and banjo. One of Garcia's students was Bob Matthews, who later engineered many of the Grateful Dead's albums. Matthews attended Menlo-Atherton High School and was friends with Bob Weir, and on New Year's Eve 1963, he introduced Weir and Garcia.
Between 1962 and 1964, Garcia sang and performed mainly bluegrass, old-time, and folk music. One of the bands Garcia performed with was the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers, a bluegrass act. The group consisted of Garcia on guitar, banjo, vocals, and harmonica, Marshall Leicester on banjo, guitar, and vocals, and Dick Arnold on fiddle and vocals. Soon after this, Garcia, Weir, Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, and several of their friends formed a jug band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions. Around this time, the psychedelic drug LSD was gaining popularity. Garcia first began using LSD in 1964; later, when asked how it changed his life, he remarked: "Well, it changed everything [...] the effect was that it freed me because I suddenly realized that my little attempt at having a straight life and doing that was really a fiction and just wasn't going to work out. Luckily I wasn't far enough into it for it to be shattering or anything; it was like a realization that just made me feel immensely relieved."
In 1965, Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions evolved into the Warlocks, with the addition of Phil Lesh on bass guitar and Bill Kreutzmann on percussion. However, the band discovered that another group (which would later become the Velvet Underground) had recently selected the same name. In response, Garcia came up with "Grateful Dead" by opening a Funk & Wagnalls dictionary to an entry for "Grateful dead". The definition for "Grateful dead" was "a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". The band's first reaction was disapproval. Garcia later explained the group's reaction: "I didn't like it really, I just found it to be really powerful. [Bob] Weir didn't like it, [Bill] Kreutzmann didn't like it and nobody really wanted to hear about it." Despite their dislike of the name, it quickly spread by word of mouth, and soon became their official title.
Career with the Grateful Dead
Garcia served as lead guitarist, as well as one of the principal vocalists and songwriters of the Grateful Dead for its entire career. Garcia composed such songs as "Dark Star", "Franklin's Tower", and "Scarlet Begonias", among many others. Robert Hunter, an ardent collaborator with the band, wrote the lyrics to all but a few of Garcia's songs.
Garcia was well-noted for his "soulful extended guitar improvisations", which would frequently feature interplay between him and his fellow band members. His fame, as well as the band's, arguably rested on their ability to never play a song the same way twice. Often, Garcia would take cues from rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, remarking that "there are some [...] kinds of ideas that would really throw me if I had to create a harmonic bridge between all the things going on rhythmically with two drums and Phil [Lesh's] innovative bass playing. Weir's ability to solve that sort of problem is extraordinary. [...] Harmonically, I take a lot of my solo cues from Bob."
When asked to describe his approach to soloing, Garcia commented: "It keeps on changing. I still basically revolve around the melody and the way it's broken up into phrases as I perceive them. With most solos, I tend to play something that phrases the way the melody does; my phrases may be more dense or have different value, but they'll occur in the same places in the song. [...]"
Garcia and the band toured almost constantly from their formation in 1965 until Garcia's death in 1995. Periodically, there were breaks due to exhaustion or health problems, often due to Garcia's drug use. During their three-decade span, the Grateful Dead played 2,314 shows.
Garcia's guitar-playing was eclectic. He melded elements from the various kinds of music that influenced him. Echoes of bluegrass playing (such as Arthur Smith and Doc Watson) could be heard. There was also early rock (like Lonnie Mack, James Burton, and Chuck Berry), contemporary blues (Freddie King and Lowell Fulsom), country and western (Roy Nichols and Don Rich), and jazz (Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt) to be heard in Garcia's style. Don Rich was the sparkling country guitar player in Buck Owens's "the Buckaroos" band of the 1960s, but besides Rich's style, both Garcia's pedal steel guitar playing (on Grateful Dead records and others) and his standard electric guitar work, were influenced by another of Owens's Buckaroos of that time, pedal steel player Tom Brumley. And as an improvisational soloist, John Coltrane was one of his greatest personal and musical influences.
Garcia later described his playing style as having "descended from barroom rock and roll, country guitar. Just 'cause that's where all my stuff comes from. It's like that blues instrumental stuff that was happening in the late Fifties and early Sixties, like Freddie King." Garcia's style could vary with the song being played and the instrument he was using, but his playing had a number of so-called "signatures". Among these were lead lines based on rhythmic triplets (examples include the songs "Good Morning Little School Girl", "New Speedway Boogie", "Brokedown Palace", "Deal", "Loser", "Truckin'", "That's It for the Other One", "U.S. Blues", "Sugaree", and "Don't Ease Me In").
Side projects
In addition to the Grateful Dead, Garcia had numerous side projects, the most notable being the Jerry Garcia Band. He was also involved with various acoustic projects such as Old & In the Way and other bluegrass bands, including collaborations with noted bluegrass mandolinist David Grisman. The documentary film Grateful Dawg, co-produced by Gillian Grisman and former NBC producer Pamela Hamilton chronicles the deep, long-term friendship between Garcia and Grisman. When Garcia and Grisman released Not For Kids Only, Hamilton produced their interview and concert for NBC. After several years of producing stories on the Grateful Dead and band members' side projects, Hamilton interviewed Bob Weir for a feature on Garcia's death marking the end of an era.
Other groups of which Garcia was a member at one time or another include the Black Mountain Boys, Legion of Mary, Reconstruction, and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. Garcia was also a fan of jazz artists and improvisation: he played with jazz keyboardists Merl Saunders and Howard Wales for many years in various groups and jam sessions, and he appeared on saxophonist Ornette Coleman's 1988 album, Virgin Beauty. His collaboration with Merl Saunders and Muruga Booker on the world music album Blues From the Rainforest launched the Rainforest Band.
Garcia also spent a lot of time in the recording studio helping out fellow musician friends in session work, often adding guitar, vocals, pedal steel, sometimes banjo and piano and even producing. He played on over 50 studio albums, the styles of which were eclectic and varied, including bluegrass, rock, folk, blues, country, jazz, electronic music, gospel, funk, and reggae. Artists who sought Garcia's help included the likes of Jefferson Airplane (most notably Surrealistic Pillow, Garcia being listed as their "spiritual advisor"). Garcia himself recalled in a mid-1967 interview that he'd played the high lead on "Today," played on "Plastic Fantastic Lover" and "Comin' Back to Me" on that album. Others include Tom Fogerty, David Bromberg, Robert Hunter (Liberty, on Relix Records), Paul Pena, Peter Rowan, Warren Zevon, Country Joe McDonald, Pete Sears, Ken Nordine, Ornette Coleman, Bruce Hornsby, Bob Dylan, It's a Beautiful Day, and many more. In 1995 Garcia played on three tracks for the CD Blue Incantation by guitarist Sanjay Mishra, making it his last studio collaboration.
Throughout the early 1970s, Garcia, Lesh, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, and David Crosby collaborated intermittently with MIT-educated composer and biologist Ned Lagin on several projects in the realm of early ambient music; these include the album Seastones (released by the Ned Lagin on the Round Records subsidiary) and L, an unfinished dance work composed by Ned Lagin. In 1970, Garcia participated in the soundtrack for the film Zabriskie Point.
Garcia also played pedal steel guitar for fellow-San Francisco musicians New Riders of the Purple Sage from their initial dates in 1969 to October 1971, when increased commitments with the Dead forced him to opt out of the group. He appears as a band member on their debut album New Riders of the Purple Sage, and produced Home, Home on the Road, a 1974 live album by the band. He also contributed pedal steel guitar to the enduring hit "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. Garcia also played steel guitar licks on Brewer & Shipley's 1970 album Tarkio. Despite considering himself a novice on the pedal steel, Garcia routinely ranked high in player polls. After a long lapse from playing the pedal steel, he played it once more during several of the Dead's concerts with Bob Dylan in the summer of 1987.
In 1988, Garcia agreed to perform at several major benefits including the "Soviet American Peace Walk" concert at the Band Shell, in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, that drew 25,000 people. He was asked to play by longtime friend and fellow musician, Pete Sears, who played piano with all the bands that day, and also procured all the other musicians. Garcia, Mickey Hart and Steve Parish played the show, then were given a police escort to a Grateful Dead show across the bay later that night. Garcia also played with Nick Gravenites and Pete Sears at a benefit given for Vietnam Veteran and peace activist Brian Willson, who lost both legs below the knee when he attempted to block a train carrying weapons to military dictatorships in El Salvador.
Having previously studied at the San Francisco Art Institute as a teenager, Garcia embarked on a second career in the visual arts in the late 1980s. He created a number of drawings, etchings, and water colors. Garcia's artistic endeavors were represented by the Weir Gallery in Berkeley, California from 1989 to 1996. During this period, Roberta Weir (unrelated to Garcia's bandmate Bob Weir) provided Garcia with new art techniques to use, sponsored his first solo show in 1990, and prepared blank etching plates for him to draw on. These would then be processed and printed by gallery staff and brought back to Garcia for approval and signature, usually with a passing of stacks of paper backstage at a Dead show. His annual shows at the Weir Gallery garnered much attention, leading to further shows in New York and other cities. Garcia was an early adopter of digital art media; his artistic style was as varied as his musical output, and he carried small notebooks for pen and ink sketches wherever he toured. Roberta Weir continues to maintain an archive of the artwork of Jerry Garcia. Perhaps the most widely seen pieces of Jerry Garcia's art are the many editions of men's neckties produced by Stonehenge Ltd. and Mulberry Neckware. Some began as etchings, other designs came from his drawings, paintings, and digital art. Garcia's artwork has since expanded into everything from hotel rooms, wet suits, men's sport shirts, a women's wear line, boxer shorts, hair accessories, cummerbunds, silk scarves and wool rugs.
Personal life
Garcia met his first wife, Sara Ruppenthal, in 1963. She was working at the coffee house in the back of Kepler's Books, where Garcia, Hunter, and Nelson regularly performed. They married on April 23, 1963, and on December 8 of that year their daughter Heather was born.
Carolyn Adams, a Merry Prankster also known as "Mountain Girl" or "M.G.," had a daughter, Sunshine, with Ken Kesey. Mountain Girl married another Prankster, George Walker, but they soon separated. She and Sunshine then moved into 710 Ashbury with Garcia in late 1966 where they would ultimately live together until 1975. In 1994, Sara and Jerry officially divorced after a long separation. Adams gave birth to Garcia's second and third daughters, Annabelle Walker Garcia (February 2, 1970) and Theresa Adams "Trixie" Garcia (September 21, 1974).
In August 1970, Garcia's mother Ruth was involved in a car crash near Twin Peaks in San Francisco. Garcia, who was recording the album American Beauty at the time, often left the sessions to visit his mother with his brother Clifford. She died on September 28, 1970.
In the midst of a March 1973 Grateful Dead engagement at Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, Garcia met Deborah Koons, an aspiring filmmaker from a wealthy Cincinnati, Ohio-based family who would much later marry him and become his widow. After a brief correspondence, he began his relationship with her in mid-1974. This gradually strained his relationship with Adams and culminated in Garcia leaving Adams for Koons in late 1975. The end of his relationship with Koons in 1977 precipitated a brief reconciliation with Adams, including the reestablishment of their household. However, she did not agree with the guitarist's persistent use of narcotics and moved with the children to the Eugene, Oregon area, living near Kesey, in 1978.
Following Adams' departure, Garcia had an affair with Amy Moore. She was a Kentucky-born member of the extended "Grateful Dead family", and the mistress of Texas oil heir Roy Cullen. Their affair lasted circa 1980–1981, and inspired the Garcia-Hunter song "Run for the Roses."
Adams and Garcia were married on December 31, 1981, largely as a result of mutual tax exigencies. Despite the legal codification of their union, she remained in Oregon, while Garcia continued to live near the Grateful Dead's offices in San Rafael, California. Garcia lived with a variety of housemates, including longtime Grateful Dead employee and Jerry Garcia Band manager Rock Scully. Scully, who co-managed the Grateful Dead throughout the mid-to-late 1960s before serving as the band's "advance man" and publicist, was dismissed by the group in 1984 for enabling Garcia's addictions and for allegedly embezzling the Garcia Band's profits. Another housemate was Nora Sage, a Deadhead who became Garcia's housekeeper while studying at the Golden Gate University School of Law. The exact nature of their relationship remains unclear, although it is believed to have been platonic due to Garcia's addictions. She later became his art representative.
While they would briefly reunite following his diabetic coma, Garcia and Adams ultimately divorced in 1994. Phil Lesh has subsequently stated that he rarely saw Adams on any of the band tours. In a 1991 Rolling Stone interview, Garcia stated that "we haven't really lived together since the Seventies".
During the autumn of 1978, Garcia developed a friendship with Shimer College student Manasha Matheson, an artist and music enthusiast. They remained friends over the following nine years before initiating a romantic relationship in Hartford, Connecticut on the Grateful Dead's spring 1987 tour. Jerry and Manasha became parents with the birth of their daughter, Keelin Noel Garcia, on December 20, 1987. On August 17, 1990, Jerry and Manasha married at their San Anselmo, California home in a spiritual ceremony free of legal convention. In 1991, Garcia expressed his delight in finding the time to "actually be a father" to Keelin in contrast to his past relationships with his children. A year later, Garcia dedicated his first art book, Paintings, Drawings and Sketches, "For Manasha, with love, Jerry."
In January 1993, Barbara "Brigid" Meier, a former girlfriend from the early 1960s, reentered Garcia's life for a brief period. Meier claimed, Garcia had considered her to be the "love of his life" and proposed to her during a Hawaiian vacation shortly after their relationship recommenced. Garcia's "love of his life" sentiment was not reserved for one lover, as he expressed the same feelings to several other women in his life. At Garcia's 1995 funeral, Koons declared that she was "the love of his life" while paying her final respects, whereupon Meier and Ruppenthal, who were both in attendance, simultaneously exclaimed, "He said that to me!"
The affair with Meier marked the breakup of Jerry's family life with Manasha and Keelin. Garcia ended the affair with Meier forty-five days later while on tour in Chicago with the Grateful Dead after she confronted him about his drug use.
Shortly thereafter, Garcia renewed his acquaintance with Deborah Koons in the spring of 1993. They married on February 14, 1994, in Sausalito, California. Garcia and Koons were married at the time of his death.
Lifestyle and health
Because of their public profile, Garcia and his collaborators were occasionally singled out in the American government's war on drugs. On October 2, 1967, 710 Ashbury Street in San Francisco (where the Grateful Dead had taken up residence the year before) was raided after a police tip-off. Grateful Dead members Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Ron "Pigpen" McKernan were apprehended on marijuana charges which were later dropped, although Garcia himself was not arrested. The following year, Garcia's picture was used in a defamatory context in a campaign commercial for Richard Nixon.
Most of the band were arrested again in January 1970, after they flew to New Orleans from Hawaii. After returning to their hotel from a performance, the band checked into their rooms, only to be quickly raided by police. Approximately fifteen people were arrested on the spot, including many of the road crew, management, and nearly all of the Grateful Dead except for Garcia, who arrived later, outgoing keyboardist Tom Constanten, who abstained from all drugs as a member of the Church of Scientology, and McKernan, who eschewed illegal drugs in favor of alcohol.
According to Bill Kreutzmann, the band's use of cocaine accelerated throughout the early 1970s. After using heroin in a brothel in 1974 (likely on the band's second European tour), Garcia was introduced to a smokeable form of the drug (initially advertised as refined opium) colloquially known as "Persian" or "Persian Base" during the group's 1975 hiatus. Influenced by the stresses of creating and releasing The Grateful Dead Movie and the acrimonious collapse of the band's independent record labels over the next two years, Garcia became increasingly dependent upon both substances. These factors, combined with the alcohol and drug abuse of several other members of the Grateful Dead, resulted in a turbulent atmosphere. By 1978, the band's chemistry began "cracking and crumbling", resulting in poor group cohesion. As a result, Keith and Donna Jean Godchaux left the band in February 1979.
With the addition of keyboardist/vocalist Brent Mydland that year amid the ongoing coalescence of the Deadhead subculture, the band reached new commercial heights as a touring group on the American arena circuit in the early 1980s, enabling them to forsake studio recording for several years. Nevertheless, this was offset by such factors as the band's atypically large payroll and Garcia's $700-a-day () drug addiction, resulting in the guitarist taking on a frenetic slate of solo touring outside of the Grateful Dead's rigorous schedule, including abbreviated acoustic duo concerts with Jerry Garcia Band bassist John Kahn that were widely rumored to be a funding conduit for their respective addictions.
Though things seemed to be getting better for the band, Garcia's health was declining. By 1983, Garcia's demeanor onstage had appeared to change. Despite still playing the guitar with great passion and intensity, there were times that he would appear disengaged; as such, shows were often inconsistent. Years of heavy tobacco smoking had affected his voice, and he gained considerable weight. By 1984, he would often rest his chin on the microphone during performances. The so-called "endless tour"—the result of years of financial risks, drug use, and poor business decisions—had taken its toll.
Garcia's decade-long heroin addiction culminated in the rest of the band holding an intervention in January 1985. Given the choice between the band or the drugs, Garcia agreed to check into a rehabilitation center in Oakland, California. A few days later in January, before the start of his program in Oakland, Garcia was arrested for drug possession in Golden Gate Park; he subsequently attended a drug diversion program. Throughout 1985, he tapered his drug use on tour and at home with the assistance of Nora Sage; by the spring of 1986, he was completely abstinent.
Precipitated by an unhealthy weight, dehydration, bad eating habits, and a recent relapse on the Grateful Dead's first stadium tour, Garcia collapsed into a diabetic coma in July 1986, waking up five days later. He later spoke about this period of unconsciousness as surreal: "Well, I had some very weird experiences. My main experience was one of furious activity and tremendous struggle in a sort of futuristic, space-ship vehicle with insectoid presences. After I came out of my coma, I had this image of myself as these little hunks of protoplasm that were stuck together kind of like stamps with perforations between them that you could snap off." Garcia's coma had a profound effect on him: it forced him to have to relearn how to play the guitar, as well as other, more basic skills. Within a handful of months, he had recovered, playing with the Jerry Garcia Band and the Grateful Dead again later that year.
After Garcia's recovery, the band released a comeback album In the Dark in 1987, which became their best-selling studio album. Inspired by Garcia's improved health, a successful album and the continuing emergence of Mydland as a third frontman, the band's energy and chemistry reached a new peak in the late 1980s.
Amid a litany of personal problems, Mydland died of a speedball overdose in July 1990. His death greatly affected Garcia, leading him to believe that the band's chemistry would never be the same. Before beginning the fall tour, the band acquired keyboardists Vince Welnick and Bruce Hornsby. The power of Hornsby's performances drove Garcia to new heights on stage. However, as the band continued through 1991, Garcia became concerned with the band's future. He was exhausted from five straight years of touring. He thought a break was necessary, mainly so that the band could come back with fresh material. The idea was put off by the pressures of management, and the touring continued. Garcia began using heroin again after several years of intermittent prescription opiate use. Though his relapse was brief, the band was quick to react. Soon after the last show of the tour in Denver, Garcia was confronted by the band with another intervention. After a disastrous meeting, Garcia invited Phil Lesh over to his home in San Rafael, California, where he explained that after the meeting he would start attending a methadone clinic. Garcia said that he wanted to clean up in his own way, and return to making music.
After returning from the band's 1992 summer tour, Garcia became sick, a throwback to his diabetic coma in 1986. Manasha Garcia nursed Jerry back to health and organized a team of health professionals which included acupuncturist Yen Wei Choong and Randy Baker, MD, a holistic family physician to treat him at home. Garcia recovered over the following days, despite the Grateful Dead having to cancel their fall tour to allow him time to recuperate. Garcia reduced his cigarette smoking and began losing weight. He also became a vegetarian.
Despite these improvements, Garcia's physical and mental condition continued to decline throughout 1993 and 1994. He began to use narcotics again to dull the pain.
In light of his second drug relapse and current condition, Garcia checked himself into the Betty Ford Center during July 1995. His stay was limited, lasting only two weeks. Motivated by the experience, he then checked into the Serenity Knolls treatment center in Forest Knolls, California, where he died.
Death
Garcia died in his room at the rehabilitation clinic on August 9, 1995. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes—all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that, upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb. I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former pro basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred two of Garcia's former wives from the ceremony.
On August 13, about 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Haight-Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn.
On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes.
Musical equipment
Garcia played many guitars during his career, which ranged from student and budget models to custom-made instruments. During his thirty-five year career as a professional musician, Garcia used about 25 guitars.
In 1965, when Garcia was playing with the Warlocks, he used a Guild Starfire, which he also used on the début album of the Grateful Dead. Beginning in late 1967 and ending in 1968, Garcia played black or gold mid-1950s Gibson Les Paul guitars with P-90 pickups. In 1969, he picked up the Gibson SG and used it for most of that year and 1970, except for a small period in between where he used a sunburst Fender Stratocaster.
During Garcia's "pedal steel flirtation period" (as Bob Weir referred to it in Anthem to Beauty), from approximately 1969 to 1972, he initially played a Fender instrument before upgrading to the ZB Custom D-10, especially in his earlier public performances. Although this was a double neck guitar, Garcia used the "E9 neck and the three pedals to raise the tone and two levers to lower it." He employed an Emmons D-10 at the Grateful Dead's and New Riders of the Purple Sage's final appearances at the Fillmore East in April 1971.
In 1969, Garcia played pedal steel on three notable outside recordings: the track "The Farm" on the Jefferson Airplane album Volunteers, the track "Oh Mommy" by Brewer and Shipley and the hit single "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young from their album Déjà Vu, released in 1970. Garcia played on the latter album in exchange for harmony lessons for the Grateful Dead, who were at the time recording Workingman's Dead.
In 1971, Garcia began playing a sunburst Les Paul. In March and April 1971 – the time period during which the Grateful Dead recorded its second live album, Grateful Dead – Garcia played the "Peanut," a guitar he had received from Rick Turner, who had custom built the guitar's body and incorporated the neck, pickups, and hardware from an early '60s Les Paul.
In May, Garcia began using a 1957 natural finish Stratocaster that had been given to him by Graham Nash. Garcia added an alligator sticker to the pickguard in the fall of that year. "Alligator" would remain Garcia's principal electric guitar until August 1973.
In the summer of 1971, Garcia also played a double-cutaway Les Paul TV Junior.
While Alligator was in the shop in the summer of 1972, he briefly reverted to the sunburst Stratocaster; this can be seen in Sunshine Daydream.
In late 1972, Garcia purchased the first guitar ("Eagle") made by Alembic luthier Doug Irwin for $850 (). Enamored of Irwin's talents, he immediately commissioned his own custom instrument. This guitar, nicknamed "Wolf" for a memorable sticker Garcia added below the tailpiece, was delivered in May 1973 and replaced Alligator on stage in September. It cost $1,500 (), an extremely high price for the era.
Wolf was made with an ebony fingerboard and featured numerous embellishments like alternating grain designs in the headstock, ivory inlays, and fret marker dots made of sterling silver. The body was composed of western maple wood which had a core of purpleheart. Garcia later had Irwin (who ultimately left Alembic to start his own business) replace the electronics inside the guitar, at which point he added his own logo to the headstock alongside the Alembic logo. The system included two interchangeable plates for configuring pickups: one was made for strictly single coils, while the other accommodated humbuckers. Shortly after receiving the modified instrument, Garcia commissioned another custom guitar from Irwin with one caveat: "Don't hold back."
During the Grateful Dead's 1974 European tour, Wolf was dropped on several occasions, one of which caused a minor crack in the headstock. Following filming of The Grateful Dead Movie (in which the guitar is prominently visible) a month later, Garcia returned it to Irwin for repairs. Throughout its absence, Garcia predominantly played several Travis Bean guitars, including the TB1000A (1975) and the TB500 (1976-1977). On September 28, 1977, Irwin delivered the refurbished Wolf back to Garcia. The wolf sticker which gave the guitar its name had now been inlaid into the instrument; it also featured an effects loop between the pick-ups and controls (so inline effects would "see" the same signal at all times) which was bypassable. Irwin also put a new face on the headstock with only his logo (he later claimed to have built the guitar himself, though pictures through time clearly show the progression of logos, from Alembic, to Alembic & Irwin, to only Irwin).
Nearly seven years after he commissioned it, Garcia received his second custom guitar ("Tiger") from Irwin in the summer of 1979.
He first employed the instrument in concert at a Grateful Dead performance at the Oakland Auditorium Arena on August 4, 1979. Its name was derived from the inlay on the preamp cover.
The body of Tiger was of rich quality: the top layer was cocobolo, with the preceding layers being maple stripe, vermilion, and flame maple, in that order. The neck was made of western maple with an ebony fingerboard. The pickups consisted of a single coil DiMarzio SDS-1 and two humbucker DiMarzio Super IIs which were easily removable due to Garcia's preference for replacing his pickups every year or two. The electronics were composed of an effects bypass loop, which allowed Garcia to control the sound of his effects through the tone and volume controls on the guitar, and a preamplifier/buffer which rested behind a plate in the back of the guitar. Fully outfitted, Tiger weighed . This was Garcia's principal guitar for the next eleven years, and most played.
In the late 1980s Garcia, Weir and CSN (along with many others) endorsed Alvarez Yairi acoustic guitars. There are many photographs circulating (mostly promotional) of Garcia playing a DY99 Virtuoso Custom with a Modulus Graphite neck. He opted to play with the less decorated model but the promotional photo from the Alvarez Yairi catalog has him holding the "tree of life" model. This hand-built guitar was notable for the collaboration between Japanese luthier Kazuo Yairi and Modulus Graphite of San Rafael. As with most things Garcia, with his passing, the DY99 model is highly valued among collectors.
In 1990, Irwin completed "Rosebud", Garcia's fourth custom guitar. It was similar to his previous guitar Tiger in many respects, but featured different inlays and electronics, tone and volume controls, and weight. Rosebud, unlike Tiger, was configured with three humbuckers; the neck and bridge pickups shared a tone control, while the middle had its own. Atop the guitar was a Roland GK-2 pickup which fed the controller set inside the guitar. The GK2 was used in junction with the Roland GR-50 rack mount synthesizer. The GR-50 synthesizer in turn drove a Korg M1R synthesizer producing the MIDI effects heard during live performances of this period as heard on the Grateful Dead recording Without a Net. Sections of the guitar were hollowed out to bring the weight down to . The inlay, a dancing skeleton holding a rose, covers a plate just below the bridge. The final cost of the instrument was $11,000 ().
In 1993, carpenter-turned-luthier Stephen Cripe tried his hand at making an instrument for Garcia. After researching Tiger through pictures and films, Cripe set out on what would soon become known as "Lightning Bolt", again named for its inlay.
The guitar used Brazilian rosewood for the fingerboard and East Indian rosewood for the body, which, with admitted irony from Cripe, had been taken from a 19th-century bed used by opium smokers. Built purely from guesswork, Lightning Bolt was a hit with Garcia, who began using the guitar exclusively. Soon after, Garcia requested that Cripe build a backup of the guitar. Cripe, who had not measured or photographed the original, was told simply to "wing it."
Cripe later delivered the backup, which was known by the name "Top Hat". Garcia bought it from him for $6,500, making it the first guitar that Cripe had ever sold. However, infatuated with Lightning Bolt, Garcia rarely used the backup.
After Garcia's death, the ownership of Wolf and Tiger came into question. According to Garcia's will, his guitars were bequeathed to Doug Irwin, who had constructed them.
The remaining Grateful Dead members disagreed – they considered his guitars to be property of the band, leading to a lawsuit between the two parties. In 2001, Irwin won the case. However, nearly having been left destitute from a traffic accident in 1998, he decided to place the guitars up for auction in hopes of being able to start another guitar workshop.
On May 8, 2002, Wolf and Tiger, among other memorabilia, were placed for auction at Studio 54 in New York City. Tiger was sold for $957,500, and Wolf for $789,500. Together, the pair sold for $1.74 million, setting a new world record. Wolf went into in the private collection of Daniel Pritzker who kept it in a secure climate controlled room in a private residence at Utica, N.Y. Tiger went to the private collection of Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.
In May 2017, Wolf was again auctioned, but this time for charity. Pritzker decided to sell the guitar and donate all proceeds to the Montgomery, Alabama based Southern Poverty Law Center.
Brian Halligan placed the winning bid totaling $1.9M.
For the majority of 2019 Wolf and Tiger were included in the Play it Loud exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. On June 23, 2019 John Mayer played Wolf with Dead & Co. at Citi Field.
Legacy
Garcia was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Grateful Dead in 1994. He declined to attend the ceremony; the band jokingly brought a cardboard cutout of Garcia out on stage in his absence.
In 1987, Vermont ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's introduced their Cherry Garcia flavor dedicated to him. It was the first ice cream flavor dedicated to a musician.
In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Jerry Garcia 13th in their list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
According to fellow Bay Area guitar player Henry Kaiser, Garcia is "the most recorded guitarist in history. With more than 2,200 Grateful Dead concerts, and 1,000 Jerry Garcia Band concerts captured on tape – as well as numerous studio sessions – there are about 15,000 hours of his guitar work preserved for the ages."
On July 30, 2004, Melvin Seals was the first Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) member to headline an outdoor music and camping festival called "The Grateful Garcia Gathering". Jerry Garcia Band drummer David Kemper joined Melvin Seals and JGB in 2007. Other musicians and friends of Garcia include Donna Jean Godchaux, Mookie Siegel, Pete Sears, G.E. Smith, Chuck Hammer, Barry Sless, Jackie Greene, Brian Lesh, Sanjay Mishra, and Mark Karan.
On July 21, 2005, the San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission passed a resolution to name the amphitheater in McLaren Park "The Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." The amphitheater is located in the Excelsior District, where Garcia grew up. The first show to happen at the Jerry Garcia Amphitheater was Jerry Day 2005 on August 7, 2005. Jerry's brother, Tiff Garcia, was the first person to welcome everybody to the "Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." Jerry Day is an annual celebration of Garcia in his childhood neighborhood. The dedication ceremony (Jerry Day 2) on October 29, 2005, was officiated by mayor Gavin Newsom.
On September 24, 2005, the Comes a Time: A Celebration of the Music & Spirit of Jerry Garcia tribute concert was held at the Hearst Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California. The concert featured Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, Bruce Hornsby, Trey Anastasio, Warren Haynes, Jimmy Herring, Michael Kang, Jay Lane, Jeff Chimenti, Mark Karan, Robin Sylvester, Kenny Brooks, Melvin Seals, Merl Saunders, Marty Holland, Stu Allen, Gloria Jones, and Jackie LaBranch.
Georgia-based composer Lee Johnson released an orchestral tribute to the music of the Grateful Dead, recorded with the Russian National Orchestra, entitled "Dead Symphony: Lee Johnson Symphony No. 6." Johnson was interviewed on NPR on the July 26, 2008 broadcast of Weekend Edition, and gave much credit to the genius and craft of Garcia's songwriting. A live performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Johnson himself, was held Friday, August 1.
In 2010 the Santa Barbara Bowl in California opened Jerry Garcia Glen along the walk up to the venue. There is a statue of Garcia's right hand along the way.
Seattle rock band Soundgarden wrote and recorded the instrumental song "Jerry Garcia's Finger", dedicated to the singer, which was released as a b-side with their single "Pretty Noose".
Numerous music festivals across the United States and Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK hold annual events in memory of Jerry Garcia.
On May 14, 2015, an all-star lineup held a tribute concert for Garcia at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. The event was called "Dear Jerry".
In 2015, Hunter and Garcia were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Hunter accepted the award along with Garcia's daughter, Trixie Garcia, who accepted on behalf of her father.
In 2015, Jerry Garcia's wife, Manasha Garcia and their daughter, Keelin Garcia launched The Jerry Garcia Foundation, a nonprofit charity that supports projects for artistic, environmental, and humanitarian causes. The Foundation's Board members are Bob Weir, Peter Shapiro, Glenn Fischer, Irwin Sternberg, Daniel Shiner, TRI Studios CEO, Christopher McCutcheon and Fender Music Foundation Executive Director,
Lynn Robison. Keelin Garcia said, "It is a tremendous honor to participate in nonprofit work that is in accordance with my father's values."
In 2018, Jerry Garcia family members, Keelin Garcia and Manasha Garcia launched the Jerry Garcia Music Arts independent music label.
On November 18, 2021, it was announced Jonah Hill would portray Garcia in a forthcoming Grateful Dead biopic written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski directed by Martin Scorsese for Apple TV+.
Discography
New Riders of the Purple Sage – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1971
Hooteroll? – Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia – 1971
Garcia – Jerry Garcia – 1972
Live at Keystone – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1973
Compliments – Jerry Garcia – 1974
Old & In the Way – Old & In the Way – 1975
Reflections – Jerry Garcia – 1976
Cats Under the Stars – Jerry Garcia Band – 1978
Run for the Roses – Jerry Garcia – 1982
Vintage NRPS – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1986
Keystone Encores – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1988
Almost Acoustic – Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band – 1988
Jerry Garcia / David Grisman – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1991
Jerry Garcia Band – Jerry Garcia Band – 1991
Not for Kids Only – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1993
Notes
References
Sources
External links
The official homepage of Jerry Garcia
Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jerry Garcia on Fretbase
The Jerry Site
Official Grateful Dead website
Jerry Garcia discography at deaddisc.com
Jerry Garcia autopsy
Jerry Day: A Civic and Cultural Celebration of Jerry Garcia held in San Francisco
FBI Records: The Vault - Jerry Garcia at vault.fbi.gov
Jerry Garcia's Army personnel file at the National Archives
TEAM
Garcia's Guitars & Gear Directory
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"The following is a list of episodes for the television series Too Close for Comfort. The first two seasons have been released on DVD by Rhino Entertainment.\n\nSeries overview\n\nEpisodes\n\nSeason 1 (1980–81)\n\nSeason 2 (1981–82)\nStarting with the episode \"What's Our Rush\", Jim J. Bullock (Monroe Ficus) is upgraded to series regular status and appears in the opening credits from that point on (with the exception of the season two episodes \"Where There's a Will\", \"The Remaking of Monroe\" and \"When the Bough Breaks\", which were aired out of production order).\n\nSeason 3 (1982–83)\nThis season was the last to air on ABC, as it was cancelled at the end of the season due to declining ratings as a result of the show's move to Thursday nights, as part of a lineup of short-lived freshman series.\n\nSeason 4 (1984)\nBeginning this season, Too Close for Comfort began airing in first-run syndication, after Metromedia Producers Corporation began distributing the series.\n\nSeason 5 (1985)\nDeborah Van Valkenburgh (Jackie Rush) appears in only nine episodes (\"Drawing Room\", \"Nearly Departed\", \"My Son, the PhD\", \"All in a Day's Unemployment\", \"And Baby Makes Two\", \"For Every Man, There's Two Women\", \"Finders Keepers\", \"These Stupid Things Remind Me Of You\", and \"Arrividerci, Jackie\").\nJoshua Goodwin takes over the role of Andrew Rush for remainder of the series, though appears in only twelve episodes over the course of the next two seasons.\n\nSeason 6 (1986–87)\nThis season, the series was renamed The Ted Knight Show during the original broadcast season, but in reruns the name Too Close for Comfort was used in the titles.\nLydia Cornell (Sara Rush) and Deborah Van Valkenburgh (Jackie Rush) do not appear this season, while Pat Carroll (Hope Stinson) and Lisa Antille (Lisa Flores) join the cast.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n \n\nLists of American sitcom episodes",
"\"Dear John\" is a song by Scottish singer-songwriter Eddi Reader, which was released in 1994 as the third and final single from her second studio album Eddi Reader. It was written by Kirsty MacColl and Mark E. Nevin, and produced by Greg Penny. \"Dear John\" reached No. 48 in the UK and remained in the charts for two weeks. In 1995, the song was nominated for \"Best song musically and lyrically\" at the Ivor Novello Awards.\n\nBackground\n\"Dear John\" was inspired by the end of MacColl's ten year marriage to Steve Lillywhite. It was originally intended for inclusion on her 1993 album Titanic Days, however she considered it too emotional and personal, and offered it to Reader instead. MacColl's demo version, which was recorded at Nevin's house, would later surface on the 2005 compilation From Croydon to Cuba: An Anthology.\n\nNevin said of the song in the 2001 BBC documentary The Life and Songs of Kirsty MacColl: \"It was really Kirsty admitting violently that her marriage was over. I remember when she first sung me the lyrics, I put my arms around her and she cried, and I cried because I knew it was the end.\" He told Ian Peel of Record Collector: \"\"Dear John\" was literally Kirsty's Dear John note to her husband, Steve, and just too close to the bone. You can hear how emotional Kirsty was when she was singing it [on the demo version]. We ended up giving the song to Eddi Reader.\" Reader told Insight in 2019 that performing \"Dear John\" live \"can be difficult\". She added: \"It was written by people in the misery of divorce then sung at the time by me, in the misery of that too!\"\n\nReception\nIn a review of Eddi Reader, Jan Moir of The Guardian described the song as a \"big ballad\" and considered it the best track on the album. Rick Anderson of AllMusic felt \"Dear John\" was \"perhaps the tenderest kiss-off song ever written\".\n\nTrack listing\n7\" single\n\"Dear John\" - 4:08\n\"Battersea Moon\" (Jay's Edit) - 4:12\n\nCD single\n\"Dear John\" - 4:08\n\"When I Watch You Sleeping\" (Demo Version) - 3:53\n\"What You Do With What You've Got\" - 4:37\n\"That's Fair\" - 4:44\n\nPersonnel\n Eddi Reader - vocals\n Mark E. Nevin - guitar\n David Piltch - bass\n Roy Dodds - drums\n\nProduction\n Greg Penny - producer\n John Ingoldsby - engineer, mixing\n Andy Strange, Steve Holroyd - assistant engineers\n Chris Bellman - mastering\n Thomas Dolby - remix of \"What You Do With What You've Got\"\n Eddi Reader, Kevin Moloney, Roy Dodds - producers of \"What You Do With What You've Got\"\n The Patron Saints of Imperfection - producers of \"That's Fair\"\n\nOther\n Kevin Westenberg - photography\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n1994 songs\n1994 singles\nKirsty MacColl songs\nSongs written by Kirsty MacColl\nBlanco y Negro Records singles"
] |
[
"Jerry Garcia",
"Death",
"When was he found",
"August 9, 1995,",
"what time",
"4:23 am,",
"what was this close too",
"53rd birthday,"
] | C_a95583dc963548a79d885ace2c196575_0 | how close was this | 4 | How close was Jerry Garcia's death date to his 53rd birthday? | Jerry Garcia | On August 9, 1995, at 4:23 am, eight days after his 53rd birthday, Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes--all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb; I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred Garcia's former wives from the ceremony. On August 13, approximately 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn. On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons, accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges River at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes. CANNOTANSWER | eight days after | Jerome John Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known for being a principal songwriter, the lead guitarist and a vocalist with the rock band the Grateful Dead, of which he was a founding member and which came to prominence during the counterculture of the 1960s. Although he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader of the band.
As one of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead for their entire 30-year career (1965–1995). Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), the Jerry Garcia Band, Old & In the Way, the Garcia/Grisman and Garcia/Kahn acoustic duos, Legion of Mary, and New Riders of the Purple Sage (which he co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known for his distinctive guitar playing, and was ranked 13th in Rolling Stones "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" cover story in 2003. In the 2015 version of the list he was ranked at #46.
Garcia was also renowned for his musical and technical ability, particularly his ability to play a variety of instruments and sustain long improvisations with the Grateful Dead. Garcia believed that improvisation took stress away from his playing and allowed him to make spur of the moment decisions that he would not have made intentionally. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Garcia noted that "my own preferences are for improvisation, for making it up as I go along. The idea of picking, of eliminating possibilities by deciding, that's difficult for me". Originating from the days of the "acid tests", these improvisations were a form of exploration rather than playing a song already written.
Later in life, Garcia struggled with diabetes and in 1986, went into a diabetic coma that nearly cost him his life. Although his overall health improved somewhat after that, he continued to struggle with obesity, smoking, and longstanding heroin and cocaine addictions. He was staying in a California drug rehabilitation facility when he died of a heart attack on August 9, 1995, at the age of 53.
Early life
Garcia's ancestors on his father's side were from Galicia in northwest Spain. His mother's ancestors were Irish and Swedish. He was born in the Excelsior District of San Francisco, California, on August 1, 1942, to Jose Ramon "Joe" Garcia and Ruth Marie "Bobbie" (née Clifford) Garcia, who was herself born in San Francisco. His parents named him after composer Jerome Kern. Jerome John was their second child, preceded by Clifford Ramon "Tiff", who was born in 1937. Shortly before Clifford's birth, their father and a partner leased a building in downtown San Francisco and turned it into a bar, partly in response to Jose being blackballed from a musicians' union for moonlighting.
Garcia was influenced by music at an early age, taking piano lessons for much of his childhood. His father was a retired professional musician and his mother enjoyed playing the piano. His father's extended family—which had immigrated from Spain in 1919—would often sing during reunions.
In 1946, two-thirds of four-year-old Garcia's right middle finger was cut off by his brother in a wood splitting accident, while the family was vacationing in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Garcia later confessed that he often used it to his advantage in his youth, showing it off to other children in his neighborhood.
Less than a year after this incident his father died in a fly fishing accident when the family was vacationing near Arcata in Northern California. He slipped after entering the Trinity River, part of the Six Rivers National Forest, and drowned before other fishermen could reach him. Although Garcia claimed he saw the incident, Dennis McNally, author of the book A Long Strange Trip: The Inside Story of the Grateful Dead, argues Garcia formed the memory after hearing others repeat the story. Blair Jackson, who wrote Garcia: An American Life, notes that a local newspaper article describing Jose's death did not mention Jerry being present when he died.
Excelsior District
Following his father's death, Garcia's mother Ruth took over her husband's bar, buying out his partner for full ownership. She began working full-time there, sending Jerry and his brother to live nearby with her parents, Tillie and William Clifford. During the five-year period in which he lived with his grandparents, Garcia enjoyed a large amount of autonomy and attended Monroe Elementary School. At the school, Garcia was greatly encouraged in his artistic abilities by his third grade teacher: through her, he discovered that "being a creative person was a viable possibility in life." According to Garcia, it was around this time that he was opened up to country and bluegrass music by his grandmother, whom he recalled enjoyed listening to the Grand Ole Opry. His elder brother, Clifford, however, staunchly believed the contrary, insisting that Garcia was "fantasizing all [that] ... she'd been to Opry, but she didn't listen to it on the radio." It was at this point that Garcia started playing the banjo, his first stringed instrument.
Menlo Park
In 1953, Garcia's mother married Wally Matusiewicz. Subsequently, Garcia and his brother moved back home with their mother and new stepfather. However, due to the roughneck reputation of their neighborhood at the time, Garcia's mother moved their family to Menlo Park. During their stay in Menlo Park, Garcia became acquainted with racism and antisemitism, things he disliked intensely. The same year, Garcia was also introduced to rock and roll and rhythm and blues by his brother, and enjoyed listening to Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, B. B. King, Hank Ballard, and, later, Chuck Berry. Clifford often memorized the vocals for his favorite songs, and would then make Garcia learn the harmony parts, a move to which Garcia later attributed much of his early ear training.
In mid-1957, Garcia began smoking cigarettes and was introduced to marijuana. Garcia would later reminisce about the first time he smoked marijuana: "Me and a friend of mine went up into the hills with two joints, the San Francisco foothills, and smoked these joints and just got so high and laughed and roared and went skipping down the streets doing funny things and just having a helluva time". During this time, Garcia also studied at what is now the San Francisco Art Institute. The teacher there was Wally Hedrick, an artist who came to prominence during the 1960s. During the classes, he often encouraged Garcia in his drawing and painting skills. Hedrick also introduced Garcia to the fiction of Jack Kerouac, whom Garcia later cited as a major influence.
San Francisco
In June, Garcia graduated from the local Menlo Oaks school. He then moved with his family back to San Francisco, where they lived in an apartment above the family bar, a newly built replacement for the original, that had been torn down to make way for a freeway entrance. Two months later, on Garcia's fifteenth birthday, his mother bought an accordion for him, to his great disappointment. Garcia had long been captivated by many rhythm and blues artists, especially Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, leaving him craving an electric guitar. After some pleading, his mother exchanged the accordion for a Danelectro with a small amplifier at a local pawnshop. Garcia's stepfather, who was somewhat proficient with instruments, helped tune his guitar to an unusual open tuning.
Cazadero
After a short stint at Denman Junior High School, Garcia attended tenth grade at Balboa High School in 1958, where he often got into trouble for skipping classes and fighting. Consequently, in 1959, Garcia's mother again moved the family to a safer environment, to Cazadero, a small town in Sonoma County, north of San Francisco. This turn of events did not sit well with Garcia, who had to travel by bus to Analy High School in Sebastopol, the nearest school. Garcia did, however, join a band at his school known as the Chords. After performing in and winning a contest, the band's reward was recording a song. They chose "Raunchy" by Bill Justis.
Recording career
Relocation and band beginnings
Garcia stole his mother's car in 1960, and was given the option of joining the United States Army in lieu of prison. He received basic training at Fort Ord. After training, he was transferred to Fort Winfield Scott in the Presidio of San Francisco. Garcia spent most of his time in the army at his leisure, missing roll call and accruing many counts of being AWOL. As a result, Garcia was given a general discharge on December 14, 1960.
In January 1961, Garcia drove down to East Palo Alto to see Laird Grant, an old friend from middle school. He had bought a 1950 Cadillac sedan from a cook in the army, which barely made it to Grant's residence before it broke down. Garcia spent the next few weeks sleeping where friends would allow, eventually using his car as a home. Through Grant, Garcia met Dave McQueen in February, who, after hearing Garcia perform some blues music, introduced him to local people and to the Chateau, a rooming house located near Stanford University which was then a popular hangout.
On February 20, 1961, Garcia got into a car with Paul Speegle, a sixteen-year-old artist and acquaintance of Garcia; Lee Adams, the house manager of the Chateau and driver of the car; and Alan Trist, a companion of theirs. After speeding past the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital, the driver encountered a curve and, speeding around , crashed into the guard rail, sending the car rolling turbulently. Garcia was hurled through the windshield of the car into a nearby field with such force he was literally thrown out of his shoes and would later be unable to recall the ejection. Lee Adams, the driver, and Alan Trist, who was seated in the back, were thrown from the car as well, suffering from abdominal injuries and a spine fracture, respectively. Garcia escaped with a broken collarbone, while Speegle, still in the car, was fatally injured.
Lee's reckless driving and crash served as an awakening for Garcia, who later commented: "That's where my life began. Before then I was always living at less than capacity. I was idling. That was the slingshot for the rest of my life. It was like a second chance. Then I got serious". It was at this time that Garcia began to realize that he needed to begin playing the guitar in earnest—a move which meant giving up his love of drawing and painting.
In April 1961, Garcia first met Robert Hunter, who would become a long-time friend of and lyricist for the Grateful Dead, collaborating principally with Garcia. The two involved themselves in the South Bay and San Francisco art and music scenes, sometimes playing at Menlo Park's Kepler's Books. Garcia performed his first concert with Hunter, each earning five dollars. Garcia and Hunter also played in bands (the Wildwood Boys and the Hart Valley Drifters) with David Nelson, who would later play with Garcia in the New Riders of the Purple Sage and contribute to several Grateful Dead album songs.
In 1962, Garcia met Phil Lesh, the eventual bassist of the Grateful Dead, during a party in Menlo Park's bohemian Perry Lane neighborhood (where author Ken Kesey lived). Lesh would later write in his autobiography that Garcia reminded him of pictures he had seen of the composer Claude Debussy, with his "dark, curly hair, goatee, Impressionist eyes". While attending another party in Palo Alto, Lesh approached Garcia to suggest they record Garcia on Lesh's tape recorder and produce a radio show for the progressive, community-supported Berkeley radio station KPFA. Using an old Wollensak tape recorder, they recorded "Matty Groves" and "The Long Black Veil", among several other tunes. The recordings became a central feature of a 90-minute KPFA special broadcast, "The Long Black Veil and Other Ballads: An Evening with Jerry Garcia". The link between KPFA and the Grateful Dead continues to this day, having included many fundraisers, interviews, live concert broadcasts, taped band performances and all-day or all-weekend "Dead-only" marathons.
Garcia soon began playing and teaching acoustic guitar and banjo. One of Garcia's students was Bob Matthews, who later engineered many of the Grateful Dead's albums. Matthews attended Menlo-Atherton High School and was friends with Bob Weir, and on New Year's Eve 1963, he introduced Weir and Garcia.
Between 1962 and 1964, Garcia sang and performed mainly bluegrass, old-time, and folk music. One of the bands Garcia performed with was the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers, a bluegrass act. The group consisted of Garcia on guitar, banjo, vocals, and harmonica, Marshall Leicester on banjo, guitar, and vocals, and Dick Arnold on fiddle and vocals. Soon after this, Garcia, Weir, Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, and several of their friends formed a jug band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions. Around this time, the psychedelic drug LSD was gaining popularity. Garcia first began using LSD in 1964; later, when asked how it changed his life, he remarked: "Well, it changed everything [...] the effect was that it freed me because I suddenly realized that my little attempt at having a straight life and doing that was really a fiction and just wasn't going to work out. Luckily I wasn't far enough into it for it to be shattering or anything; it was like a realization that just made me feel immensely relieved."
In 1965, Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions evolved into the Warlocks, with the addition of Phil Lesh on bass guitar and Bill Kreutzmann on percussion. However, the band discovered that another group (which would later become the Velvet Underground) had recently selected the same name. In response, Garcia came up with "Grateful Dead" by opening a Funk & Wagnalls dictionary to an entry for "Grateful dead". The definition for "Grateful dead" was "a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". The band's first reaction was disapproval. Garcia later explained the group's reaction: "I didn't like it really, I just found it to be really powerful. [Bob] Weir didn't like it, [Bill] Kreutzmann didn't like it and nobody really wanted to hear about it." Despite their dislike of the name, it quickly spread by word of mouth, and soon became their official title.
Career with the Grateful Dead
Garcia served as lead guitarist, as well as one of the principal vocalists and songwriters of the Grateful Dead for its entire career. Garcia composed such songs as "Dark Star", "Franklin's Tower", and "Scarlet Begonias", among many others. Robert Hunter, an ardent collaborator with the band, wrote the lyrics to all but a few of Garcia's songs.
Garcia was well-noted for his "soulful extended guitar improvisations", which would frequently feature interplay between him and his fellow band members. His fame, as well as the band's, arguably rested on their ability to never play a song the same way twice. Often, Garcia would take cues from rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, remarking that "there are some [...] kinds of ideas that would really throw me if I had to create a harmonic bridge between all the things going on rhythmically with two drums and Phil [Lesh's] innovative bass playing. Weir's ability to solve that sort of problem is extraordinary. [...] Harmonically, I take a lot of my solo cues from Bob."
When asked to describe his approach to soloing, Garcia commented: "It keeps on changing. I still basically revolve around the melody and the way it's broken up into phrases as I perceive them. With most solos, I tend to play something that phrases the way the melody does; my phrases may be more dense or have different value, but they'll occur in the same places in the song. [...]"
Garcia and the band toured almost constantly from their formation in 1965 until Garcia's death in 1995. Periodically, there were breaks due to exhaustion or health problems, often due to Garcia's drug use. During their three-decade span, the Grateful Dead played 2,314 shows.
Garcia's guitar-playing was eclectic. He melded elements from the various kinds of music that influenced him. Echoes of bluegrass playing (such as Arthur Smith and Doc Watson) could be heard. There was also early rock (like Lonnie Mack, James Burton, and Chuck Berry), contemporary blues (Freddie King and Lowell Fulsom), country and western (Roy Nichols and Don Rich), and jazz (Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt) to be heard in Garcia's style. Don Rich was the sparkling country guitar player in Buck Owens's "the Buckaroos" band of the 1960s, but besides Rich's style, both Garcia's pedal steel guitar playing (on Grateful Dead records and others) and his standard electric guitar work, were influenced by another of Owens's Buckaroos of that time, pedal steel player Tom Brumley. And as an improvisational soloist, John Coltrane was one of his greatest personal and musical influences.
Garcia later described his playing style as having "descended from barroom rock and roll, country guitar. Just 'cause that's where all my stuff comes from. It's like that blues instrumental stuff that was happening in the late Fifties and early Sixties, like Freddie King." Garcia's style could vary with the song being played and the instrument he was using, but his playing had a number of so-called "signatures". Among these were lead lines based on rhythmic triplets (examples include the songs "Good Morning Little School Girl", "New Speedway Boogie", "Brokedown Palace", "Deal", "Loser", "Truckin'", "That's It for the Other One", "U.S. Blues", "Sugaree", and "Don't Ease Me In").
Side projects
In addition to the Grateful Dead, Garcia had numerous side projects, the most notable being the Jerry Garcia Band. He was also involved with various acoustic projects such as Old & In the Way and other bluegrass bands, including collaborations with noted bluegrass mandolinist David Grisman. The documentary film Grateful Dawg, co-produced by Gillian Grisman and former NBC producer Pamela Hamilton chronicles the deep, long-term friendship between Garcia and Grisman. When Garcia and Grisman released Not For Kids Only, Hamilton produced their interview and concert for NBC. After several years of producing stories on the Grateful Dead and band members' side projects, Hamilton interviewed Bob Weir for a feature on Garcia's death marking the end of an era.
Other groups of which Garcia was a member at one time or another include the Black Mountain Boys, Legion of Mary, Reconstruction, and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. Garcia was also a fan of jazz artists and improvisation: he played with jazz keyboardists Merl Saunders and Howard Wales for many years in various groups and jam sessions, and he appeared on saxophonist Ornette Coleman's 1988 album, Virgin Beauty. His collaboration with Merl Saunders and Muruga Booker on the world music album Blues From the Rainforest launched the Rainforest Band.
Garcia also spent a lot of time in the recording studio helping out fellow musician friends in session work, often adding guitar, vocals, pedal steel, sometimes banjo and piano and even producing. He played on over 50 studio albums, the styles of which were eclectic and varied, including bluegrass, rock, folk, blues, country, jazz, electronic music, gospel, funk, and reggae. Artists who sought Garcia's help included the likes of Jefferson Airplane (most notably Surrealistic Pillow, Garcia being listed as their "spiritual advisor"). Garcia himself recalled in a mid-1967 interview that he'd played the high lead on "Today," played on "Plastic Fantastic Lover" and "Comin' Back to Me" on that album. Others include Tom Fogerty, David Bromberg, Robert Hunter (Liberty, on Relix Records), Paul Pena, Peter Rowan, Warren Zevon, Country Joe McDonald, Pete Sears, Ken Nordine, Ornette Coleman, Bruce Hornsby, Bob Dylan, It's a Beautiful Day, and many more. In 1995 Garcia played on three tracks for the CD Blue Incantation by guitarist Sanjay Mishra, making it his last studio collaboration.
Throughout the early 1970s, Garcia, Lesh, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, and David Crosby collaborated intermittently with MIT-educated composer and biologist Ned Lagin on several projects in the realm of early ambient music; these include the album Seastones (released by the Ned Lagin on the Round Records subsidiary) and L, an unfinished dance work composed by Ned Lagin. In 1970, Garcia participated in the soundtrack for the film Zabriskie Point.
Garcia also played pedal steel guitar for fellow-San Francisco musicians New Riders of the Purple Sage from their initial dates in 1969 to October 1971, when increased commitments with the Dead forced him to opt out of the group. He appears as a band member on their debut album New Riders of the Purple Sage, and produced Home, Home on the Road, a 1974 live album by the band. He also contributed pedal steel guitar to the enduring hit "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. Garcia also played steel guitar licks on Brewer & Shipley's 1970 album Tarkio. Despite considering himself a novice on the pedal steel, Garcia routinely ranked high in player polls. After a long lapse from playing the pedal steel, he played it once more during several of the Dead's concerts with Bob Dylan in the summer of 1987.
In 1988, Garcia agreed to perform at several major benefits including the "Soviet American Peace Walk" concert at the Band Shell, in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, that drew 25,000 people. He was asked to play by longtime friend and fellow musician, Pete Sears, who played piano with all the bands that day, and also procured all the other musicians. Garcia, Mickey Hart and Steve Parish played the show, then were given a police escort to a Grateful Dead show across the bay later that night. Garcia also played with Nick Gravenites and Pete Sears at a benefit given for Vietnam Veteran and peace activist Brian Willson, who lost both legs below the knee when he attempted to block a train carrying weapons to military dictatorships in El Salvador.
Having previously studied at the San Francisco Art Institute as a teenager, Garcia embarked on a second career in the visual arts in the late 1980s. He created a number of drawings, etchings, and water colors. Garcia's artistic endeavors were represented by the Weir Gallery in Berkeley, California from 1989 to 1996. During this period, Roberta Weir (unrelated to Garcia's bandmate Bob Weir) provided Garcia with new art techniques to use, sponsored his first solo show in 1990, and prepared blank etching plates for him to draw on. These would then be processed and printed by gallery staff and brought back to Garcia for approval and signature, usually with a passing of stacks of paper backstage at a Dead show. His annual shows at the Weir Gallery garnered much attention, leading to further shows in New York and other cities. Garcia was an early adopter of digital art media; his artistic style was as varied as his musical output, and he carried small notebooks for pen and ink sketches wherever he toured. Roberta Weir continues to maintain an archive of the artwork of Jerry Garcia. Perhaps the most widely seen pieces of Jerry Garcia's art are the many editions of men's neckties produced by Stonehenge Ltd. and Mulberry Neckware. Some began as etchings, other designs came from his drawings, paintings, and digital art. Garcia's artwork has since expanded into everything from hotel rooms, wet suits, men's sport shirts, a women's wear line, boxer shorts, hair accessories, cummerbunds, silk scarves and wool rugs.
Personal life
Garcia met his first wife, Sara Ruppenthal, in 1963. She was working at the coffee house in the back of Kepler's Books, where Garcia, Hunter, and Nelson regularly performed. They married on April 23, 1963, and on December 8 of that year their daughter Heather was born.
Carolyn Adams, a Merry Prankster also known as "Mountain Girl" or "M.G.," had a daughter, Sunshine, with Ken Kesey. Mountain Girl married another Prankster, George Walker, but they soon separated. She and Sunshine then moved into 710 Ashbury with Garcia in late 1966 where they would ultimately live together until 1975. In 1994, Sara and Jerry officially divorced after a long separation. Adams gave birth to Garcia's second and third daughters, Annabelle Walker Garcia (February 2, 1970) and Theresa Adams "Trixie" Garcia (September 21, 1974).
In August 1970, Garcia's mother Ruth was involved in a car crash near Twin Peaks in San Francisco. Garcia, who was recording the album American Beauty at the time, often left the sessions to visit his mother with his brother Clifford. She died on September 28, 1970.
In the midst of a March 1973 Grateful Dead engagement at Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, Garcia met Deborah Koons, an aspiring filmmaker from a wealthy Cincinnati, Ohio-based family who would much later marry him and become his widow. After a brief correspondence, he began his relationship with her in mid-1974. This gradually strained his relationship with Adams and culminated in Garcia leaving Adams for Koons in late 1975. The end of his relationship with Koons in 1977 precipitated a brief reconciliation with Adams, including the reestablishment of their household. However, she did not agree with the guitarist's persistent use of narcotics and moved with the children to the Eugene, Oregon area, living near Kesey, in 1978.
Following Adams' departure, Garcia had an affair with Amy Moore. She was a Kentucky-born member of the extended "Grateful Dead family", and the mistress of Texas oil heir Roy Cullen. Their affair lasted circa 1980–1981, and inspired the Garcia-Hunter song "Run for the Roses."
Adams and Garcia were married on December 31, 1981, largely as a result of mutual tax exigencies. Despite the legal codification of their union, she remained in Oregon, while Garcia continued to live near the Grateful Dead's offices in San Rafael, California. Garcia lived with a variety of housemates, including longtime Grateful Dead employee and Jerry Garcia Band manager Rock Scully. Scully, who co-managed the Grateful Dead throughout the mid-to-late 1960s before serving as the band's "advance man" and publicist, was dismissed by the group in 1984 for enabling Garcia's addictions and for allegedly embezzling the Garcia Band's profits. Another housemate was Nora Sage, a Deadhead who became Garcia's housekeeper while studying at the Golden Gate University School of Law. The exact nature of their relationship remains unclear, although it is believed to have been platonic due to Garcia's addictions. She later became his art representative.
While they would briefly reunite following his diabetic coma, Garcia and Adams ultimately divorced in 1994. Phil Lesh has subsequently stated that he rarely saw Adams on any of the band tours. In a 1991 Rolling Stone interview, Garcia stated that "we haven't really lived together since the Seventies".
During the autumn of 1978, Garcia developed a friendship with Shimer College student Manasha Matheson, an artist and music enthusiast. They remained friends over the following nine years before initiating a romantic relationship in Hartford, Connecticut on the Grateful Dead's spring 1987 tour. Jerry and Manasha became parents with the birth of their daughter, Keelin Noel Garcia, on December 20, 1987. On August 17, 1990, Jerry and Manasha married at their San Anselmo, California home in a spiritual ceremony free of legal convention. In 1991, Garcia expressed his delight in finding the time to "actually be a father" to Keelin in contrast to his past relationships with his children. A year later, Garcia dedicated his first art book, Paintings, Drawings and Sketches, "For Manasha, with love, Jerry."
In January 1993, Barbara "Brigid" Meier, a former girlfriend from the early 1960s, reentered Garcia's life for a brief period. Meier claimed, Garcia had considered her to be the "love of his life" and proposed to her during a Hawaiian vacation shortly after their relationship recommenced. Garcia's "love of his life" sentiment was not reserved for one lover, as he expressed the same feelings to several other women in his life. At Garcia's 1995 funeral, Koons declared that she was "the love of his life" while paying her final respects, whereupon Meier and Ruppenthal, who were both in attendance, simultaneously exclaimed, "He said that to me!"
The affair with Meier marked the breakup of Jerry's family life with Manasha and Keelin. Garcia ended the affair with Meier forty-five days later while on tour in Chicago with the Grateful Dead after she confronted him about his drug use.
Shortly thereafter, Garcia renewed his acquaintance with Deborah Koons in the spring of 1993. They married on February 14, 1994, in Sausalito, California. Garcia and Koons were married at the time of his death.
Lifestyle and health
Because of their public profile, Garcia and his collaborators were occasionally singled out in the American government's war on drugs. On October 2, 1967, 710 Ashbury Street in San Francisco (where the Grateful Dead had taken up residence the year before) was raided after a police tip-off. Grateful Dead members Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Ron "Pigpen" McKernan were apprehended on marijuana charges which were later dropped, although Garcia himself was not arrested. The following year, Garcia's picture was used in a defamatory context in a campaign commercial for Richard Nixon.
Most of the band were arrested again in January 1970, after they flew to New Orleans from Hawaii. After returning to their hotel from a performance, the band checked into their rooms, only to be quickly raided by police. Approximately fifteen people were arrested on the spot, including many of the road crew, management, and nearly all of the Grateful Dead except for Garcia, who arrived later, outgoing keyboardist Tom Constanten, who abstained from all drugs as a member of the Church of Scientology, and McKernan, who eschewed illegal drugs in favor of alcohol.
According to Bill Kreutzmann, the band's use of cocaine accelerated throughout the early 1970s. After using heroin in a brothel in 1974 (likely on the band's second European tour), Garcia was introduced to a smokeable form of the drug (initially advertised as refined opium) colloquially known as "Persian" or "Persian Base" during the group's 1975 hiatus. Influenced by the stresses of creating and releasing The Grateful Dead Movie and the acrimonious collapse of the band's independent record labels over the next two years, Garcia became increasingly dependent upon both substances. These factors, combined with the alcohol and drug abuse of several other members of the Grateful Dead, resulted in a turbulent atmosphere. By 1978, the band's chemistry began "cracking and crumbling", resulting in poor group cohesion. As a result, Keith and Donna Jean Godchaux left the band in February 1979.
With the addition of keyboardist/vocalist Brent Mydland that year amid the ongoing coalescence of the Deadhead subculture, the band reached new commercial heights as a touring group on the American arena circuit in the early 1980s, enabling them to forsake studio recording for several years. Nevertheless, this was offset by such factors as the band's atypically large payroll and Garcia's $700-a-day () drug addiction, resulting in the guitarist taking on a frenetic slate of solo touring outside of the Grateful Dead's rigorous schedule, including abbreviated acoustic duo concerts with Jerry Garcia Band bassist John Kahn that were widely rumored to be a funding conduit for their respective addictions.
Though things seemed to be getting better for the band, Garcia's health was declining. By 1983, Garcia's demeanor onstage had appeared to change. Despite still playing the guitar with great passion and intensity, there were times that he would appear disengaged; as such, shows were often inconsistent. Years of heavy tobacco smoking had affected his voice, and he gained considerable weight. By 1984, he would often rest his chin on the microphone during performances. The so-called "endless tour"—the result of years of financial risks, drug use, and poor business decisions—had taken its toll.
Garcia's decade-long heroin addiction culminated in the rest of the band holding an intervention in January 1985. Given the choice between the band or the drugs, Garcia agreed to check into a rehabilitation center in Oakland, California. A few days later in January, before the start of his program in Oakland, Garcia was arrested for drug possession in Golden Gate Park; he subsequently attended a drug diversion program. Throughout 1985, he tapered his drug use on tour and at home with the assistance of Nora Sage; by the spring of 1986, he was completely abstinent.
Precipitated by an unhealthy weight, dehydration, bad eating habits, and a recent relapse on the Grateful Dead's first stadium tour, Garcia collapsed into a diabetic coma in July 1986, waking up five days later. He later spoke about this period of unconsciousness as surreal: "Well, I had some very weird experiences. My main experience was one of furious activity and tremendous struggle in a sort of futuristic, space-ship vehicle with insectoid presences. After I came out of my coma, I had this image of myself as these little hunks of protoplasm that were stuck together kind of like stamps with perforations between them that you could snap off." Garcia's coma had a profound effect on him: it forced him to have to relearn how to play the guitar, as well as other, more basic skills. Within a handful of months, he had recovered, playing with the Jerry Garcia Band and the Grateful Dead again later that year.
After Garcia's recovery, the band released a comeback album In the Dark in 1987, which became their best-selling studio album. Inspired by Garcia's improved health, a successful album and the continuing emergence of Mydland as a third frontman, the band's energy and chemistry reached a new peak in the late 1980s.
Amid a litany of personal problems, Mydland died of a speedball overdose in July 1990. His death greatly affected Garcia, leading him to believe that the band's chemistry would never be the same. Before beginning the fall tour, the band acquired keyboardists Vince Welnick and Bruce Hornsby. The power of Hornsby's performances drove Garcia to new heights on stage. However, as the band continued through 1991, Garcia became concerned with the band's future. He was exhausted from five straight years of touring. He thought a break was necessary, mainly so that the band could come back with fresh material. The idea was put off by the pressures of management, and the touring continued. Garcia began using heroin again after several years of intermittent prescription opiate use. Though his relapse was brief, the band was quick to react. Soon after the last show of the tour in Denver, Garcia was confronted by the band with another intervention. After a disastrous meeting, Garcia invited Phil Lesh over to his home in San Rafael, California, where he explained that after the meeting he would start attending a methadone clinic. Garcia said that he wanted to clean up in his own way, and return to making music.
After returning from the band's 1992 summer tour, Garcia became sick, a throwback to his diabetic coma in 1986. Manasha Garcia nursed Jerry back to health and organized a team of health professionals which included acupuncturist Yen Wei Choong and Randy Baker, MD, a holistic family physician to treat him at home. Garcia recovered over the following days, despite the Grateful Dead having to cancel their fall tour to allow him time to recuperate. Garcia reduced his cigarette smoking and began losing weight. He also became a vegetarian.
Despite these improvements, Garcia's physical and mental condition continued to decline throughout 1993 and 1994. He began to use narcotics again to dull the pain.
In light of his second drug relapse and current condition, Garcia checked himself into the Betty Ford Center during July 1995. His stay was limited, lasting only two weeks. Motivated by the experience, he then checked into the Serenity Knolls treatment center in Forest Knolls, California, where he died.
Death
Garcia died in his room at the rehabilitation clinic on August 9, 1995. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes—all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that, upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb. I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former pro basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred two of Garcia's former wives from the ceremony.
On August 13, about 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Haight-Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn.
On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes.
Musical equipment
Garcia played many guitars during his career, which ranged from student and budget models to custom-made instruments. During his thirty-five year career as a professional musician, Garcia used about 25 guitars.
In 1965, when Garcia was playing with the Warlocks, he used a Guild Starfire, which he also used on the début album of the Grateful Dead. Beginning in late 1967 and ending in 1968, Garcia played black or gold mid-1950s Gibson Les Paul guitars with P-90 pickups. In 1969, he picked up the Gibson SG and used it for most of that year and 1970, except for a small period in between where he used a sunburst Fender Stratocaster.
During Garcia's "pedal steel flirtation period" (as Bob Weir referred to it in Anthem to Beauty), from approximately 1969 to 1972, he initially played a Fender instrument before upgrading to the ZB Custom D-10, especially in his earlier public performances. Although this was a double neck guitar, Garcia used the "E9 neck and the three pedals to raise the tone and two levers to lower it." He employed an Emmons D-10 at the Grateful Dead's and New Riders of the Purple Sage's final appearances at the Fillmore East in April 1971.
In 1969, Garcia played pedal steel on three notable outside recordings: the track "The Farm" on the Jefferson Airplane album Volunteers, the track "Oh Mommy" by Brewer and Shipley and the hit single "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young from their album Déjà Vu, released in 1970. Garcia played on the latter album in exchange for harmony lessons for the Grateful Dead, who were at the time recording Workingman's Dead.
In 1971, Garcia began playing a sunburst Les Paul. In March and April 1971 – the time period during which the Grateful Dead recorded its second live album, Grateful Dead – Garcia played the "Peanut," a guitar he had received from Rick Turner, who had custom built the guitar's body and incorporated the neck, pickups, and hardware from an early '60s Les Paul.
In May, Garcia began using a 1957 natural finish Stratocaster that had been given to him by Graham Nash. Garcia added an alligator sticker to the pickguard in the fall of that year. "Alligator" would remain Garcia's principal electric guitar until August 1973.
In the summer of 1971, Garcia also played a double-cutaway Les Paul TV Junior.
While Alligator was in the shop in the summer of 1972, he briefly reverted to the sunburst Stratocaster; this can be seen in Sunshine Daydream.
In late 1972, Garcia purchased the first guitar ("Eagle") made by Alembic luthier Doug Irwin for $850 (). Enamored of Irwin's talents, he immediately commissioned his own custom instrument. This guitar, nicknamed "Wolf" for a memorable sticker Garcia added below the tailpiece, was delivered in May 1973 and replaced Alligator on stage in September. It cost $1,500 (), an extremely high price for the era.
Wolf was made with an ebony fingerboard and featured numerous embellishments like alternating grain designs in the headstock, ivory inlays, and fret marker dots made of sterling silver. The body was composed of western maple wood which had a core of purpleheart. Garcia later had Irwin (who ultimately left Alembic to start his own business) replace the electronics inside the guitar, at which point he added his own logo to the headstock alongside the Alembic logo. The system included two interchangeable plates for configuring pickups: one was made for strictly single coils, while the other accommodated humbuckers. Shortly after receiving the modified instrument, Garcia commissioned another custom guitar from Irwin with one caveat: "Don't hold back."
During the Grateful Dead's 1974 European tour, Wolf was dropped on several occasions, one of which caused a minor crack in the headstock. Following filming of The Grateful Dead Movie (in which the guitar is prominently visible) a month later, Garcia returned it to Irwin for repairs. Throughout its absence, Garcia predominantly played several Travis Bean guitars, including the TB1000A (1975) and the TB500 (1976-1977). On September 28, 1977, Irwin delivered the refurbished Wolf back to Garcia. The wolf sticker which gave the guitar its name had now been inlaid into the instrument; it also featured an effects loop between the pick-ups and controls (so inline effects would "see" the same signal at all times) which was bypassable. Irwin also put a new face on the headstock with only his logo (he later claimed to have built the guitar himself, though pictures through time clearly show the progression of logos, from Alembic, to Alembic & Irwin, to only Irwin).
Nearly seven years after he commissioned it, Garcia received his second custom guitar ("Tiger") from Irwin in the summer of 1979.
He first employed the instrument in concert at a Grateful Dead performance at the Oakland Auditorium Arena on August 4, 1979. Its name was derived from the inlay on the preamp cover.
The body of Tiger was of rich quality: the top layer was cocobolo, with the preceding layers being maple stripe, vermilion, and flame maple, in that order. The neck was made of western maple with an ebony fingerboard. The pickups consisted of a single coil DiMarzio SDS-1 and two humbucker DiMarzio Super IIs which were easily removable due to Garcia's preference for replacing his pickups every year or two. The electronics were composed of an effects bypass loop, which allowed Garcia to control the sound of his effects through the tone and volume controls on the guitar, and a preamplifier/buffer which rested behind a plate in the back of the guitar. Fully outfitted, Tiger weighed . This was Garcia's principal guitar for the next eleven years, and most played.
In the late 1980s Garcia, Weir and CSN (along with many others) endorsed Alvarez Yairi acoustic guitars. There are many photographs circulating (mostly promotional) of Garcia playing a DY99 Virtuoso Custom with a Modulus Graphite neck. He opted to play with the less decorated model but the promotional photo from the Alvarez Yairi catalog has him holding the "tree of life" model. This hand-built guitar was notable for the collaboration between Japanese luthier Kazuo Yairi and Modulus Graphite of San Rafael. As with most things Garcia, with his passing, the DY99 model is highly valued among collectors.
In 1990, Irwin completed "Rosebud", Garcia's fourth custom guitar. It was similar to his previous guitar Tiger in many respects, but featured different inlays and electronics, tone and volume controls, and weight. Rosebud, unlike Tiger, was configured with three humbuckers; the neck and bridge pickups shared a tone control, while the middle had its own. Atop the guitar was a Roland GK-2 pickup which fed the controller set inside the guitar. The GK2 was used in junction with the Roland GR-50 rack mount synthesizer. The GR-50 synthesizer in turn drove a Korg M1R synthesizer producing the MIDI effects heard during live performances of this period as heard on the Grateful Dead recording Without a Net. Sections of the guitar were hollowed out to bring the weight down to . The inlay, a dancing skeleton holding a rose, covers a plate just below the bridge. The final cost of the instrument was $11,000 ().
In 1993, carpenter-turned-luthier Stephen Cripe tried his hand at making an instrument for Garcia. After researching Tiger through pictures and films, Cripe set out on what would soon become known as "Lightning Bolt", again named for its inlay.
The guitar used Brazilian rosewood for the fingerboard and East Indian rosewood for the body, which, with admitted irony from Cripe, had been taken from a 19th-century bed used by opium smokers. Built purely from guesswork, Lightning Bolt was a hit with Garcia, who began using the guitar exclusively. Soon after, Garcia requested that Cripe build a backup of the guitar. Cripe, who had not measured or photographed the original, was told simply to "wing it."
Cripe later delivered the backup, which was known by the name "Top Hat". Garcia bought it from him for $6,500, making it the first guitar that Cripe had ever sold. However, infatuated with Lightning Bolt, Garcia rarely used the backup.
After Garcia's death, the ownership of Wolf and Tiger came into question. According to Garcia's will, his guitars were bequeathed to Doug Irwin, who had constructed them.
The remaining Grateful Dead members disagreed – they considered his guitars to be property of the band, leading to a lawsuit between the two parties. In 2001, Irwin won the case. However, nearly having been left destitute from a traffic accident in 1998, he decided to place the guitars up for auction in hopes of being able to start another guitar workshop.
On May 8, 2002, Wolf and Tiger, among other memorabilia, were placed for auction at Studio 54 in New York City. Tiger was sold for $957,500, and Wolf for $789,500. Together, the pair sold for $1.74 million, setting a new world record. Wolf went into in the private collection of Daniel Pritzker who kept it in a secure climate controlled room in a private residence at Utica, N.Y. Tiger went to the private collection of Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.
In May 2017, Wolf was again auctioned, but this time for charity. Pritzker decided to sell the guitar and donate all proceeds to the Montgomery, Alabama based Southern Poverty Law Center.
Brian Halligan placed the winning bid totaling $1.9M.
For the majority of 2019 Wolf and Tiger were included in the Play it Loud exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. On June 23, 2019 John Mayer played Wolf with Dead & Co. at Citi Field.
Legacy
Garcia was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Grateful Dead in 1994. He declined to attend the ceremony; the band jokingly brought a cardboard cutout of Garcia out on stage in his absence.
In 1987, Vermont ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's introduced their Cherry Garcia flavor dedicated to him. It was the first ice cream flavor dedicated to a musician.
In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Jerry Garcia 13th in their list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
According to fellow Bay Area guitar player Henry Kaiser, Garcia is "the most recorded guitarist in history. With more than 2,200 Grateful Dead concerts, and 1,000 Jerry Garcia Band concerts captured on tape – as well as numerous studio sessions – there are about 15,000 hours of his guitar work preserved for the ages."
On July 30, 2004, Melvin Seals was the first Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) member to headline an outdoor music and camping festival called "The Grateful Garcia Gathering". Jerry Garcia Band drummer David Kemper joined Melvin Seals and JGB in 2007. Other musicians and friends of Garcia include Donna Jean Godchaux, Mookie Siegel, Pete Sears, G.E. Smith, Chuck Hammer, Barry Sless, Jackie Greene, Brian Lesh, Sanjay Mishra, and Mark Karan.
On July 21, 2005, the San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission passed a resolution to name the amphitheater in McLaren Park "The Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." The amphitheater is located in the Excelsior District, where Garcia grew up. The first show to happen at the Jerry Garcia Amphitheater was Jerry Day 2005 on August 7, 2005. Jerry's brother, Tiff Garcia, was the first person to welcome everybody to the "Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." Jerry Day is an annual celebration of Garcia in his childhood neighborhood. The dedication ceremony (Jerry Day 2) on October 29, 2005, was officiated by mayor Gavin Newsom.
On September 24, 2005, the Comes a Time: A Celebration of the Music & Spirit of Jerry Garcia tribute concert was held at the Hearst Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California. The concert featured Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, Bruce Hornsby, Trey Anastasio, Warren Haynes, Jimmy Herring, Michael Kang, Jay Lane, Jeff Chimenti, Mark Karan, Robin Sylvester, Kenny Brooks, Melvin Seals, Merl Saunders, Marty Holland, Stu Allen, Gloria Jones, and Jackie LaBranch.
Georgia-based composer Lee Johnson released an orchestral tribute to the music of the Grateful Dead, recorded with the Russian National Orchestra, entitled "Dead Symphony: Lee Johnson Symphony No. 6." Johnson was interviewed on NPR on the July 26, 2008 broadcast of Weekend Edition, and gave much credit to the genius and craft of Garcia's songwriting. A live performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Johnson himself, was held Friday, August 1.
In 2010 the Santa Barbara Bowl in California opened Jerry Garcia Glen along the walk up to the venue. There is a statue of Garcia's right hand along the way.
Seattle rock band Soundgarden wrote and recorded the instrumental song "Jerry Garcia's Finger", dedicated to the singer, which was released as a b-side with their single "Pretty Noose".
Numerous music festivals across the United States and Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK hold annual events in memory of Jerry Garcia.
On May 14, 2015, an all-star lineup held a tribute concert for Garcia at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. The event was called "Dear Jerry".
In 2015, Hunter and Garcia were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Hunter accepted the award along with Garcia's daughter, Trixie Garcia, who accepted on behalf of her father.
In 2015, Jerry Garcia's wife, Manasha Garcia and their daughter, Keelin Garcia launched The Jerry Garcia Foundation, a nonprofit charity that supports projects for artistic, environmental, and humanitarian causes. The Foundation's Board members are Bob Weir, Peter Shapiro, Glenn Fischer, Irwin Sternberg, Daniel Shiner, TRI Studios CEO, Christopher McCutcheon and Fender Music Foundation Executive Director,
Lynn Robison. Keelin Garcia said, "It is a tremendous honor to participate in nonprofit work that is in accordance with my father's values."
In 2018, Jerry Garcia family members, Keelin Garcia and Manasha Garcia launched the Jerry Garcia Music Arts independent music label.
On November 18, 2021, it was announced Jonah Hill would portray Garcia in a forthcoming Grateful Dead biopic written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski directed by Martin Scorsese for Apple TV+.
Discography
New Riders of the Purple Sage – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1971
Hooteroll? – Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia – 1971
Garcia – Jerry Garcia – 1972
Live at Keystone – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1973
Compliments – Jerry Garcia – 1974
Old & In the Way – Old & In the Way – 1975
Reflections – Jerry Garcia – 1976
Cats Under the Stars – Jerry Garcia Band – 1978
Run for the Roses – Jerry Garcia – 1982
Vintage NRPS – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1986
Keystone Encores – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1988
Almost Acoustic – Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band – 1988
Jerry Garcia / David Grisman – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1991
Jerry Garcia Band – Jerry Garcia Band – 1991
Not for Kids Only – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1993
Notes
References
Sources
External links
The official homepage of Jerry Garcia
Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jerry Garcia on Fretbase
The Jerry Site
Official Grateful Dead website
Jerry Garcia discography at deaddisc.com
Jerry Garcia autopsy
Jerry Day: A Civic and Cultural Celebration of Jerry Garcia held in San Francisco
FBI Records: The Vault - Jerry Garcia at vault.fbi.gov
Jerry Garcia's Army personnel file at the National Archives
TEAM
Garcia's Guitars & Gear Directory
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Singers from San Francisco
20th-century American singers
Psychedelic drug advocates
New Riders of the Purple Sage members
20th-century American guitarists
Old & In the Way members
Reconstruction (band) members
Jerry Garcia Band members
Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band members
Rainforest Band members
Legion of Mary (band) members
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20th-century American male singers
Singer-songwriters from California
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"\"How Do I Get Close\" is a song released by the British rock group, the Kinks. Released on the band's critically panned LP, UK Jive, the song was written by the band's main songwriter, Ray Davies.\n\nRelease and reception\n\"How Do I Get Close\" was first released on the Kinks' album UK Jive. UK Jive failed to make an impression on fans and critics alike, as the album failed to chart in the UK and only reached No. 122 in America. However, despite the failure of the album and the lead UK single, \"Down All the Days (Till 1992)\", \"How Do I Get Close\" was released as the second British single from the album, backed with \"Down All the Days (Till 1992)\". The single failed to chart. The single was also released in America (backed with \"War is Over\"), where, although it did not chart on the Billboard Hot 100, it hit No. 21 on the Mainstream Rock Tracks chart, the highest on that chart since \"Working At The Factory\" in 1986. \"How Do I Get Close\" also appeared on the compilation album Lost & Found (1986-1989).\n\nStephen Thomas Erlewine cited \"How Do I Get Close\" as a highlight from both UK Jive and Lost & Found (1986-1989).\n\nReferences\n\nThe Kinks songs\n1990 singles\nSongs written by Ray Davies\nSong recordings produced by Ray Davies\n1989 songs\nMCA Records singles",
"Up Close is an American sports interview show that has aired on ESPN+ since 2021 and had aired on ESPN from 1981–2001.\n\nHistory\n\nEarly years\nThe program debuted in 1981 on USA Network and was created by the advertising agency Foote, Cone and Belding to advertise one of its clients, Mazda cars. Mazda SportsLook moved to ESPN in 1982 and was subsequently rechristened Up Close.\n\nTime slots\nOnce it arrived at ESPN, SportsLook was slotted before SportsCenter. The show aired at 6 p.m. Eastern time, followed by SportsCenter at 6:30. The show remained in that slot until September 1999, when SportsCenter was expanded to an hour and Up Close, as it was then renamed, moved to 5:30 p.m.\n\nHosts\nThe original host of Up Close was Roy Firestone, who served as host for 13 years. During this time, both Firestone and the show won many CableACE Awards, then the gold standard for cable television programming. When Firestone left in 1994, Chris Myers became the new host; he stayed there until 1998 and enjoyed the highest ratings in the history of the program. Gary Miller was the show's host when Up Close signed off in 2001. Sage Steele became the host when the show was brought back in 2021.\n\nNotable interviews\nRoy Firestone was the subject of extensive criticism regarding what has been characterized as a \"softball\" and \"chummy\" 1992 ESPN interview with O. J. Simpson (or, as he called Simpson in the interview, \"Juice\") during which he asserted that Simpson's January 1989 arrest and subsequent conviction for beating his wife, Nicole, unfairly distorted Simpson's reputation to the point that Simpson was portrayed by the press as \"the bad guy\" merely for having \"a little bit too much to drink.\" He further expressed his annoyance with the press' reports of Simpson's arrest and conviction for beating Nicole because the press, in reporting the facts, had the temerity to portray Simpson as \"a wife beater\" (the offense for which he was convicted). He then gave Simpson a free pass to downplay the criminal beating of Nicole and characterize it as an argument that got a \"little loud,\" asserting that he and Nicole were \"both guilty.\" These assertions, which were contrary to the public record, were not only unchallenged by Firestone, but were actively encouraged and endorsed by him. This criticism was renewed upon the release of the documentary OJ: Made In America which included an excerpt from the interview in which Firestone expresses these sentiments and where the \"chumminess\" is apparent. Firestone has recently expressed remorse for how he handled the interview, stating, \"The Simpson interview is one of the most tragic examples of how the media (including me) and the public trusted and accommodated their heroes, believing their mythology and perpetuating their deification.\"\n\nChris Myers would later also interview O. J. Simpson live in November 1995; this was Simpson's first full-length interview since he was acquitted in the \"trial of the century\" a month earlier.\n\nSome interviews, notably those with college basketball coaches Jim Valvano and Bob Knight, are still occasionally shown on ESPN Classic under the name Up Close Classics.\n\nBroadcast locations\nIn 1999, Up Close broadcasts were moved from studios in Los Angeles to the ESPN Zone in Anaheim, on Disneyland property.\n\nCancellation\nEventually, declining ratings and the rise of a confrontational style of talk led to the show's demise, which took place on Friday, October 19, 2001. Three days later, Up Close was replaced with Unscripted with Chris Connelly, which updated the Up Close format to be more contemporary. The new program lasted less than a year.\n\n2021 Revival\nOn May 27, 2021, SportsCenter anchor Sage Steele revealed during the show's noon ET episode that she would host a reboot of Up Close, exclusively on the digital subscription service ESPN+. The first episode of the reimagined show was made available for streaming to ESPN+ subscribers on June 30, 2021.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n ESPN.com - TVLISTINGS - Up Close\n 2001 Up Close archive\n 2000 Up Close archive\n 1999 Up Close archive\n\n1980s American television talk shows\n1990s American television talk shows\n2000s American television talk shows\n2020s American television talk shows\nESPN original programming\nUSA Network original programming\nAmerican sports television series\n1981 American television series debuts\n2001 American television series endings\nUSA Network Sports"
] |
[
"Jerry Garcia",
"Death",
"When was he found",
"August 9, 1995,",
"what time",
"4:23 am,",
"what was this close too",
"53rd birthday,",
"how close was this",
"eight days after"
] | C_a95583dc963548a79d885ace2c196575_0 | Where was he found at | 5 | Where was Jerry Garcia found dead at? | Jerry Garcia | On August 9, 1995, at 4:23 am, eight days after his 53rd birthday, Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes--all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb; I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred Garcia's former wives from the ceremony. On August 13, approximately 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn. On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons, accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges River at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes. CANNOTANSWER | Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic. | Jerome John Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known for being a principal songwriter, the lead guitarist and a vocalist with the rock band the Grateful Dead, of which he was a founding member and which came to prominence during the counterculture of the 1960s. Although he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader of the band.
As one of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead for their entire 30-year career (1965–1995). Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), the Jerry Garcia Band, Old & In the Way, the Garcia/Grisman and Garcia/Kahn acoustic duos, Legion of Mary, and New Riders of the Purple Sage (which he co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known for his distinctive guitar playing, and was ranked 13th in Rolling Stones "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" cover story in 2003. In the 2015 version of the list he was ranked at #46.
Garcia was also renowned for his musical and technical ability, particularly his ability to play a variety of instruments and sustain long improvisations with the Grateful Dead. Garcia believed that improvisation took stress away from his playing and allowed him to make spur of the moment decisions that he would not have made intentionally. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Garcia noted that "my own preferences are for improvisation, for making it up as I go along. The idea of picking, of eliminating possibilities by deciding, that's difficult for me". Originating from the days of the "acid tests", these improvisations were a form of exploration rather than playing a song already written.
Later in life, Garcia struggled with diabetes and in 1986, went into a diabetic coma that nearly cost him his life. Although his overall health improved somewhat after that, he continued to struggle with obesity, smoking, and longstanding heroin and cocaine addictions. He was staying in a California drug rehabilitation facility when he died of a heart attack on August 9, 1995, at the age of 53.
Early life
Garcia's ancestors on his father's side were from Galicia in northwest Spain. His mother's ancestors were Irish and Swedish. He was born in the Excelsior District of San Francisco, California, on August 1, 1942, to Jose Ramon "Joe" Garcia and Ruth Marie "Bobbie" (née Clifford) Garcia, who was herself born in San Francisco. His parents named him after composer Jerome Kern. Jerome John was their second child, preceded by Clifford Ramon "Tiff", who was born in 1937. Shortly before Clifford's birth, their father and a partner leased a building in downtown San Francisco and turned it into a bar, partly in response to Jose being blackballed from a musicians' union for moonlighting.
Garcia was influenced by music at an early age, taking piano lessons for much of his childhood. His father was a retired professional musician and his mother enjoyed playing the piano. His father's extended family—which had immigrated from Spain in 1919—would often sing during reunions.
In 1946, two-thirds of four-year-old Garcia's right middle finger was cut off by his brother in a wood splitting accident, while the family was vacationing in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Garcia later confessed that he often used it to his advantage in his youth, showing it off to other children in his neighborhood.
Less than a year after this incident his father died in a fly fishing accident when the family was vacationing near Arcata in Northern California. He slipped after entering the Trinity River, part of the Six Rivers National Forest, and drowned before other fishermen could reach him. Although Garcia claimed he saw the incident, Dennis McNally, author of the book A Long Strange Trip: The Inside Story of the Grateful Dead, argues Garcia formed the memory after hearing others repeat the story. Blair Jackson, who wrote Garcia: An American Life, notes that a local newspaper article describing Jose's death did not mention Jerry being present when he died.
Excelsior District
Following his father's death, Garcia's mother Ruth took over her husband's bar, buying out his partner for full ownership. She began working full-time there, sending Jerry and his brother to live nearby with her parents, Tillie and William Clifford. During the five-year period in which he lived with his grandparents, Garcia enjoyed a large amount of autonomy and attended Monroe Elementary School. At the school, Garcia was greatly encouraged in his artistic abilities by his third grade teacher: through her, he discovered that "being a creative person was a viable possibility in life." According to Garcia, it was around this time that he was opened up to country and bluegrass music by his grandmother, whom he recalled enjoyed listening to the Grand Ole Opry. His elder brother, Clifford, however, staunchly believed the contrary, insisting that Garcia was "fantasizing all [that] ... she'd been to Opry, but she didn't listen to it on the radio." It was at this point that Garcia started playing the banjo, his first stringed instrument.
Menlo Park
In 1953, Garcia's mother married Wally Matusiewicz. Subsequently, Garcia and his brother moved back home with their mother and new stepfather. However, due to the roughneck reputation of their neighborhood at the time, Garcia's mother moved their family to Menlo Park. During their stay in Menlo Park, Garcia became acquainted with racism and antisemitism, things he disliked intensely. The same year, Garcia was also introduced to rock and roll and rhythm and blues by his brother, and enjoyed listening to Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, B. B. King, Hank Ballard, and, later, Chuck Berry. Clifford often memorized the vocals for his favorite songs, and would then make Garcia learn the harmony parts, a move to which Garcia later attributed much of his early ear training.
In mid-1957, Garcia began smoking cigarettes and was introduced to marijuana. Garcia would later reminisce about the first time he smoked marijuana: "Me and a friend of mine went up into the hills with two joints, the San Francisco foothills, and smoked these joints and just got so high and laughed and roared and went skipping down the streets doing funny things and just having a helluva time". During this time, Garcia also studied at what is now the San Francisco Art Institute. The teacher there was Wally Hedrick, an artist who came to prominence during the 1960s. During the classes, he often encouraged Garcia in his drawing and painting skills. Hedrick also introduced Garcia to the fiction of Jack Kerouac, whom Garcia later cited as a major influence.
San Francisco
In June, Garcia graduated from the local Menlo Oaks school. He then moved with his family back to San Francisco, where they lived in an apartment above the family bar, a newly built replacement for the original, that had been torn down to make way for a freeway entrance. Two months later, on Garcia's fifteenth birthday, his mother bought an accordion for him, to his great disappointment. Garcia had long been captivated by many rhythm and blues artists, especially Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, leaving him craving an electric guitar. After some pleading, his mother exchanged the accordion for a Danelectro with a small amplifier at a local pawnshop. Garcia's stepfather, who was somewhat proficient with instruments, helped tune his guitar to an unusual open tuning.
Cazadero
After a short stint at Denman Junior High School, Garcia attended tenth grade at Balboa High School in 1958, where he often got into trouble for skipping classes and fighting. Consequently, in 1959, Garcia's mother again moved the family to a safer environment, to Cazadero, a small town in Sonoma County, north of San Francisco. This turn of events did not sit well with Garcia, who had to travel by bus to Analy High School in Sebastopol, the nearest school. Garcia did, however, join a band at his school known as the Chords. After performing in and winning a contest, the band's reward was recording a song. They chose "Raunchy" by Bill Justis.
Recording career
Relocation and band beginnings
Garcia stole his mother's car in 1960, and was given the option of joining the United States Army in lieu of prison. He received basic training at Fort Ord. After training, he was transferred to Fort Winfield Scott in the Presidio of San Francisco. Garcia spent most of his time in the army at his leisure, missing roll call and accruing many counts of being AWOL. As a result, Garcia was given a general discharge on December 14, 1960.
In January 1961, Garcia drove down to East Palo Alto to see Laird Grant, an old friend from middle school. He had bought a 1950 Cadillac sedan from a cook in the army, which barely made it to Grant's residence before it broke down. Garcia spent the next few weeks sleeping where friends would allow, eventually using his car as a home. Through Grant, Garcia met Dave McQueen in February, who, after hearing Garcia perform some blues music, introduced him to local people and to the Chateau, a rooming house located near Stanford University which was then a popular hangout.
On February 20, 1961, Garcia got into a car with Paul Speegle, a sixteen-year-old artist and acquaintance of Garcia; Lee Adams, the house manager of the Chateau and driver of the car; and Alan Trist, a companion of theirs. After speeding past the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital, the driver encountered a curve and, speeding around , crashed into the guard rail, sending the car rolling turbulently. Garcia was hurled through the windshield of the car into a nearby field with such force he was literally thrown out of his shoes and would later be unable to recall the ejection. Lee Adams, the driver, and Alan Trist, who was seated in the back, were thrown from the car as well, suffering from abdominal injuries and a spine fracture, respectively. Garcia escaped with a broken collarbone, while Speegle, still in the car, was fatally injured.
Lee's reckless driving and crash served as an awakening for Garcia, who later commented: "That's where my life began. Before then I was always living at less than capacity. I was idling. That was the slingshot for the rest of my life. It was like a second chance. Then I got serious". It was at this time that Garcia began to realize that he needed to begin playing the guitar in earnest—a move which meant giving up his love of drawing and painting.
In April 1961, Garcia first met Robert Hunter, who would become a long-time friend of and lyricist for the Grateful Dead, collaborating principally with Garcia. The two involved themselves in the South Bay and San Francisco art and music scenes, sometimes playing at Menlo Park's Kepler's Books. Garcia performed his first concert with Hunter, each earning five dollars. Garcia and Hunter also played in bands (the Wildwood Boys and the Hart Valley Drifters) with David Nelson, who would later play with Garcia in the New Riders of the Purple Sage and contribute to several Grateful Dead album songs.
In 1962, Garcia met Phil Lesh, the eventual bassist of the Grateful Dead, during a party in Menlo Park's bohemian Perry Lane neighborhood (where author Ken Kesey lived). Lesh would later write in his autobiography that Garcia reminded him of pictures he had seen of the composer Claude Debussy, with his "dark, curly hair, goatee, Impressionist eyes". While attending another party in Palo Alto, Lesh approached Garcia to suggest they record Garcia on Lesh's tape recorder and produce a radio show for the progressive, community-supported Berkeley radio station KPFA. Using an old Wollensak tape recorder, they recorded "Matty Groves" and "The Long Black Veil", among several other tunes. The recordings became a central feature of a 90-minute KPFA special broadcast, "The Long Black Veil and Other Ballads: An Evening with Jerry Garcia". The link between KPFA and the Grateful Dead continues to this day, having included many fundraisers, interviews, live concert broadcasts, taped band performances and all-day or all-weekend "Dead-only" marathons.
Garcia soon began playing and teaching acoustic guitar and banjo. One of Garcia's students was Bob Matthews, who later engineered many of the Grateful Dead's albums. Matthews attended Menlo-Atherton High School and was friends with Bob Weir, and on New Year's Eve 1963, he introduced Weir and Garcia.
Between 1962 and 1964, Garcia sang and performed mainly bluegrass, old-time, and folk music. One of the bands Garcia performed with was the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers, a bluegrass act. The group consisted of Garcia on guitar, banjo, vocals, and harmonica, Marshall Leicester on banjo, guitar, and vocals, and Dick Arnold on fiddle and vocals. Soon after this, Garcia, Weir, Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, and several of their friends formed a jug band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions. Around this time, the psychedelic drug LSD was gaining popularity. Garcia first began using LSD in 1964; later, when asked how it changed his life, he remarked: "Well, it changed everything [...] the effect was that it freed me because I suddenly realized that my little attempt at having a straight life and doing that was really a fiction and just wasn't going to work out. Luckily I wasn't far enough into it for it to be shattering or anything; it was like a realization that just made me feel immensely relieved."
In 1965, Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions evolved into the Warlocks, with the addition of Phil Lesh on bass guitar and Bill Kreutzmann on percussion. However, the band discovered that another group (which would later become the Velvet Underground) had recently selected the same name. In response, Garcia came up with "Grateful Dead" by opening a Funk & Wagnalls dictionary to an entry for "Grateful dead". The definition for "Grateful dead" was "a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". The band's first reaction was disapproval. Garcia later explained the group's reaction: "I didn't like it really, I just found it to be really powerful. [Bob] Weir didn't like it, [Bill] Kreutzmann didn't like it and nobody really wanted to hear about it." Despite their dislike of the name, it quickly spread by word of mouth, and soon became their official title.
Career with the Grateful Dead
Garcia served as lead guitarist, as well as one of the principal vocalists and songwriters of the Grateful Dead for its entire career. Garcia composed such songs as "Dark Star", "Franklin's Tower", and "Scarlet Begonias", among many others. Robert Hunter, an ardent collaborator with the band, wrote the lyrics to all but a few of Garcia's songs.
Garcia was well-noted for his "soulful extended guitar improvisations", which would frequently feature interplay between him and his fellow band members. His fame, as well as the band's, arguably rested on their ability to never play a song the same way twice. Often, Garcia would take cues from rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, remarking that "there are some [...] kinds of ideas that would really throw me if I had to create a harmonic bridge between all the things going on rhythmically with two drums and Phil [Lesh's] innovative bass playing. Weir's ability to solve that sort of problem is extraordinary. [...] Harmonically, I take a lot of my solo cues from Bob."
When asked to describe his approach to soloing, Garcia commented: "It keeps on changing. I still basically revolve around the melody and the way it's broken up into phrases as I perceive them. With most solos, I tend to play something that phrases the way the melody does; my phrases may be more dense or have different value, but they'll occur in the same places in the song. [...]"
Garcia and the band toured almost constantly from their formation in 1965 until Garcia's death in 1995. Periodically, there were breaks due to exhaustion or health problems, often due to Garcia's drug use. During their three-decade span, the Grateful Dead played 2,314 shows.
Garcia's guitar-playing was eclectic. He melded elements from the various kinds of music that influenced him. Echoes of bluegrass playing (such as Arthur Smith and Doc Watson) could be heard. There was also early rock (like Lonnie Mack, James Burton, and Chuck Berry), contemporary blues (Freddie King and Lowell Fulsom), country and western (Roy Nichols and Don Rich), and jazz (Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt) to be heard in Garcia's style. Don Rich was the sparkling country guitar player in Buck Owens's "the Buckaroos" band of the 1960s, but besides Rich's style, both Garcia's pedal steel guitar playing (on Grateful Dead records and others) and his standard electric guitar work, were influenced by another of Owens's Buckaroos of that time, pedal steel player Tom Brumley. And as an improvisational soloist, John Coltrane was one of his greatest personal and musical influences.
Garcia later described his playing style as having "descended from barroom rock and roll, country guitar. Just 'cause that's where all my stuff comes from. It's like that blues instrumental stuff that was happening in the late Fifties and early Sixties, like Freddie King." Garcia's style could vary with the song being played and the instrument he was using, but his playing had a number of so-called "signatures". Among these were lead lines based on rhythmic triplets (examples include the songs "Good Morning Little School Girl", "New Speedway Boogie", "Brokedown Palace", "Deal", "Loser", "Truckin'", "That's It for the Other One", "U.S. Blues", "Sugaree", and "Don't Ease Me In").
Side projects
In addition to the Grateful Dead, Garcia had numerous side projects, the most notable being the Jerry Garcia Band. He was also involved with various acoustic projects such as Old & In the Way and other bluegrass bands, including collaborations with noted bluegrass mandolinist David Grisman. The documentary film Grateful Dawg, co-produced by Gillian Grisman and former NBC producer Pamela Hamilton chronicles the deep, long-term friendship between Garcia and Grisman. When Garcia and Grisman released Not For Kids Only, Hamilton produced their interview and concert for NBC. After several years of producing stories on the Grateful Dead and band members' side projects, Hamilton interviewed Bob Weir for a feature on Garcia's death marking the end of an era.
Other groups of which Garcia was a member at one time or another include the Black Mountain Boys, Legion of Mary, Reconstruction, and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. Garcia was also a fan of jazz artists and improvisation: he played with jazz keyboardists Merl Saunders and Howard Wales for many years in various groups and jam sessions, and he appeared on saxophonist Ornette Coleman's 1988 album, Virgin Beauty. His collaboration with Merl Saunders and Muruga Booker on the world music album Blues From the Rainforest launched the Rainforest Band.
Garcia also spent a lot of time in the recording studio helping out fellow musician friends in session work, often adding guitar, vocals, pedal steel, sometimes banjo and piano and even producing. He played on over 50 studio albums, the styles of which were eclectic and varied, including bluegrass, rock, folk, blues, country, jazz, electronic music, gospel, funk, and reggae. Artists who sought Garcia's help included the likes of Jefferson Airplane (most notably Surrealistic Pillow, Garcia being listed as their "spiritual advisor"). Garcia himself recalled in a mid-1967 interview that he'd played the high lead on "Today," played on "Plastic Fantastic Lover" and "Comin' Back to Me" on that album. Others include Tom Fogerty, David Bromberg, Robert Hunter (Liberty, on Relix Records), Paul Pena, Peter Rowan, Warren Zevon, Country Joe McDonald, Pete Sears, Ken Nordine, Ornette Coleman, Bruce Hornsby, Bob Dylan, It's a Beautiful Day, and many more. In 1995 Garcia played on three tracks for the CD Blue Incantation by guitarist Sanjay Mishra, making it his last studio collaboration.
Throughout the early 1970s, Garcia, Lesh, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, and David Crosby collaborated intermittently with MIT-educated composer and biologist Ned Lagin on several projects in the realm of early ambient music; these include the album Seastones (released by the Ned Lagin on the Round Records subsidiary) and L, an unfinished dance work composed by Ned Lagin. In 1970, Garcia participated in the soundtrack for the film Zabriskie Point.
Garcia also played pedal steel guitar for fellow-San Francisco musicians New Riders of the Purple Sage from their initial dates in 1969 to October 1971, when increased commitments with the Dead forced him to opt out of the group. He appears as a band member on their debut album New Riders of the Purple Sage, and produced Home, Home on the Road, a 1974 live album by the band. He also contributed pedal steel guitar to the enduring hit "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. Garcia also played steel guitar licks on Brewer & Shipley's 1970 album Tarkio. Despite considering himself a novice on the pedal steel, Garcia routinely ranked high in player polls. After a long lapse from playing the pedal steel, he played it once more during several of the Dead's concerts with Bob Dylan in the summer of 1987.
In 1988, Garcia agreed to perform at several major benefits including the "Soviet American Peace Walk" concert at the Band Shell, in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, that drew 25,000 people. He was asked to play by longtime friend and fellow musician, Pete Sears, who played piano with all the bands that day, and also procured all the other musicians. Garcia, Mickey Hart and Steve Parish played the show, then were given a police escort to a Grateful Dead show across the bay later that night. Garcia also played with Nick Gravenites and Pete Sears at a benefit given for Vietnam Veteran and peace activist Brian Willson, who lost both legs below the knee when he attempted to block a train carrying weapons to military dictatorships in El Salvador.
Having previously studied at the San Francisco Art Institute as a teenager, Garcia embarked on a second career in the visual arts in the late 1980s. He created a number of drawings, etchings, and water colors. Garcia's artistic endeavors were represented by the Weir Gallery in Berkeley, California from 1989 to 1996. During this period, Roberta Weir (unrelated to Garcia's bandmate Bob Weir) provided Garcia with new art techniques to use, sponsored his first solo show in 1990, and prepared blank etching plates for him to draw on. These would then be processed and printed by gallery staff and brought back to Garcia for approval and signature, usually with a passing of stacks of paper backstage at a Dead show. His annual shows at the Weir Gallery garnered much attention, leading to further shows in New York and other cities. Garcia was an early adopter of digital art media; his artistic style was as varied as his musical output, and he carried small notebooks for pen and ink sketches wherever he toured. Roberta Weir continues to maintain an archive of the artwork of Jerry Garcia. Perhaps the most widely seen pieces of Jerry Garcia's art are the many editions of men's neckties produced by Stonehenge Ltd. and Mulberry Neckware. Some began as etchings, other designs came from his drawings, paintings, and digital art. Garcia's artwork has since expanded into everything from hotel rooms, wet suits, men's sport shirts, a women's wear line, boxer shorts, hair accessories, cummerbunds, silk scarves and wool rugs.
Personal life
Garcia met his first wife, Sara Ruppenthal, in 1963. She was working at the coffee house in the back of Kepler's Books, where Garcia, Hunter, and Nelson regularly performed. They married on April 23, 1963, and on December 8 of that year their daughter Heather was born.
Carolyn Adams, a Merry Prankster also known as "Mountain Girl" or "M.G.," had a daughter, Sunshine, with Ken Kesey. Mountain Girl married another Prankster, George Walker, but they soon separated. She and Sunshine then moved into 710 Ashbury with Garcia in late 1966 where they would ultimately live together until 1975. In 1994, Sara and Jerry officially divorced after a long separation. Adams gave birth to Garcia's second and third daughters, Annabelle Walker Garcia (February 2, 1970) and Theresa Adams "Trixie" Garcia (September 21, 1974).
In August 1970, Garcia's mother Ruth was involved in a car crash near Twin Peaks in San Francisco. Garcia, who was recording the album American Beauty at the time, often left the sessions to visit his mother with his brother Clifford. She died on September 28, 1970.
In the midst of a March 1973 Grateful Dead engagement at Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, Garcia met Deborah Koons, an aspiring filmmaker from a wealthy Cincinnati, Ohio-based family who would much later marry him and become his widow. After a brief correspondence, he began his relationship with her in mid-1974. This gradually strained his relationship with Adams and culminated in Garcia leaving Adams for Koons in late 1975. The end of his relationship with Koons in 1977 precipitated a brief reconciliation with Adams, including the reestablishment of their household. However, she did not agree with the guitarist's persistent use of narcotics and moved with the children to the Eugene, Oregon area, living near Kesey, in 1978.
Following Adams' departure, Garcia had an affair with Amy Moore. She was a Kentucky-born member of the extended "Grateful Dead family", and the mistress of Texas oil heir Roy Cullen. Their affair lasted circa 1980–1981, and inspired the Garcia-Hunter song "Run for the Roses."
Adams and Garcia were married on December 31, 1981, largely as a result of mutual tax exigencies. Despite the legal codification of their union, she remained in Oregon, while Garcia continued to live near the Grateful Dead's offices in San Rafael, California. Garcia lived with a variety of housemates, including longtime Grateful Dead employee and Jerry Garcia Band manager Rock Scully. Scully, who co-managed the Grateful Dead throughout the mid-to-late 1960s before serving as the band's "advance man" and publicist, was dismissed by the group in 1984 for enabling Garcia's addictions and for allegedly embezzling the Garcia Band's profits. Another housemate was Nora Sage, a Deadhead who became Garcia's housekeeper while studying at the Golden Gate University School of Law. The exact nature of their relationship remains unclear, although it is believed to have been platonic due to Garcia's addictions. She later became his art representative.
While they would briefly reunite following his diabetic coma, Garcia and Adams ultimately divorced in 1994. Phil Lesh has subsequently stated that he rarely saw Adams on any of the band tours. In a 1991 Rolling Stone interview, Garcia stated that "we haven't really lived together since the Seventies".
During the autumn of 1978, Garcia developed a friendship with Shimer College student Manasha Matheson, an artist and music enthusiast. They remained friends over the following nine years before initiating a romantic relationship in Hartford, Connecticut on the Grateful Dead's spring 1987 tour. Jerry and Manasha became parents with the birth of their daughter, Keelin Noel Garcia, on December 20, 1987. On August 17, 1990, Jerry and Manasha married at their San Anselmo, California home in a spiritual ceremony free of legal convention. In 1991, Garcia expressed his delight in finding the time to "actually be a father" to Keelin in contrast to his past relationships with his children. A year later, Garcia dedicated his first art book, Paintings, Drawings and Sketches, "For Manasha, with love, Jerry."
In January 1993, Barbara "Brigid" Meier, a former girlfriend from the early 1960s, reentered Garcia's life for a brief period. Meier claimed, Garcia had considered her to be the "love of his life" and proposed to her during a Hawaiian vacation shortly after their relationship recommenced. Garcia's "love of his life" sentiment was not reserved for one lover, as he expressed the same feelings to several other women in his life. At Garcia's 1995 funeral, Koons declared that she was "the love of his life" while paying her final respects, whereupon Meier and Ruppenthal, who were both in attendance, simultaneously exclaimed, "He said that to me!"
The affair with Meier marked the breakup of Jerry's family life with Manasha and Keelin. Garcia ended the affair with Meier forty-five days later while on tour in Chicago with the Grateful Dead after she confronted him about his drug use.
Shortly thereafter, Garcia renewed his acquaintance with Deborah Koons in the spring of 1993. They married on February 14, 1994, in Sausalito, California. Garcia and Koons were married at the time of his death.
Lifestyle and health
Because of their public profile, Garcia and his collaborators were occasionally singled out in the American government's war on drugs. On October 2, 1967, 710 Ashbury Street in San Francisco (where the Grateful Dead had taken up residence the year before) was raided after a police tip-off. Grateful Dead members Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Ron "Pigpen" McKernan were apprehended on marijuana charges which were later dropped, although Garcia himself was not arrested. The following year, Garcia's picture was used in a defamatory context in a campaign commercial for Richard Nixon.
Most of the band were arrested again in January 1970, after they flew to New Orleans from Hawaii. After returning to their hotel from a performance, the band checked into their rooms, only to be quickly raided by police. Approximately fifteen people were arrested on the spot, including many of the road crew, management, and nearly all of the Grateful Dead except for Garcia, who arrived later, outgoing keyboardist Tom Constanten, who abstained from all drugs as a member of the Church of Scientology, and McKernan, who eschewed illegal drugs in favor of alcohol.
According to Bill Kreutzmann, the band's use of cocaine accelerated throughout the early 1970s. After using heroin in a brothel in 1974 (likely on the band's second European tour), Garcia was introduced to a smokeable form of the drug (initially advertised as refined opium) colloquially known as "Persian" or "Persian Base" during the group's 1975 hiatus. Influenced by the stresses of creating and releasing The Grateful Dead Movie and the acrimonious collapse of the band's independent record labels over the next two years, Garcia became increasingly dependent upon both substances. These factors, combined with the alcohol and drug abuse of several other members of the Grateful Dead, resulted in a turbulent atmosphere. By 1978, the band's chemistry began "cracking and crumbling", resulting in poor group cohesion. As a result, Keith and Donna Jean Godchaux left the band in February 1979.
With the addition of keyboardist/vocalist Brent Mydland that year amid the ongoing coalescence of the Deadhead subculture, the band reached new commercial heights as a touring group on the American arena circuit in the early 1980s, enabling them to forsake studio recording for several years. Nevertheless, this was offset by such factors as the band's atypically large payroll and Garcia's $700-a-day () drug addiction, resulting in the guitarist taking on a frenetic slate of solo touring outside of the Grateful Dead's rigorous schedule, including abbreviated acoustic duo concerts with Jerry Garcia Band bassist John Kahn that were widely rumored to be a funding conduit for their respective addictions.
Though things seemed to be getting better for the band, Garcia's health was declining. By 1983, Garcia's demeanor onstage had appeared to change. Despite still playing the guitar with great passion and intensity, there were times that he would appear disengaged; as such, shows were often inconsistent. Years of heavy tobacco smoking had affected his voice, and he gained considerable weight. By 1984, he would often rest his chin on the microphone during performances. The so-called "endless tour"—the result of years of financial risks, drug use, and poor business decisions—had taken its toll.
Garcia's decade-long heroin addiction culminated in the rest of the band holding an intervention in January 1985. Given the choice between the band or the drugs, Garcia agreed to check into a rehabilitation center in Oakland, California. A few days later in January, before the start of his program in Oakland, Garcia was arrested for drug possession in Golden Gate Park; he subsequently attended a drug diversion program. Throughout 1985, he tapered his drug use on tour and at home with the assistance of Nora Sage; by the spring of 1986, he was completely abstinent.
Precipitated by an unhealthy weight, dehydration, bad eating habits, and a recent relapse on the Grateful Dead's first stadium tour, Garcia collapsed into a diabetic coma in July 1986, waking up five days later. He later spoke about this period of unconsciousness as surreal: "Well, I had some very weird experiences. My main experience was one of furious activity and tremendous struggle in a sort of futuristic, space-ship vehicle with insectoid presences. After I came out of my coma, I had this image of myself as these little hunks of protoplasm that were stuck together kind of like stamps with perforations between them that you could snap off." Garcia's coma had a profound effect on him: it forced him to have to relearn how to play the guitar, as well as other, more basic skills. Within a handful of months, he had recovered, playing with the Jerry Garcia Band and the Grateful Dead again later that year.
After Garcia's recovery, the band released a comeback album In the Dark in 1987, which became their best-selling studio album. Inspired by Garcia's improved health, a successful album and the continuing emergence of Mydland as a third frontman, the band's energy and chemistry reached a new peak in the late 1980s.
Amid a litany of personal problems, Mydland died of a speedball overdose in July 1990. His death greatly affected Garcia, leading him to believe that the band's chemistry would never be the same. Before beginning the fall tour, the band acquired keyboardists Vince Welnick and Bruce Hornsby. The power of Hornsby's performances drove Garcia to new heights on stage. However, as the band continued through 1991, Garcia became concerned with the band's future. He was exhausted from five straight years of touring. He thought a break was necessary, mainly so that the band could come back with fresh material. The idea was put off by the pressures of management, and the touring continued. Garcia began using heroin again after several years of intermittent prescription opiate use. Though his relapse was brief, the band was quick to react. Soon after the last show of the tour in Denver, Garcia was confronted by the band with another intervention. After a disastrous meeting, Garcia invited Phil Lesh over to his home in San Rafael, California, where he explained that after the meeting he would start attending a methadone clinic. Garcia said that he wanted to clean up in his own way, and return to making music.
After returning from the band's 1992 summer tour, Garcia became sick, a throwback to his diabetic coma in 1986. Manasha Garcia nursed Jerry back to health and organized a team of health professionals which included acupuncturist Yen Wei Choong and Randy Baker, MD, a holistic family physician to treat him at home. Garcia recovered over the following days, despite the Grateful Dead having to cancel their fall tour to allow him time to recuperate. Garcia reduced his cigarette smoking and began losing weight. He also became a vegetarian.
Despite these improvements, Garcia's physical and mental condition continued to decline throughout 1993 and 1994. He began to use narcotics again to dull the pain.
In light of his second drug relapse and current condition, Garcia checked himself into the Betty Ford Center during July 1995. His stay was limited, lasting only two weeks. Motivated by the experience, he then checked into the Serenity Knolls treatment center in Forest Knolls, California, where he died.
Death
Garcia died in his room at the rehabilitation clinic on August 9, 1995. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes—all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that, upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb. I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former pro basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred two of Garcia's former wives from the ceremony.
On August 13, about 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Haight-Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn.
On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes.
Musical equipment
Garcia played many guitars during his career, which ranged from student and budget models to custom-made instruments. During his thirty-five year career as a professional musician, Garcia used about 25 guitars.
In 1965, when Garcia was playing with the Warlocks, he used a Guild Starfire, which he also used on the début album of the Grateful Dead. Beginning in late 1967 and ending in 1968, Garcia played black or gold mid-1950s Gibson Les Paul guitars with P-90 pickups. In 1969, he picked up the Gibson SG and used it for most of that year and 1970, except for a small period in between where he used a sunburst Fender Stratocaster.
During Garcia's "pedal steel flirtation period" (as Bob Weir referred to it in Anthem to Beauty), from approximately 1969 to 1972, he initially played a Fender instrument before upgrading to the ZB Custom D-10, especially in his earlier public performances. Although this was a double neck guitar, Garcia used the "E9 neck and the three pedals to raise the tone and two levers to lower it." He employed an Emmons D-10 at the Grateful Dead's and New Riders of the Purple Sage's final appearances at the Fillmore East in April 1971.
In 1969, Garcia played pedal steel on three notable outside recordings: the track "The Farm" on the Jefferson Airplane album Volunteers, the track "Oh Mommy" by Brewer and Shipley and the hit single "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young from their album Déjà Vu, released in 1970. Garcia played on the latter album in exchange for harmony lessons for the Grateful Dead, who were at the time recording Workingman's Dead.
In 1971, Garcia began playing a sunburst Les Paul. In March and April 1971 – the time period during which the Grateful Dead recorded its second live album, Grateful Dead – Garcia played the "Peanut," a guitar he had received from Rick Turner, who had custom built the guitar's body and incorporated the neck, pickups, and hardware from an early '60s Les Paul.
In May, Garcia began using a 1957 natural finish Stratocaster that had been given to him by Graham Nash. Garcia added an alligator sticker to the pickguard in the fall of that year. "Alligator" would remain Garcia's principal electric guitar until August 1973.
In the summer of 1971, Garcia also played a double-cutaway Les Paul TV Junior.
While Alligator was in the shop in the summer of 1972, he briefly reverted to the sunburst Stratocaster; this can be seen in Sunshine Daydream.
In late 1972, Garcia purchased the first guitar ("Eagle") made by Alembic luthier Doug Irwin for $850 (). Enamored of Irwin's talents, he immediately commissioned his own custom instrument. This guitar, nicknamed "Wolf" for a memorable sticker Garcia added below the tailpiece, was delivered in May 1973 and replaced Alligator on stage in September. It cost $1,500 (), an extremely high price for the era.
Wolf was made with an ebony fingerboard and featured numerous embellishments like alternating grain designs in the headstock, ivory inlays, and fret marker dots made of sterling silver. The body was composed of western maple wood which had a core of purpleheart. Garcia later had Irwin (who ultimately left Alembic to start his own business) replace the electronics inside the guitar, at which point he added his own logo to the headstock alongside the Alembic logo. The system included two interchangeable plates for configuring pickups: one was made for strictly single coils, while the other accommodated humbuckers. Shortly after receiving the modified instrument, Garcia commissioned another custom guitar from Irwin with one caveat: "Don't hold back."
During the Grateful Dead's 1974 European tour, Wolf was dropped on several occasions, one of which caused a minor crack in the headstock. Following filming of The Grateful Dead Movie (in which the guitar is prominently visible) a month later, Garcia returned it to Irwin for repairs. Throughout its absence, Garcia predominantly played several Travis Bean guitars, including the TB1000A (1975) and the TB500 (1976-1977). On September 28, 1977, Irwin delivered the refurbished Wolf back to Garcia. The wolf sticker which gave the guitar its name had now been inlaid into the instrument; it also featured an effects loop between the pick-ups and controls (so inline effects would "see" the same signal at all times) which was bypassable. Irwin also put a new face on the headstock with only his logo (he later claimed to have built the guitar himself, though pictures through time clearly show the progression of logos, from Alembic, to Alembic & Irwin, to only Irwin).
Nearly seven years after he commissioned it, Garcia received his second custom guitar ("Tiger") from Irwin in the summer of 1979.
He first employed the instrument in concert at a Grateful Dead performance at the Oakland Auditorium Arena on August 4, 1979. Its name was derived from the inlay on the preamp cover.
The body of Tiger was of rich quality: the top layer was cocobolo, with the preceding layers being maple stripe, vermilion, and flame maple, in that order. The neck was made of western maple with an ebony fingerboard. The pickups consisted of a single coil DiMarzio SDS-1 and two humbucker DiMarzio Super IIs which were easily removable due to Garcia's preference for replacing his pickups every year or two. The electronics were composed of an effects bypass loop, which allowed Garcia to control the sound of his effects through the tone and volume controls on the guitar, and a preamplifier/buffer which rested behind a plate in the back of the guitar. Fully outfitted, Tiger weighed . This was Garcia's principal guitar for the next eleven years, and most played.
In the late 1980s Garcia, Weir and CSN (along with many others) endorsed Alvarez Yairi acoustic guitars. There are many photographs circulating (mostly promotional) of Garcia playing a DY99 Virtuoso Custom with a Modulus Graphite neck. He opted to play with the less decorated model but the promotional photo from the Alvarez Yairi catalog has him holding the "tree of life" model. This hand-built guitar was notable for the collaboration between Japanese luthier Kazuo Yairi and Modulus Graphite of San Rafael. As with most things Garcia, with his passing, the DY99 model is highly valued among collectors.
In 1990, Irwin completed "Rosebud", Garcia's fourth custom guitar. It was similar to his previous guitar Tiger in many respects, but featured different inlays and electronics, tone and volume controls, and weight. Rosebud, unlike Tiger, was configured with three humbuckers; the neck and bridge pickups shared a tone control, while the middle had its own. Atop the guitar was a Roland GK-2 pickup which fed the controller set inside the guitar. The GK2 was used in junction with the Roland GR-50 rack mount synthesizer. The GR-50 synthesizer in turn drove a Korg M1R synthesizer producing the MIDI effects heard during live performances of this period as heard on the Grateful Dead recording Without a Net. Sections of the guitar were hollowed out to bring the weight down to . The inlay, a dancing skeleton holding a rose, covers a plate just below the bridge. The final cost of the instrument was $11,000 ().
In 1993, carpenter-turned-luthier Stephen Cripe tried his hand at making an instrument for Garcia. After researching Tiger through pictures and films, Cripe set out on what would soon become known as "Lightning Bolt", again named for its inlay.
The guitar used Brazilian rosewood for the fingerboard and East Indian rosewood for the body, which, with admitted irony from Cripe, had been taken from a 19th-century bed used by opium smokers. Built purely from guesswork, Lightning Bolt was a hit with Garcia, who began using the guitar exclusively. Soon after, Garcia requested that Cripe build a backup of the guitar. Cripe, who had not measured or photographed the original, was told simply to "wing it."
Cripe later delivered the backup, which was known by the name "Top Hat". Garcia bought it from him for $6,500, making it the first guitar that Cripe had ever sold. However, infatuated with Lightning Bolt, Garcia rarely used the backup.
After Garcia's death, the ownership of Wolf and Tiger came into question. According to Garcia's will, his guitars were bequeathed to Doug Irwin, who had constructed them.
The remaining Grateful Dead members disagreed – they considered his guitars to be property of the band, leading to a lawsuit between the two parties. In 2001, Irwin won the case. However, nearly having been left destitute from a traffic accident in 1998, he decided to place the guitars up for auction in hopes of being able to start another guitar workshop.
On May 8, 2002, Wolf and Tiger, among other memorabilia, were placed for auction at Studio 54 in New York City. Tiger was sold for $957,500, and Wolf for $789,500. Together, the pair sold for $1.74 million, setting a new world record. Wolf went into in the private collection of Daniel Pritzker who kept it in a secure climate controlled room in a private residence at Utica, N.Y. Tiger went to the private collection of Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.
In May 2017, Wolf was again auctioned, but this time for charity. Pritzker decided to sell the guitar and donate all proceeds to the Montgomery, Alabama based Southern Poverty Law Center.
Brian Halligan placed the winning bid totaling $1.9M.
For the majority of 2019 Wolf and Tiger were included in the Play it Loud exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. On June 23, 2019 John Mayer played Wolf with Dead & Co. at Citi Field.
Legacy
Garcia was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Grateful Dead in 1994. He declined to attend the ceremony; the band jokingly brought a cardboard cutout of Garcia out on stage in his absence.
In 1987, Vermont ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's introduced their Cherry Garcia flavor dedicated to him. It was the first ice cream flavor dedicated to a musician.
In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Jerry Garcia 13th in their list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
According to fellow Bay Area guitar player Henry Kaiser, Garcia is "the most recorded guitarist in history. With more than 2,200 Grateful Dead concerts, and 1,000 Jerry Garcia Band concerts captured on tape – as well as numerous studio sessions – there are about 15,000 hours of his guitar work preserved for the ages."
On July 30, 2004, Melvin Seals was the first Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) member to headline an outdoor music and camping festival called "The Grateful Garcia Gathering". Jerry Garcia Band drummer David Kemper joined Melvin Seals and JGB in 2007. Other musicians and friends of Garcia include Donna Jean Godchaux, Mookie Siegel, Pete Sears, G.E. Smith, Chuck Hammer, Barry Sless, Jackie Greene, Brian Lesh, Sanjay Mishra, and Mark Karan.
On July 21, 2005, the San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission passed a resolution to name the amphitheater in McLaren Park "The Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." The amphitheater is located in the Excelsior District, where Garcia grew up. The first show to happen at the Jerry Garcia Amphitheater was Jerry Day 2005 on August 7, 2005. Jerry's brother, Tiff Garcia, was the first person to welcome everybody to the "Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." Jerry Day is an annual celebration of Garcia in his childhood neighborhood. The dedication ceremony (Jerry Day 2) on October 29, 2005, was officiated by mayor Gavin Newsom.
On September 24, 2005, the Comes a Time: A Celebration of the Music & Spirit of Jerry Garcia tribute concert was held at the Hearst Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California. The concert featured Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, Bruce Hornsby, Trey Anastasio, Warren Haynes, Jimmy Herring, Michael Kang, Jay Lane, Jeff Chimenti, Mark Karan, Robin Sylvester, Kenny Brooks, Melvin Seals, Merl Saunders, Marty Holland, Stu Allen, Gloria Jones, and Jackie LaBranch.
Georgia-based composer Lee Johnson released an orchestral tribute to the music of the Grateful Dead, recorded with the Russian National Orchestra, entitled "Dead Symphony: Lee Johnson Symphony No. 6." Johnson was interviewed on NPR on the July 26, 2008 broadcast of Weekend Edition, and gave much credit to the genius and craft of Garcia's songwriting. A live performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Johnson himself, was held Friday, August 1.
In 2010 the Santa Barbara Bowl in California opened Jerry Garcia Glen along the walk up to the venue. There is a statue of Garcia's right hand along the way.
Seattle rock band Soundgarden wrote and recorded the instrumental song "Jerry Garcia's Finger", dedicated to the singer, which was released as a b-side with their single "Pretty Noose".
Numerous music festivals across the United States and Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK hold annual events in memory of Jerry Garcia.
On May 14, 2015, an all-star lineup held a tribute concert for Garcia at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. The event was called "Dear Jerry".
In 2015, Hunter and Garcia were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Hunter accepted the award along with Garcia's daughter, Trixie Garcia, who accepted on behalf of her father.
In 2015, Jerry Garcia's wife, Manasha Garcia and their daughter, Keelin Garcia launched The Jerry Garcia Foundation, a nonprofit charity that supports projects for artistic, environmental, and humanitarian causes. The Foundation's Board members are Bob Weir, Peter Shapiro, Glenn Fischer, Irwin Sternberg, Daniel Shiner, TRI Studios CEO, Christopher McCutcheon and Fender Music Foundation Executive Director,
Lynn Robison. Keelin Garcia said, "It is a tremendous honor to participate in nonprofit work that is in accordance with my father's values."
In 2018, Jerry Garcia family members, Keelin Garcia and Manasha Garcia launched the Jerry Garcia Music Arts independent music label.
On November 18, 2021, it was announced Jonah Hill would portray Garcia in a forthcoming Grateful Dead biopic written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski directed by Martin Scorsese for Apple TV+.
Discography
New Riders of the Purple Sage – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1971
Hooteroll? – Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia – 1971
Garcia – Jerry Garcia – 1972
Live at Keystone – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1973
Compliments – Jerry Garcia – 1974
Old & In the Way – Old & In the Way – 1975
Reflections – Jerry Garcia – 1976
Cats Under the Stars – Jerry Garcia Band – 1978
Run for the Roses – Jerry Garcia – 1982
Vintage NRPS – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1986
Keystone Encores – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1988
Almost Acoustic – Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band – 1988
Jerry Garcia / David Grisman – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1991
Jerry Garcia Band – Jerry Garcia Band – 1991
Not for Kids Only – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1993
Notes
References
Sources
External links
The official homepage of Jerry Garcia
Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jerry Garcia on Fretbase
The Jerry Site
Official Grateful Dead website
Jerry Garcia discography at deaddisc.com
Jerry Garcia autopsy
Jerry Day: A Civic and Cultural Celebration of Jerry Garcia held in San Francisco
FBI Records: The Vault - Jerry Garcia at vault.fbi.gov
Jerry Garcia's Army personnel file at the National Archives
TEAM
Garcia's Guitars & Gear Directory
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American folk guitarists
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"Heinrich Grimm (1592/1593-1637) was a late-Renaissance/early-Baroque German composer, cantor, music theorist, and organist.\n\nCareer\nGrimm was born in Holzminden in the Duchy of Braunschweig-Lüneburg. Little is known of his life before 1607, when he went to Wolfenbüttel to study with Michael Praetorius, who was the Hofkapellmeister to Duke Heinrich Julius. While some scholars have suggested that Grimm was a choirboy at the ducal court, this cannot be verified with extant sources.\n\nGrimm studied under Praetorius until 1609, when he matriculated at the University of Helmstedt, where he studied philosophy and theology. In approximately 1617, Grimm became a cantor in Magdeburg, where his title was Musicus Magdeburgiensis Ordinarius. In this position, he taught at the Gymnasium, was music director at the churches of St. Johannes and St. Jacobi, and led a choir of his students once per month at the Magdeburg Cathedral. Grimm is credited with being one of the first to bring the new Italian style of music to northern Germany, and he was the first to introduce figured bass practice to Magdeburg.\n\nIn May 1631, Grimm and his family were forced to flee Magdeburg, which was attacked by Count Tilly in the Magdeburger Hochzeit. He escaped the Catholic forces only with the help of a Jesuit priest. From Magdeburg, he fled to Hamburg, where he briefly found employment at the St. Catharinen church. However, he was unable to find satisfactory long-term employment, and left Hamburg in search of better work.\n\nLate in 1631, Grimm arrived in Braunschweig, where he was cordially greeted as an accomplished musician by Duke Friedrich Ulrich. From November 1631 to November 1632, he worked as a freelance composer and musician at the churches of St. Michaelis, St. Martini, and St. Katharinen. Grimm finally found permanent employment as organist at St. Andreas church in November 1632, where he was employed until briefly before his death. Grimm became ill in the spring of 1637, and resigned his post at St. Andreas. He died on 10 July that year, and was buried in the cemetery at St. Petri church in Braunschweig on 12 July.\n\nWorks\nHeinrich Grimm's works are cataloged using HGWV (Heinrich-Grimm-Werke-Verzeichnis) numbers assigned by Thomas Synofzik in his dissertation.\n\nReferences \n\n1592 births\n1637 deaths\n16th-century German musicians\n\n16th-century German composers\nGerman organists\nGerman male organists\nPeople from Holzminden",
"Johann Wilhelm Albrecht Sudholz (17 May 1821 – 7 November 1903) was an Australian politician. He was a member of the South Australian House of Assembly from February to May 1875, representing the electorate of Murray.\n\nSudholz was born at Kirchdorf in Hanover, and arrived at Port Adelaide in 1846 on the Heerjheebhoy Rustomjee Patel. He settled at Gilles Plains, where he became a successful farmer. He was one of the founders of the Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Flinders Street, Adelaide, was a member of the Church Council of the Australian Synod for many years, and was described upon his death as one of the \"most prominent and whole-hearted members\" of the Lutheran Church in Australia.\n\nSudholz was elected to the House of Assembly at the 1875 election, but was unseated by the Committee of Disputed Returns and disqualified from that term of parliament on 22 May for bribery and corruption when it was found that his agents had run up a bill at the Angaston Hotel contrary to electoral law. He denied responsibility and stated that he had only paid the bill to avoid scandal, but the committee unanimously found against him. The decision was the subject of considerable local protest.\n\nHe later contested the 1893 election in the seat of Yatala, but was unsuccessful. He died in 1903 and was buried at Walkerville Cemetery.\n\nReferences\n\nMembers of the South Australian House of Assembly\n1821 births\n1903 deaths\n19th-century Australian politicians"
] |
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] | C_a95583dc963548a79d885ace2c196575_0 | what was the cause of his death | 6 | What was the cause of Jerry Garcia's death? | Jerry Garcia | On August 9, 1995, at 4:23 am, eight days after his 53rd birthday, Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes--all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb; I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred Garcia's former wives from the ceremony. On August 13, approximately 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn. On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons, accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges River at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes. CANNOTANSWER | The cause of death was a heart attack. | Jerome John Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known for being a principal songwriter, the lead guitarist and a vocalist with the rock band the Grateful Dead, of which he was a founding member and which came to prominence during the counterculture of the 1960s. Although he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader of the band.
As one of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead for their entire 30-year career (1965–1995). Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), the Jerry Garcia Band, Old & In the Way, the Garcia/Grisman and Garcia/Kahn acoustic duos, Legion of Mary, and New Riders of the Purple Sage (which he co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known for his distinctive guitar playing, and was ranked 13th in Rolling Stones "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" cover story in 2003. In the 2015 version of the list he was ranked at #46.
Garcia was also renowned for his musical and technical ability, particularly his ability to play a variety of instruments and sustain long improvisations with the Grateful Dead. Garcia believed that improvisation took stress away from his playing and allowed him to make spur of the moment decisions that he would not have made intentionally. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Garcia noted that "my own preferences are for improvisation, for making it up as I go along. The idea of picking, of eliminating possibilities by deciding, that's difficult for me". Originating from the days of the "acid tests", these improvisations were a form of exploration rather than playing a song already written.
Later in life, Garcia struggled with diabetes and in 1986, went into a diabetic coma that nearly cost him his life. Although his overall health improved somewhat after that, he continued to struggle with obesity, smoking, and longstanding heroin and cocaine addictions. He was staying in a California drug rehabilitation facility when he died of a heart attack on August 9, 1995, at the age of 53.
Early life
Garcia's ancestors on his father's side were from Galicia in northwest Spain. His mother's ancestors were Irish and Swedish. He was born in the Excelsior District of San Francisco, California, on August 1, 1942, to Jose Ramon "Joe" Garcia and Ruth Marie "Bobbie" (née Clifford) Garcia, who was herself born in San Francisco. His parents named him after composer Jerome Kern. Jerome John was their second child, preceded by Clifford Ramon "Tiff", who was born in 1937. Shortly before Clifford's birth, their father and a partner leased a building in downtown San Francisco and turned it into a bar, partly in response to Jose being blackballed from a musicians' union for moonlighting.
Garcia was influenced by music at an early age, taking piano lessons for much of his childhood. His father was a retired professional musician and his mother enjoyed playing the piano. His father's extended family—which had immigrated from Spain in 1919—would often sing during reunions.
In 1946, two-thirds of four-year-old Garcia's right middle finger was cut off by his brother in a wood splitting accident, while the family was vacationing in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Garcia later confessed that he often used it to his advantage in his youth, showing it off to other children in his neighborhood.
Less than a year after this incident his father died in a fly fishing accident when the family was vacationing near Arcata in Northern California. He slipped after entering the Trinity River, part of the Six Rivers National Forest, and drowned before other fishermen could reach him. Although Garcia claimed he saw the incident, Dennis McNally, author of the book A Long Strange Trip: The Inside Story of the Grateful Dead, argues Garcia formed the memory after hearing others repeat the story. Blair Jackson, who wrote Garcia: An American Life, notes that a local newspaper article describing Jose's death did not mention Jerry being present when he died.
Excelsior District
Following his father's death, Garcia's mother Ruth took over her husband's bar, buying out his partner for full ownership. She began working full-time there, sending Jerry and his brother to live nearby with her parents, Tillie and William Clifford. During the five-year period in which he lived with his grandparents, Garcia enjoyed a large amount of autonomy and attended Monroe Elementary School. At the school, Garcia was greatly encouraged in his artistic abilities by his third grade teacher: through her, he discovered that "being a creative person was a viable possibility in life." According to Garcia, it was around this time that he was opened up to country and bluegrass music by his grandmother, whom he recalled enjoyed listening to the Grand Ole Opry. His elder brother, Clifford, however, staunchly believed the contrary, insisting that Garcia was "fantasizing all [that] ... she'd been to Opry, but she didn't listen to it on the radio." It was at this point that Garcia started playing the banjo, his first stringed instrument.
Menlo Park
In 1953, Garcia's mother married Wally Matusiewicz. Subsequently, Garcia and his brother moved back home with their mother and new stepfather. However, due to the roughneck reputation of their neighborhood at the time, Garcia's mother moved their family to Menlo Park. During their stay in Menlo Park, Garcia became acquainted with racism and antisemitism, things he disliked intensely. The same year, Garcia was also introduced to rock and roll and rhythm and blues by his brother, and enjoyed listening to Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, B. B. King, Hank Ballard, and, later, Chuck Berry. Clifford often memorized the vocals for his favorite songs, and would then make Garcia learn the harmony parts, a move to which Garcia later attributed much of his early ear training.
In mid-1957, Garcia began smoking cigarettes and was introduced to marijuana. Garcia would later reminisce about the first time he smoked marijuana: "Me and a friend of mine went up into the hills with two joints, the San Francisco foothills, and smoked these joints and just got so high and laughed and roared and went skipping down the streets doing funny things and just having a helluva time". During this time, Garcia also studied at what is now the San Francisco Art Institute. The teacher there was Wally Hedrick, an artist who came to prominence during the 1960s. During the classes, he often encouraged Garcia in his drawing and painting skills. Hedrick also introduced Garcia to the fiction of Jack Kerouac, whom Garcia later cited as a major influence.
San Francisco
In June, Garcia graduated from the local Menlo Oaks school. He then moved with his family back to San Francisco, where they lived in an apartment above the family bar, a newly built replacement for the original, that had been torn down to make way for a freeway entrance. Two months later, on Garcia's fifteenth birthday, his mother bought an accordion for him, to his great disappointment. Garcia had long been captivated by many rhythm and blues artists, especially Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, leaving him craving an electric guitar. After some pleading, his mother exchanged the accordion for a Danelectro with a small amplifier at a local pawnshop. Garcia's stepfather, who was somewhat proficient with instruments, helped tune his guitar to an unusual open tuning.
Cazadero
After a short stint at Denman Junior High School, Garcia attended tenth grade at Balboa High School in 1958, where he often got into trouble for skipping classes and fighting. Consequently, in 1959, Garcia's mother again moved the family to a safer environment, to Cazadero, a small town in Sonoma County, north of San Francisco. This turn of events did not sit well with Garcia, who had to travel by bus to Analy High School in Sebastopol, the nearest school. Garcia did, however, join a band at his school known as the Chords. After performing in and winning a contest, the band's reward was recording a song. They chose "Raunchy" by Bill Justis.
Recording career
Relocation and band beginnings
Garcia stole his mother's car in 1960, and was given the option of joining the United States Army in lieu of prison. He received basic training at Fort Ord. After training, he was transferred to Fort Winfield Scott in the Presidio of San Francisco. Garcia spent most of his time in the army at his leisure, missing roll call and accruing many counts of being AWOL. As a result, Garcia was given a general discharge on December 14, 1960.
In January 1961, Garcia drove down to East Palo Alto to see Laird Grant, an old friend from middle school. He had bought a 1950 Cadillac sedan from a cook in the army, which barely made it to Grant's residence before it broke down. Garcia spent the next few weeks sleeping where friends would allow, eventually using his car as a home. Through Grant, Garcia met Dave McQueen in February, who, after hearing Garcia perform some blues music, introduced him to local people and to the Chateau, a rooming house located near Stanford University which was then a popular hangout.
On February 20, 1961, Garcia got into a car with Paul Speegle, a sixteen-year-old artist and acquaintance of Garcia; Lee Adams, the house manager of the Chateau and driver of the car; and Alan Trist, a companion of theirs. After speeding past the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital, the driver encountered a curve and, speeding around , crashed into the guard rail, sending the car rolling turbulently. Garcia was hurled through the windshield of the car into a nearby field with such force he was literally thrown out of his shoes and would later be unable to recall the ejection. Lee Adams, the driver, and Alan Trist, who was seated in the back, were thrown from the car as well, suffering from abdominal injuries and a spine fracture, respectively. Garcia escaped with a broken collarbone, while Speegle, still in the car, was fatally injured.
Lee's reckless driving and crash served as an awakening for Garcia, who later commented: "That's where my life began. Before then I was always living at less than capacity. I was idling. That was the slingshot for the rest of my life. It was like a second chance. Then I got serious". It was at this time that Garcia began to realize that he needed to begin playing the guitar in earnest—a move which meant giving up his love of drawing and painting.
In April 1961, Garcia first met Robert Hunter, who would become a long-time friend of and lyricist for the Grateful Dead, collaborating principally with Garcia. The two involved themselves in the South Bay and San Francisco art and music scenes, sometimes playing at Menlo Park's Kepler's Books. Garcia performed his first concert with Hunter, each earning five dollars. Garcia and Hunter also played in bands (the Wildwood Boys and the Hart Valley Drifters) with David Nelson, who would later play with Garcia in the New Riders of the Purple Sage and contribute to several Grateful Dead album songs.
In 1962, Garcia met Phil Lesh, the eventual bassist of the Grateful Dead, during a party in Menlo Park's bohemian Perry Lane neighborhood (where author Ken Kesey lived). Lesh would later write in his autobiography that Garcia reminded him of pictures he had seen of the composer Claude Debussy, with his "dark, curly hair, goatee, Impressionist eyes". While attending another party in Palo Alto, Lesh approached Garcia to suggest they record Garcia on Lesh's tape recorder and produce a radio show for the progressive, community-supported Berkeley radio station KPFA. Using an old Wollensak tape recorder, they recorded "Matty Groves" and "The Long Black Veil", among several other tunes. The recordings became a central feature of a 90-minute KPFA special broadcast, "The Long Black Veil and Other Ballads: An Evening with Jerry Garcia". The link between KPFA and the Grateful Dead continues to this day, having included many fundraisers, interviews, live concert broadcasts, taped band performances and all-day or all-weekend "Dead-only" marathons.
Garcia soon began playing and teaching acoustic guitar and banjo. One of Garcia's students was Bob Matthews, who later engineered many of the Grateful Dead's albums. Matthews attended Menlo-Atherton High School and was friends with Bob Weir, and on New Year's Eve 1963, he introduced Weir and Garcia.
Between 1962 and 1964, Garcia sang and performed mainly bluegrass, old-time, and folk music. One of the bands Garcia performed with was the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers, a bluegrass act. The group consisted of Garcia on guitar, banjo, vocals, and harmonica, Marshall Leicester on banjo, guitar, and vocals, and Dick Arnold on fiddle and vocals. Soon after this, Garcia, Weir, Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, and several of their friends formed a jug band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions. Around this time, the psychedelic drug LSD was gaining popularity. Garcia first began using LSD in 1964; later, when asked how it changed his life, he remarked: "Well, it changed everything [...] the effect was that it freed me because I suddenly realized that my little attempt at having a straight life and doing that was really a fiction and just wasn't going to work out. Luckily I wasn't far enough into it for it to be shattering or anything; it was like a realization that just made me feel immensely relieved."
In 1965, Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions evolved into the Warlocks, with the addition of Phil Lesh on bass guitar and Bill Kreutzmann on percussion. However, the band discovered that another group (which would later become the Velvet Underground) had recently selected the same name. In response, Garcia came up with "Grateful Dead" by opening a Funk & Wagnalls dictionary to an entry for "Grateful dead". The definition for "Grateful dead" was "a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". The band's first reaction was disapproval. Garcia later explained the group's reaction: "I didn't like it really, I just found it to be really powerful. [Bob] Weir didn't like it, [Bill] Kreutzmann didn't like it and nobody really wanted to hear about it." Despite their dislike of the name, it quickly spread by word of mouth, and soon became their official title.
Career with the Grateful Dead
Garcia served as lead guitarist, as well as one of the principal vocalists and songwriters of the Grateful Dead for its entire career. Garcia composed such songs as "Dark Star", "Franklin's Tower", and "Scarlet Begonias", among many others. Robert Hunter, an ardent collaborator with the band, wrote the lyrics to all but a few of Garcia's songs.
Garcia was well-noted for his "soulful extended guitar improvisations", which would frequently feature interplay between him and his fellow band members. His fame, as well as the band's, arguably rested on their ability to never play a song the same way twice. Often, Garcia would take cues from rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, remarking that "there are some [...] kinds of ideas that would really throw me if I had to create a harmonic bridge between all the things going on rhythmically with two drums and Phil [Lesh's] innovative bass playing. Weir's ability to solve that sort of problem is extraordinary. [...] Harmonically, I take a lot of my solo cues from Bob."
When asked to describe his approach to soloing, Garcia commented: "It keeps on changing. I still basically revolve around the melody and the way it's broken up into phrases as I perceive them. With most solos, I tend to play something that phrases the way the melody does; my phrases may be more dense or have different value, but they'll occur in the same places in the song. [...]"
Garcia and the band toured almost constantly from their formation in 1965 until Garcia's death in 1995. Periodically, there were breaks due to exhaustion or health problems, often due to Garcia's drug use. During their three-decade span, the Grateful Dead played 2,314 shows.
Garcia's guitar-playing was eclectic. He melded elements from the various kinds of music that influenced him. Echoes of bluegrass playing (such as Arthur Smith and Doc Watson) could be heard. There was also early rock (like Lonnie Mack, James Burton, and Chuck Berry), contemporary blues (Freddie King and Lowell Fulsom), country and western (Roy Nichols and Don Rich), and jazz (Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt) to be heard in Garcia's style. Don Rich was the sparkling country guitar player in Buck Owens's "the Buckaroos" band of the 1960s, but besides Rich's style, both Garcia's pedal steel guitar playing (on Grateful Dead records and others) and his standard electric guitar work, were influenced by another of Owens's Buckaroos of that time, pedal steel player Tom Brumley. And as an improvisational soloist, John Coltrane was one of his greatest personal and musical influences.
Garcia later described his playing style as having "descended from barroom rock and roll, country guitar. Just 'cause that's where all my stuff comes from. It's like that blues instrumental stuff that was happening in the late Fifties and early Sixties, like Freddie King." Garcia's style could vary with the song being played and the instrument he was using, but his playing had a number of so-called "signatures". Among these were lead lines based on rhythmic triplets (examples include the songs "Good Morning Little School Girl", "New Speedway Boogie", "Brokedown Palace", "Deal", "Loser", "Truckin'", "That's It for the Other One", "U.S. Blues", "Sugaree", and "Don't Ease Me In").
Side projects
In addition to the Grateful Dead, Garcia had numerous side projects, the most notable being the Jerry Garcia Band. He was also involved with various acoustic projects such as Old & In the Way and other bluegrass bands, including collaborations with noted bluegrass mandolinist David Grisman. The documentary film Grateful Dawg, co-produced by Gillian Grisman and former NBC producer Pamela Hamilton chronicles the deep, long-term friendship between Garcia and Grisman. When Garcia and Grisman released Not For Kids Only, Hamilton produced their interview and concert for NBC. After several years of producing stories on the Grateful Dead and band members' side projects, Hamilton interviewed Bob Weir for a feature on Garcia's death marking the end of an era.
Other groups of which Garcia was a member at one time or another include the Black Mountain Boys, Legion of Mary, Reconstruction, and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. Garcia was also a fan of jazz artists and improvisation: he played with jazz keyboardists Merl Saunders and Howard Wales for many years in various groups and jam sessions, and he appeared on saxophonist Ornette Coleman's 1988 album, Virgin Beauty. His collaboration with Merl Saunders and Muruga Booker on the world music album Blues From the Rainforest launched the Rainforest Band.
Garcia also spent a lot of time in the recording studio helping out fellow musician friends in session work, often adding guitar, vocals, pedal steel, sometimes banjo and piano and even producing. He played on over 50 studio albums, the styles of which were eclectic and varied, including bluegrass, rock, folk, blues, country, jazz, electronic music, gospel, funk, and reggae. Artists who sought Garcia's help included the likes of Jefferson Airplane (most notably Surrealistic Pillow, Garcia being listed as their "spiritual advisor"). Garcia himself recalled in a mid-1967 interview that he'd played the high lead on "Today," played on "Plastic Fantastic Lover" and "Comin' Back to Me" on that album. Others include Tom Fogerty, David Bromberg, Robert Hunter (Liberty, on Relix Records), Paul Pena, Peter Rowan, Warren Zevon, Country Joe McDonald, Pete Sears, Ken Nordine, Ornette Coleman, Bruce Hornsby, Bob Dylan, It's a Beautiful Day, and many more. In 1995 Garcia played on three tracks for the CD Blue Incantation by guitarist Sanjay Mishra, making it his last studio collaboration.
Throughout the early 1970s, Garcia, Lesh, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, and David Crosby collaborated intermittently with MIT-educated composer and biologist Ned Lagin on several projects in the realm of early ambient music; these include the album Seastones (released by the Ned Lagin on the Round Records subsidiary) and L, an unfinished dance work composed by Ned Lagin. In 1970, Garcia participated in the soundtrack for the film Zabriskie Point.
Garcia also played pedal steel guitar for fellow-San Francisco musicians New Riders of the Purple Sage from their initial dates in 1969 to October 1971, when increased commitments with the Dead forced him to opt out of the group. He appears as a band member on their debut album New Riders of the Purple Sage, and produced Home, Home on the Road, a 1974 live album by the band. He also contributed pedal steel guitar to the enduring hit "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. Garcia also played steel guitar licks on Brewer & Shipley's 1970 album Tarkio. Despite considering himself a novice on the pedal steel, Garcia routinely ranked high in player polls. After a long lapse from playing the pedal steel, he played it once more during several of the Dead's concerts with Bob Dylan in the summer of 1987.
In 1988, Garcia agreed to perform at several major benefits including the "Soviet American Peace Walk" concert at the Band Shell, in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, that drew 25,000 people. He was asked to play by longtime friend and fellow musician, Pete Sears, who played piano with all the bands that day, and also procured all the other musicians. Garcia, Mickey Hart and Steve Parish played the show, then were given a police escort to a Grateful Dead show across the bay later that night. Garcia also played with Nick Gravenites and Pete Sears at a benefit given for Vietnam Veteran and peace activist Brian Willson, who lost both legs below the knee when he attempted to block a train carrying weapons to military dictatorships in El Salvador.
Having previously studied at the San Francisco Art Institute as a teenager, Garcia embarked on a second career in the visual arts in the late 1980s. He created a number of drawings, etchings, and water colors. Garcia's artistic endeavors were represented by the Weir Gallery in Berkeley, California from 1989 to 1996. During this period, Roberta Weir (unrelated to Garcia's bandmate Bob Weir) provided Garcia with new art techniques to use, sponsored his first solo show in 1990, and prepared blank etching plates for him to draw on. These would then be processed and printed by gallery staff and brought back to Garcia for approval and signature, usually with a passing of stacks of paper backstage at a Dead show. His annual shows at the Weir Gallery garnered much attention, leading to further shows in New York and other cities. Garcia was an early adopter of digital art media; his artistic style was as varied as his musical output, and he carried small notebooks for pen and ink sketches wherever he toured. Roberta Weir continues to maintain an archive of the artwork of Jerry Garcia. Perhaps the most widely seen pieces of Jerry Garcia's art are the many editions of men's neckties produced by Stonehenge Ltd. and Mulberry Neckware. Some began as etchings, other designs came from his drawings, paintings, and digital art. Garcia's artwork has since expanded into everything from hotel rooms, wet suits, men's sport shirts, a women's wear line, boxer shorts, hair accessories, cummerbunds, silk scarves and wool rugs.
Personal life
Garcia met his first wife, Sara Ruppenthal, in 1963. She was working at the coffee house in the back of Kepler's Books, where Garcia, Hunter, and Nelson regularly performed. They married on April 23, 1963, and on December 8 of that year their daughter Heather was born.
Carolyn Adams, a Merry Prankster also known as "Mountain Girl" or "M.G.," had a daughter, Sunshine, with Ken Kesey. Mountain Girl married another Prankster, George Walker, but they soon separated. She and Sunshine then moved into 710 Ashbury with Garcia in late 1966 where they would ultimately live together until 1975. In 1994, Sara and Jerry officially divorced after a long separation. Adams gave birth to Garcia's second and third daughters, Annabelle Walker Garcia (February 2, 1970) and Theresa Adams "Trixie" Garcia (September 21, 1974).
In August 1970, Garcia's mother Ruth was involved in a car crash near Twin Peaks in San Francisco. Garcia, who was recording the album American Beauty at the time, often left the sessions to visit his mother with his brother Clifford. She died on September 28, 1970.
In the midst of a March 1973 Grateful Dead engagement at Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, Garcia met Deborah Koons, an aspiring filmmaker from a wealthy Cincinnati, Ohio-based family who would much later marry him and become his widow. After a brief correspondence, he began his relationship with her in mid-1974. This gradually strained his relationship with Adams and culminated in Garcia leaving Adams for Koons in late 1975. The end of his relationship with Koons in 1977 precipitated a brief reconciliation with Adams, including the reestablishment of their household. However, she did not agree with the guitarist's persistent use of narcotics and moved with the children to the Eugene, Oregon area, living near Kesey, in 1978.
Following Adams' departure, Garcia had an affair with Amy Moore. She was a Kentucky-born member of the extended "Grateful Dead family", and the mistress of Texas oil heir Roy Cullen. Their affair lasted circa 1980–1981, and inspired the Garcia-Hunter song "Run for the Roses."
Adams and Garcia were married on December 31, 1981, largely as a result of mutual tax exigencies. Despite the legal codification of their union, she remained in Oregon, while Garcia continued to live near the Grateful Dead's offices in San Rafael, California. Garcia lived with a variety of housemates, including longtime Grateful Dead employee and Jerry Garcia Band manager Rock Scully. Scully, who co-managed the Grateful Dead throughout the mid-to-late 1960s before serving as the band's "advance man" and publicist, was dismissed by the group in 1984 for enabling Garcia's addictions and for allegedly embezzling the Garcia Band's profits. Another housemate was Nora Sage, a Deadhead who became Garcia's housekeeper while studying at the Golden Gate University School of Law. The exact nature of their relationship remains unclear, although it is believed to have been platonic due to Garcia's addictions. She later became his art representative.
While they would briefly reunite following his diabetic coma, Garcia and Adams ultimately divorced in 1994. Phil Lesh has subsequently stated that he rarely saw Adams on any of the band tours. In a 1991 Rolling Stone interview, Garcia stated that "we haven't really lived together since the Seventies".
During the autumn of 1978, Garcia developed a friendship with Shimer College student Manasha Matheson, an artist and music enthusiast. They remained friends over the following nine years before initiating a romantic relationship in Hartford, Connecticut on the Grateful Dead's spring 1987 tour. Jerry and Manasha became parents with the birth of their daughter, Keelin Noel Garcia, on December 20, 1987. On August 17, 1990, Jerry and Manasha married at their San Anselmo, California home in a spiritual ceremony free of legal convention. In 1991, Garcia expressed his delight in finding the time to "actually be a father" to Keelin in contrast to his past relationships with his children. A year later, Garcia dedicated his first art book, Paintings, Drawings and Sketches, "For Manasha, with love, Jerry."
In January 1993, Barbara "Brigid" Meier, a former girlfriend from the early 1960s, reentered Garcia's life for a brief period. Meier claimed, Garcia had considered her to be the "love of his life" and proposed to her during a Hawaiian vacation shortly after their relationship recommenced. Garcia's "love of his life" sentiment was not reserved for one lover, as he expressed the same feelings to several other women in his life. At Garcia's 1995 funeral, Koons declared that she was "the love of his life" while paying her final respects, whereupon Meier and Ruppenthal, who were both in attendance, simultaneously exclaimed, "He said that to me!"
The affair with Meier marked the breakup of Jerry's family life with Manasha and Keelin. Garcia ended the affair with Meier forty-five days later while on tour in Chicago with the Grateful Dead after she confronted him about his drug use.
Shortly thereafter, Garcia renewed his acquaintance with Deborah Koons in the spring of 1993. They married on February 14, 1994, in Sausalito, California. Garcia and Koons were married at the time of his death.
Lifestyle and health
Because of their public profile, Garcia and his collaborators were occasionally singled out in the American government's war on drugs. On October 2, 1967, 710 Ashbury Street in San Francisco (where the Grateful Dead had taken up residence the year before) was raided after a police tip-off. Grateful Dead members Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Ron "Pigpen" McKernan were apprehended on marijuana charges which were later dropped, although Garcia himself was not arrested. The following year, Garcia's picture was used in a defamatory context in a campaign commercial for Richard Nixon.
Most of the band were arrested again in January 1970, after they flew to New Orleans from Hawaii. After returning to their hotel from a performance, the band checked into their rooms, only to be quickly raided by police. Approximately fifteen people were arrested on the spot, including many of the road crew, management, and nearly all of the Grateful Dead except for Garcia, who arrived later, outgoing keyboardist Tom Constanten, who abstained from all drugs as a member of the Church of Scientology, and McKernan, who eschewed illegal drugs in favor of alcohol.
According to Bill Kreutzmann, the band's use of cocaine accelerated throughout the early 1970s. After using heroin in a brothel in 1974 (likely on the band's second European tour), Garcia was introduced to a smokeable form of the drug (initially advertised as refined opium) colloquially known as "Persian" or "Persian Base" during the group's 1975 hiatus. Influenced by the stresses of creating and releasing The Grateful Dead Movie and the acrimonious collapse of the band's independent record labels over the next two years, Garcia became increasingly dependent upon both substances. These factors, combined with the alcohol and drug abuse of several other members of the Grateful Dead, resulted in a turbulent atmosphere. By 1978, the band's chemistry began "cracking and crumbling", resulting in poor group cohesion. As a result, Keith and Donna Jean Godchaux left the band in February 1979.
With the addition of keyboardist/vocalist Brent Mydland that year amid the ongoing coalescence of the Deadhead subculture, the band reached new commercial heights as a touring group on the American arena circuit in the early 1980s, enabling them to forsake studio recording for several years. Nevertheless, this was offset by such factors as the band's atypically large payroll and Garcia's $700-a-day () drug addiction, resulting in the guitarist taking on a frenetic slate of solo touring outside of the Grateful Dead's rigorous schedule, including abbreviated acoustic duo concerts with Jerry Garcia Band bassist John Kahn that were widely rumored to be a funding conduit for their respective addictions.
Though things seemed to be getting better for the band, Garcia's health was declining. By 1983, Garcia's demeanor onstage had appeared to change. Despite still playing the guitar with great passion and intensity, there were times that he would appear disengaged; as such, shows were often inconsistent. Years of heavy tobacco smoking had affected his voice, and he gained considerable weight. By 1984, he would often rest his chin on the microphone during performances. The so-called "endless tour"—the result of years of financial risks, drug use, and poor business decisions—had taken its toll.
Garcia's decade-long heroin addiction culminated in the rest of the band holding an intervention in January 1985. Given the choice between the band or the drugs, Garcia agreed to check into a rehabilitation center in Oakland, California. A few days later in January, before the start of his program in Oakland, Garcia was arrested for drug possession in Golden Gate Park; he subsequently attended a drug diversion program. Throughout 1985, he tapered his drug use on tour and at home with the assistance of Nora Sage; by the spring of 1986, he was completely abstinent.
Precipitated by an unhealthy weight, dehydration, bad eating habits, and a recent relapse on the Grateful Dead's first stadium tour, Garcia collapsed into a diabetic coma in July 1986, waking up five days later. He later spoke about this period of unconsciousness as surreal: "Well, I had some very weird experiences. My main experience was one of furious activity and tremendous struggle in a sort of futuristic, space-ship vehicle with insectoid presences. After I came out of my coma, I had this image of myself as these little hunks of protoplasm that were stuck together kind of like stamps with perforations between them that you could snap off." Garcia's coma had a profound effect on him: it forced him to have to relearn how to play the guitar, as well as other, more basic skills. Within a handful of months, he had recovered, playing with the Jerry Garcia Band and the Grateful Dead again later that year.
After Garcia's recovery, the band released a comeback album In the Dark in 1987, which became their best-selling studio album. Inspired by Garcia's improved health, a successful album and the continuing emergence of Mydland as a third frontman, the band's energy and chemistry reached a new peak in the late 1980s.
Amid a litany of personal problems, Mydland died of a speedball overdose in July 1990. His death greatly affected Garcia, leading him to believe that the band's chemistry would never be the same. Before beginning the fall tour, the band acquired keyboardists Vince Welnick and Bruce Hornsby. The power of Hornsby's performances drove Garcia to new heights on stage. However, as the band continued through 1991, Garcia became concerned with the band's future. He was exhausted from five straight years of touring. He thought a break was necessary, mainly so that the band could come back with fresh material. The idea was put off by the pressures of management, and the touring continued. Garcia began using heroin again after several years of intermittent prescription opiate use. Though his relapse was brief, the band was quick to react. Soon after the last show of the tour in Denver, Garcia was confronted by the band with another intervention. After a disastrous meeting, Garcia invited Phil Lesh over to his home in San Rafael, California, where he explained that after the meeting he would start attending a methadone clinic. Garcia said that he wanted to clean up in his own way, and return to making music.
After returning from the band's 1992 summer tour, Garcia became sick, a throwback to his diabetic coma in 1986. Manasha Garcia nursed Jerry back to health and organized a team of health professionals which included acupuncturist Yen Wei Choong and Randy Baker, MD, a holistic family physician to treat him at home. Garcia recovered over the following days, despite the Grateful Dead having to cancel their fall tour to allow him time to recuperate. Garcia reduced his cigarette smoking and began losing weight. He also became a vegetarian.
Despite these improvements, Garcia's physical and mental condition continued to decline throughout 1993 and 1994. He began to use narcotics again to dull the pain.
In light of his second drug relapse and current condition, Garcia checked himself into the Betty Ford Center during July 1995. His stay was limited, lasting only two weeks. Motivated by the experience, he then checked into the Serenity Knolls treatment center in Forest Knolls, California, where he died.
Death
Garcia died in his room at the rehabilitation clinic on August 9, 1995. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes—all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that, upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb. I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former pro basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred two of Garcia's former wives from the ceremony.
On August 13, about 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Haight-Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn.
On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes.
Musical equipment
Garcia played many guitars during his career, which ranged from student and budget models to custom-made instruments. During his thirty-five year career as a professional musician, Garcia used about 25 guitars.
In 1965, when Garcia was playing with the Warlocks, he used a Guild Starfire, which he also used on the début album of the Grateful Dead. Beginning in late 1967 and ending in 1968, Garcia played black or gold mid-1950s Gibson Les Paul guitars with P-90 pickups. In 1969, he picked up the Gibson SG and used it for most of that year and 1970, except for a small period in between where he used a sunburst Fender Stratocaster.
During Garcia's "pedal steel flirtation period" (as Bob Weir referred to it in Anthem to Beauty), from approximately 1969 to 1972, he initially played a Fender instrument before upgrading to the ZB Custom D-10, especially in his earlier public performances. Although this was a double neck guitar, Garcia used the "E9 neck and the three pedals to raise the tone and two levers to lower it." He employed an Emmons D-10 at the Grateful Dead's and New Riders of the Purple Sage's final appearances at the Fillmore East in April 1971.
In 1969, Garcia played pedal steel on three notable outside recordings: the track "The Farm" on the Jefferson Airplane album Volunteers, the track "Oh Mommy" by Brewer and Shipley and the hit single "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young from their album Déjà Vu, released in 1970. Garcia played on the latter album in exchange for harmony lessons for the Grateful Dead, who were at the time recording Workingman's Dead.
In 1971, Garcia began playing a sunburst Les Paul. In March and April 1971 – the time period during which the Grateful Dead recorded its second live album, Grateful Dead – Garcia played the "Peanut," a guitar he had received from Rick Turner, who had custom built the guitar's body and incorporated the neck, pickups, and hardware from an early '60s Les Paul.
In May, Garcia began using a 1957 natural finish Stratocaster that had been given to him by Graham Nash. Garcia added an alligator sticker to the pickguard in the fall of that year. "Alligator" would remain Garcia's principal electric guitar until August 1973.
In the summer of 1971, Garcia also played a double-cutaway Les Paul TV Junior.
While Alligator was in the shop in the summer of 1972, he briefly reverted to the sunburst Stratocaster; this can be seen in Sunshine Daydream.
In late 1972, Garcia purchased the first guitar ("Eagle") made by Alembic luthier Doug Irwin for $850 (). Enamored of Irwin's talents, he immediately commissioned his own custom instrument. This guitar, nicknamed "Wolf" for a memorable sticker Garcia added below the tailpiece, was delivered in May 1973 and replaced Alligator on stage in September. It cost $1,500 (), an extremely high price for the era.
Wolf was made with an ebony fingerboard and featured numerous embellishments like alternating grain designs in the headstock, ivory inlays, and fret marker dots made of sterling silver. The body was composed of western maple wood which had a core of purpleheart. Garcia later had Irwin (who ultimately left Alembic to start his own business) replace the electronics inside the guitar, at which point he added his own logo to the headstock alongside the Alembic logo. The system included two interchangeable plates for configuring pickups: one was made for strictly single coils, while the other accommodated humbuckers. Shortly after receiving the modified instrument, Garcia commissioned another custom guitar from Irwin with one caveat: "Don't hold back."
During the Grateful Dead's 1974 European tour, Wolf was dropped on several occasions, one of which caused a minor crack in the headstock. Following filming of The Grateful Dead Movie (in which the guitar is prominently visible) a month later, Garcia returned it to Irwin for repairs. Throughout its absence, Garcia predominantly played several Travis Bean guitars, including the TB1000A (1975) and the TB500 (1976-1977). On September 28, 1977, Irwin delivered the refurbished Wolf back to Garcia. The wolf sticker which gave the guitar its name had now been inlaid into the instrument; it also featured an effects loop between the pick-ups and controls (so inline effects would "see" the same signal at all times) which was bypassable. Irwin also put a new face on the headstock with only his logo (he later claimed to have built the guitar himself, though pictures through time clearly show the progression of logos, from Alembic, to Alembic & Irwin, to only Irwin).
Nearly seven years after he commissioned it, Garcia received his second custom guitar ("Tiger") from Irwin in the summer of 1979.
He first employed the instrument in concert at a Grateful Dead performance at the Oakland Auditorium Arena on August 4, 1979. Its name was derived from the inlay on the preamp cover.
The body of Tiger was of rich quality: the top layer was cocobolo, with the preceding layers being maple stripe, vermilion, and flame maple, in that order. The neck was made of western maple with an ebony fingerboard. The pickups consisted of a single coil DiMarzio SDS-1 and two humbucker DiMarzio Super IIs which were easily removable due to Garcia's preference for replacing his pickups every year or two. The electronics were composed of an effects bypass loop, which allowed Garcia to control the sound of his effects through the tone and volume controls on the guitar, and a preamplifier/buffer which rested behind a plate in the back of the guitar. Fully outfitted, Tiger weighed . This was Garcia's principal guitar for the next eleven years, and most played.
In the late 1980s Garcia, Weir and CSN (along with many others) endorsed Alvarez Yairi acoustic guitars. There are many photographs circulating (mostly promotional) of Garcia playing a DY99 Virtuoso Custom with a Modulus Graphite neck. He opted to play with the less decorated model but the promotional photo from the Alvarez Yairi catalog has him holding the "tree of life" model. This hand-built guitar was notable for the collaboration between Japanese luthier Kazuo Yairi and Modulus Graphite of San Rafael. As with most things Garcia, with his passing, the DY99 model is highly valued among collectors.
In 1990, Irwin completed "Rosebud", Garcia's fourth custom guitar. It was similar to his previous guitar Tiger in many respects, but featured different inlays and electronics, tone and volume controls, and weight. Rosebud, unlike Tiger, was configured with three humbuckers; the neck and bridge pickups shared a tone control, while the middle had its own. Atop the guitar was a Roland GK-2 pickup which fed the controller set inside the guitar. The GK2 was used in junction with the Roland GR-50 rack mount synthesizer. The GR-50 synthesizer in turn drove a Korg M1R synthesizer producing the MIDI effects heard during live performances of this period as heard on the Grateful Dead recording Without a Net. Sections of the guitar were hollowed out to bring the weight down to . The inlay, a dancing skeleton holding a rose, covers a plate just below the bridge. The final cost of the instrument was $11,000 ().
In 1993, carpenter-turned-luthier Stephen Cripe tried his hand at making an instrument for Garcia. After researching Tiger through pictures and films, Cripe set out on what would soon become known as "Lightning Bolt", again named for its inlay.
The guitar used Brazilian rosewood for the fingerboard and East Indian rosewood for the body, which, with admitted irony from Cripe, had been taken from a 19th-century bed used by opium smokers. Built purely from guesswork, Lightning Bolt was a hit with Garcia, who began using the guitar exclusively. Soon after, Garcia requested that Cripe build a backup of the guitar. Cripe, who had not measured or photographed the original, was told simply to "wing it."
Cripe later delivered the backup, which was known by the name "Top Hat". Garcia bought it from him for $6,500, making it the first guitar that Cripe had ever sold. However, infatuated with Lightning Bolt, Garcia rarely used the backup.
After Garcia's death, the ownership of Wolf and Tiger came into question. According to Garcia's will, his guitars were bequeathed to Doug Irwin, who had constructed them.
The remaining Grateful Dead members disagreed – they considered his guitars to be property of the band, leading to a lawsuit between the two parties. In 2001, Irwin won the case. However, nearly having been left destitute from a traffic accident in 1998, he decided to place the guitars up for auction in hopes of being able to start another guitar workshop.
On May 8, 2002, Wolf and Tiger, among other memorabilia, were placed for auction at Studio 54 in New York City. Tiger was sold for $957,500, and Wolf for $789,500. Together, the pair sold for $1.74 million, setting a new world record. Wolf went into in the private collection of Daniel Pritzker who kept it in a secure climate controlled room in a private residence at Utica, N.Y. Tiger went to the private collection of Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.
In May 2017, Wolf was again auctioned, but this time for charity. Pritzker decided to sell the guitar and donate all proceeds to the Montgomery, Alabama based Southern Poverty Law Center.
Brian Halligan placed the winning bid totaling $1.9M.
For the majority of 2019 Wolf and Tiger were included in the Play it Loud exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. On June 23, 2019 John Mayer played Wolf with Dead & Co. at Citi Field.
Legacy
Garcia was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Grateful Dead in 1994. He declined to attend the ceremony; the band jokingly brought a cardboard cutout of Garcia out on stage in his absence.
In 1987, Vermont ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's introduced their Cherry Garcia flavor dedicated to him. It was the first ice cream flavor dedicated to a musician.
In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Jerry Garcia 13th in their list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
According to fellow Bay Area guitar player Henry Kaiser, Garcia is "the most recorded guitarist in history. With more than 2,200 Grateful Dead concerts, and 1,000 Jerry Garcia Band concerts captured on tape – as well as numerous studio sessions – there are about 15,000 hours of his guitar work preserved for the ages."
On July 30, 2004, Melvin Seals was the first Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) member to headline an outdoor music and camping festival called "The Grateful Garcia Gathering". Jerry Garcia Band drummer David Kemper joined Melvin Seals and JGB in 2007. Other musicians and friends of Garcia include Donna Jean Godchaux, Mookie Siegel, Pete Sears, G.E. Smith, Chuck Hammer, Barry Sless, Jackie Greene, Brian Lesh, Sanjay Mishra, and Mark Karan.
On July 21, 2005, the San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission passed a resolution to name the amphitheater in McLaren Park "The Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." The amphitheater is located in the Excelsior District, where Garcia grew up. The first show to happen at the Jerry Garcia Amphitheater was Jerry Day 2005 on August 7, 2005. Jerry's brother, Tiff Garcia, was the first person to welcome everybody to the "Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." Jerry Day is an annual celebration of Garcia in his childhood neighborhood. The dedication ceremony (Jerry Day 2) on October 29, 2005, was officiated by mayor Gavin Newsom.
On September 24, 2005, the Comes a Time: A Celebration of the Music & Spirit of Jerry Garcia tribute concert was held at the Hearst Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California. The concert featured Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, Bruce Hornsby, Trey Anastasio, Warren Haynes, Jimmy Herring, Michael Kang, Jay Lane, Jeff Chimenti, Mark Karan, Robin Sylvester, Kenny Brooks, Melvin Seals, Merl Saunders, Marty Holland, Stu Allen, Gloria Jones, and Jackie LaBranch.
Georgia-based composer Lee Johnson released an orchestral tribute to the music of the Grateful Dead, recorded with the Russian National Orchestra, entitled "Dead Symphony: Lee Johnson Symphony No. 6." Johnson was interviewed on NPR on the July 26, 2008 broadcast of Weekend Edition, and gave much credit to the genius and craft of Garcia's songwriting. A live performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Johnson himself, was held Friday, August 1.
In 2010 the Santa Barbara Bowl in California opened Jerry Garcia Glen along the walk up to the venue. There is a statue of Garcia's right hand along the way.
Seattle rock band Soundgarden wrote and recorded the instrumental song "Jerry Garcia's Finger", dedicated to the singer, which was released as a b-side with their single "Pretty Noose".
Numerous music festivals across the United States and Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK hold annual events in memory of Jerry Garcia.
On May 14, 2015, an all-star lineup held a tribute concert for Garcia at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. The event was called "Dear Jerry".
In 2015, Hunter and Garcia were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Hunter accepted the award along with Garcia's daughter, Trixie Garcia, who accepted on behalf of her father.
In 2015, Jerry Garcia's wife, Manasha Garcia and their daughter, Keelin Garcia launched The Jerry Garcia Foundation, a nonprofit charity that supports projects for artistic, environmental, and humanitarian causes. The Foundation's Board members are Bob Weir, Peter Shapiro, Glenn Fischer, Irwin Sternberg, Daniel Shiner, TRI Studios CEO, Christopher McCutcheon and Fender Music Foundation Executive Director,
Lynn Robison. Keelin Garcia said, "It is a tremendous honor to participate in nonprofit work that is in accordance with my father's values."
In 2018, Jerry Garcia family members, Keelin Garcia and Manasha Garcia launched the Jerry Garcia Music Arts independent music label.
On November 18, 2021, it was announced Jonah Hill would portray Garcia in a forthcoming Grateful Dead biopic written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski directed by Martin Scorsese for Apple TV+.
Discography
New Riders of the Purple Sage – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1971
Hooteroll? – Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia – 1971
Garcia – Jerry Garcia – 1972
Live at Keystone – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1973
Compliments – Jerry Garcia – 1974
Old & In the Way – Old & In the Way – 1975
Reflections – Jerry Garcia – 1976
Cats Under the Stars – Jerry Garcia Band – 1978
Run for the Roses – Jerry Garcia – 1982
Vintage NRPS – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1986
Keystone Encores – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1988
Almost Acoustic – Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band – 1988
Jerry Garcia / David Grisman – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1991
Jerry Garcia Band – Jerry Garcia Band – 1991
Not for Kids Only – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1993
Notes
References
Sources
External links
The official homepage of Jerry Garcia
Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jerry Garcia on Fretbase
The Jerry Site
Official Grateful Dead website
Jerry Garcia discography at deaddisc.com
Jerry Garcia autopsy
Jerry Day: A Civic and Cultural Celebration of Jerry Garcia held in San Francisco
FBI Records: The Vault - Jerry Garcia at vault.fbi.gov
Jerry Garcia's Army personnel file at the National Archives
TEAM
Garcia's Guitars & Gear Directory
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"R. v. Smithers, [1978] 1 S.C.R. 506 is a leading Supreme Court of Canada decision on determining criminal causation in an offence of manslaughter. The Court held that the Crown must show that the accused's acts were a \"contributing cause of death outside of the de minimis range.\" In practice, this test applied to all criminal offences requiring proof of causation.\n\nBackground\nOn February 18, 1973, Smithers, a black teen, played in a hockey game against a team including Barrie Cobby, a white teen, in a Mississauga rink. During the game, Smithers was subject to numerous racial slurs by Cobby. Evidence given by numerous witnesses at the trial indicated both had a dislike for each other's behaviour and Cobby had often been using racial slurs toward Smithers. During their final game, Cobby was given a penalty for spearing Smithers during the game while Cobby was in the penalty box Smithers scored a goal and laughed in Cobby's direction. Cobby shouted further racial slurs and Smithers threatened Cobby that he was going to \"get him\" if Cobby did not apologize for making the ongoing racial insults.\n\nAfter the game Smithers waited outside the rink for Cobby to leave. When Cobby came out Smithers chased him and was grabbed by at least 3 of Cobby's friends, Smithers grabbed Cobby's jacket and kicked Cobby once in the stomach area. Immediately Cobby fell to the ground and started to gasp for air. Cobby soon passed out and died shortly afterwards. It was discovered that he died from inhaling vomit after being kicked due to a rare condition in which his epiglottis failed. Although Smithers was unsure if the kick even landed (there were no marks on Cobby), he was still responsible. \n\nSmithers was charged for manslaughter under section 205 of the Criminal Code (now section 222) for \"caus[ing] the death of a human being\". In his defence, Smithers argued that it was the epiglottis condition that caused death, not the blow.\n\nThe issue before the Supreme Court was whether the kick was a sufficient cause of the death to attract criminal liability.\n\nA unanimous Court held that Smithers was guilty of causing death of a human being. The decision was written by Justice Dickson.\n\nOpinion of the court\nDickson adopted the comments of G. Arthur Martin from a 1943 case note on the English Larkin case, where it was stated that \"[t]here are many unlawful acts which are not dangerous in themselves and are not likely to cause injury which, nevertheless if they cause death, render the actor guilty of culpable homicide ... In the case of so-called intentional crimes where death is an unintended consequence the actor is always guilty of manslaughter at least.\"\n\nThe question Dickson considered was what degree of causation is required to prove guilt. Where consequences need not be intended such as manslaughter, he proposed the degree of contribution to the cause of death need only pass a de minimis test. That is, the Crown need only show that the amount contributed to the cause of death be more than trivial. \n\nDickson also reaffirmed the application of the thin skull doctrine in homicide, where the fact that Cobby was susceptible to failure of the epiglottis should not absolve Smithers from liability. Consequently, since the kick may have killed Cobby, its contribution to his death was more than trivial and so Smithers is criminally liable.\n\nSee also\nList of Supreme Court of Canada cases (Laskin Court)\n\nExternal links\nfull text at CanLII.org\n\nSupreme Court of Canada cases\n1978 in Canadian case law\nCanadian criminal case law\nManslaughter\nHistory of Mississauga",
"This list of unsolved deaths includes well-known cases where:\n The cause of death could not be officially determined.\n The person's identity could not be established after they were found dead.\n The cause is known, but the manner of death (homicide, suicide, accident, overdosing) could not be determined.\n Different official investigations have come to different conclusions.\n\nCases where there are unofficial alternative theories about deaths – the most common theory being that the death was a homicide – can be found under: Death conspiracy theories.\n\nUnsolved murders\n\nUnsolved deaths\n\nPrehistoric\n La Chapelle-aux-Saints 1 (40), also known as \"The Old Man\", is the near-complete skeleton of a Neanderthal discovered at La Chapelle-aux-Saints, France in 1908. He is thought to be between 47,000 and 56,000 years old and in bad health at the time of his death, but his exact cause of death is unknown.\n The Hŭngsu Child (4–6), a skeleton of a child from the Paleolithic era which supposedly dates back to 40,000 BC, was discovered in a limestone cave in Cheongji, South Korea in 1982. The decedent's cause of death is unknown.\n Eve of Naharon (20–25) is the skeleton of a Mayan female who had lived 13,600 years ago. She was found in an underwater cave near the town of Tulum, southwest of Cancún in Mexico. Her exact cause of death is unknown.\n Arlington Springs Man (20s), a set of male human remains from the Late Pleistocene period dated to 13,000 years ago that were found in 1959 on Santa Rosa Island, one of the Channel Islands located off the coast of Southern California. He might have died while he was traveling and what he died from is unknown.\n Anzick-1 (1–2) was a male Paleo-Indian toddler whose remains were discovered in 1968 in south central Montana and who is estimated to have lived between 12,707 and 12,556 years BP. His cause of death is unknown.\n Naia (15–17) is a human skeleton of a female teenager that was discovered in 2007 in the Yucatán Peninsula, Mexico. She lived 12,000–13,000 years ago. It is believed that Naia had died falling into Hoyo Negro, but this is not known for certain.\n Luzia Woman (20), is the name for a skeleton of a Paleo-Indian woman who was found in a cave in Brazil from the Upper Paleolithic period, said to be 11,500 years old, that was discovered by an archaeologist named Annette Laming-Emperaire. in 1974. What caused her death is unknown.\n Buhl Woman (17–21), is the name for a skeleton of a Paleo-Indian prehistoric female who is said to be 11,000 years old who was found in January 1989 in a quarry near Buhl, Idaho. What caused her death is unknown.\n Peñon woman (26), is the name for the human remains (mainly the skull) of a Paleo-Indian woman who lived 10,755±55 years ago discovered in 1959 by an ancient lake bed in Pueblo Peñón de los Baños in Mexico City. Her death was untimely and its cause is unknown.\n La Brea Woman (18–25), name for remains of a human partial skeleton of a woman who lived 10,220–10,250 calendar years BP. discovered in the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles, California in 1914. Though her skeleton showed signs of injury, it is not definitely known how she died.\n Leanderthal Lady (18–30), also known as \"Leanne\", is the name given to the skeletal remains of a prehistoric female 10,000 to 13,000 years old discovered at the Wilson-Leonard Brushy Creek Site located in the city of Cedar Park, Texas, next to the Texas Department of Transportation in January 1983. It is unknown how she died.\n The Koelbjerg Man, the oldest known bog body dating back to 10,000 years ago, was located in Denmark in 1941. His cause of death was never conclusively determined.\n The Tuqan Man (40–49) is refers to a set of human remains found in the Channel Islands in 2005, thought to be those of a male individual who had lived 9,800–10,200 years ago. His cause of death is unknown.\n The Spirit Cave mummy is a male mummy who was discovered in Spirit Cave in 1940 and is the oldest human mummy found in North America., said to lived more than 9,200 years ago. What caused his death is unknown.\n Kennewick Man (40–55), is the name that is given to the skeletal remains of a Paleoamerican prehistoric man discovered on a bank of the Columbia River in Kennewick, Washington, on July 28, 1996, who is dated to be around 8900 to 9000 years old. He had cracked ribs, a spear in his hip, and a wrecked shoulder, though he showed signs of healing, so it is unclear exactly how he died.\n Minnesota Woman (15–16), also known as \"Pelican Rapids-Minnesota Woman\", is the name given to the skeletal remains of a female believed to be 8,000 years old discovered in Pelican Rapids, Minnesota, on June 16, 1931, on U.S. Route 59 while it was under construction. It is unknown how she died.\n The Tepexpan man (c. 40) is the name given to a Pre-Columbian era skeleton found on the shores of the former Lake Texcoco in central Mexico. Various theories exist surrounding the skeleton's cause and circumstances of death, but it officially remains unsolved.\n\n The Lovers of Valdaro are the skeletal remains of a male and female, both thought to be around twenty years old, discovered by archaeologists inside a Neolithic tomb in San Giorgio near Mantua, Italy, in 2007. The two are estimated to have died around 4000 BCE. No evidence of a violent death could be ascertained for either individual, and both had been placed in a symbolic embrace after death.\n The Embracing Skeletons of Alepotrypa are a pair of human skeletons found in Laconia, Greece that supposedly date back to 3,800 BCE, having died in a lover's embrace. What caused their deaths is unknown.\n The Lansing Man is the name given to a collection of human remains found near Lansing, Kansas in February 1902, thought to be from an individual who died during the Early Middle Archaic period circa 3579 BC. His cause of death is unknown.\n The Cladh Hallan mummies are four skeletons found at an archaeological site on the South Uist island in the Outer Hebrides in Scotland. One of them is known to have been a female who died around 1300 BCE and one is known to have been a male who had died around 1600 BCE. Their respective causes of death are unknown.\n The Stoneyisland Man (40), is the name of a bog body found on 13 May 1929 in the Stoneyisland Bog in Gortanumera, County Galway, Ireland. He is said to have lived between 3320 and 3220 BCE. and had died from drowning that was caused from reasons unknown.\n The Egtved Girl (16–18), was a female whose remains are well-preserved who was found in 1921 outside Egtved, Denmark and had lived during the Nordic Bronze Age between 1390 and 1370 BCE. The cause of her death is unknown.\n\nAncient\n Cleopatra (39), the last ruler of Ptolemaic Egypt, died on either 10 or 12 August 30 BCE in Alexandria. According to popular belief, Cleopatra committed suicide by allowing an asp (Egyptian cobra) to bite her. According to Greek and Roman historians, Cleopatra poisoned herself using either a toxic ointment or sharp implement such as a hairpin. Primary source accounts are derived mainly from the works of the ancient Roman historians Strabo, Plutarch, and Cassius Dio. Modern scholars debate the validity of ancient reports involving snakebites as the cause of death and whether she was murdered. Some academics hypothesize that her Roman political rival Octavian forced her to commit suicide in the manner of her choosing. The location of Cleopatra's tomb is unknown.\n Amcotts Moor Woman is the name of a bog body that was discovered in a bog close to Amcotts, Lincolnshire in England in 1747 of a female who lived during 200–400 CE. Almost no details are known about her and the cause of her death remains a mystery.\n The Younger Lady (25–35), who had lived during the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt is the informal name given to a mummy whose death cause is unknown who was discovered in the Egyptian Valley of the Kings, in tomb KV35 by archaeologist Victor Loret in 1898. Through recent DNA tests, this mummy has been identified as the mother of the pharaoh Tutankhamun, and a daughter of pharaoh Amenhotep III and Queen Tiye. Early speculation was that this mummy was the remains of Queen Nefertiti, which was proven to be incorrect.\n Windeby I (16), is the name given to the bog body in 1952 that was preserved in a peat bog close to Windeby located in Northern Germany contained the remains of a teenage male who lived between 41 BCE and 118 CE. His death cause is disputed and unknown.\n Zoroaster (76), was an ancient male Iranian prophet who lived during 1000 BCE and was said to performed miracles and founded the religion now known as Zoroastrianism. Zoroaster's cause of death is unknown, but it is said that Zoroaster was killed by invading Turanians around the time that he was last seen, but this was never confirmed.\n The Hasanlu Lovers are a pair of human remains found in Teppe Hasanlu, Iran in 1972 who are thought to have died circa 800 BCE. While it has been suggested that they died from asphyxiation, no definitive cause of death has been established.\n Damendorf Man, is a German bog body discovered in 1900 in the See Moor at the village Damendorf in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany and was said to have died in 300 BCE. Only his hair, skin, nails and his few clothes were preserved, along with traces of some bones. He was found with a leather belt, shoes, and a pair of breeches. The man's identity and cause of death are unknown.\n The Girl of the Uchter Moor (17–19), who is also known as \"Moora\", is the name given to the remains of female bog body discovered in the marshland near Uchte, Germany in 2000. She had lived during the Iron Age and had died between 764 and 515 BCE, and the cause of her death is unknown.\n The Borremose bodies are three bog bodies that were found in 1946 and 1948 in Himmerland, Denmark in the Borremose peat bog. They have been dated to have lived in the Nordic Bronze Age during 770 BCE. Their deaths causes are unknown.\n The Saltmen are the remains of six men who had lived during the remainder of the Achaemenid Dynasty (550–330 BCE) that were found in 2010 in the salt mines in Chehrabad on the southern part of the Hamzehlu village in the Zanjan Province in the country of Iran. Though it is known that most of them were accidentally killed by the collapse of galleries where they worked, the deaths causes of the other saltmen remain unknown.\n Alexander the Great (32), died in 323 BCE after a short illness. Exactly what the illness was is a subject of debate; however, it is known that he was a heavy drinker throughout his life.\n The Weerdinge Men were two bog bodies found naked in the southern part of Bourtanger Moor in 1904 Drenthe in the Netherlands. Though one of the men is known to have been murdered the cause of the other man's death is unknown. They died between 160 BCE and 220 CE.\n In October 2018 human remains were found in Rome that were thought to possibly be the remains of Emanuela Orlandi and Mirella Gregori who disappeared from Rome between 7 May 1983, and 22 June 1983. Early reports said the remains could have belonged to a female, but tests results that were released on 1 February 2019 showed they were of an ancient Roman man who died between 190 and 230 CE, whose identity and cause of death are unknown.\n Orgetorix, 58 BCE, who was a wealthy aristocrat among the Helvetii, a Celtic-speaking people residing in what is now Switzerland during the consulship of Julius Caesar of the Roman Republic. He was trying to seize Gaul, and for this was put on trial. After this his death cause is disputed.\n Apollonius of Tyana (100), 100 CE, was a Greek Neopythagorean philosopher from the town of Tyana in the Roman province of Cappadocia in Anatolia. It was said that he was able to disappear and immediately reappear in another place. The circumstances of his death remain a mystery.\n\nMedieval\n The Lovers of Modena are two male skeletons found in Rome, Italy in 2009, who are thought to have lived between the 4th and 6th-century CE. Their cause of death is unknown.\n Princess Yongtai (15–16), 701, In both the Old Book of Tang and New Book of Tang, it is recorded that she was executed by Empress Wu Zetian with her brother and husband because of talking about the gossips about the two officials Zhang Yizhi and Zhang Changzong, who were also the lovers of Empress Wu Zetian. However, from her epitaph, it was said she was pregnant while she died. From a piece of her pelvic bone, it has been presumed that she died from childbirth, because her pelvis seems to be smaller than other women at the same age. It is also suspected that she went into shock on hearing the news that her brother and husband had been executed, and it caused a fatal miscarriage.\n Emperor Taizu of Song (49), the first emperor of Song Dynasty, died in 976. There are no records about how he died. However, his younger brother was granted the throne due to the fact that he had two grown sons. There is a folk story “shadows by the candle and sounds from an axe” possibly indicating that he was murdered by his brother, but it may also have been a suicide.\n Roopkund is a high altitude glacial lake in the Uttarakhand state of India. It lies in the lap of Trishul massif, located in the Himalayas. It is widely known for the hundreds of ancient human skeletons found at the edge of the lake. The human skeletal remains are visible at its bottom when the snow melts. Research generally points to a semi-legendary event where a group of people were killed in a sudden, violent hailstorm in the 9th century. Studies placed the time of mass death around the 9th century CE (1,200 years old) and second group of skeletons were dated to 19th century CE. The skeletons identities are unknown, but radiocarbon dating suggests that the older remains were deposited over an extended period or time, while the remains of the younger group were deposited during a single event.\n King William II of England (43–44), 1100, was killed by an arrow while hunting; it may or may not have been an accident.\n Margaret Hanmer (49–50), 1420, was the wife of Owain Glyndŵr; her death was never recorded and her body was never found.\n Agnès Sorel (28), 1450, was a French woman who had committed adultery with King Charles VII of France, having four daughters with him. Sorel died on 9 February 1450 from causes that are disputed.\n\nEarly modern\n The Lovers of Cluj-Napoca (30s), a nickname given to two skeletons found in a former Dominican convent in Cluj-Napoca, Romania in 2013, are thought to have lived between 1450 and 1550. Their exact causes of death are unclear.\n Kwäday Dän Ts'ìnchi (17–20), 1450–1700, also known as \"The Canadian Iceman\" is a naturally mummified body found by a group of hunters in 1999 in the Tatshenshini-Alsek Park in British Columbia, Canada. His death cause is unknown.\n Regiomontanus (40), whose real name was \"Johannes Müller von Königsberg\" was a astrologer, mathematician, and astronomer of the German Renaissance that was active in countries in Europe. He was thought to have died from the plague on 6 July 1476, but this is unknown for sure.\n Princes in the Tower, used to refer to Edward V, King of England and Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York who disappeared in the summer of 1483. In 1674, workmen at the Tower dug up a wooden box containing two small human skeletons. The bones were found in a box under the staircase in the Tower of London. The bones were widely accepted at the time as those of the princes, but this has not been proven and is far from certain. King Charles II had the bones buried in Westminster Abbey, where they remain.\n Amy Dudley (28), 1560, was the first wife of Lord Robert Dudley, favourite of Queen Elizabeth I of England. She is primarily known for her death by falling down a flight of stairs, the circumstances of which have often been regarded as suspicious.\n The Gunnister Man are the bog body remains of man found in a peat bog close to the junction of the A970 road located in Gunnister, Shetland, Scotland by two Shetlanders. The man had lived in the 17th and early 18th century and how he died is unknown.\n Cornelia Zangheri Bandi (66), was an Italian noblewoman whose death on 15 March 1731 may have been a possible case of spontaneous human combustion. But the case has never been proven, with the true cause of death remaining unknown.\n Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (35), composer, died on 5 December 1791. The circumstances of his death have attracted much research and speculation as it remains unclear whether he died from disease or poisoning. There have also been conspiracy theories.\n\n19th century\n\n The Female Stranger (23), refers to an unnamed American woman who died in 1816 and was elevated to national intrigue by the mysterious headstone and romanticized tale. Accounts of the stranger increase in oddity over time and help to incite further speculation as to the identity of the person buried in the grave. The reported location of the woman's death, Room 8 at Gadsby's Tavern, is also a tourist destination, and supposedly her ghostly visage can be seen standing at the window.\n A boat with three skeletons of sailors was discovered that washed up on Ducie Island during the 1820s–1830s, who are thought to be Obed Hendricks, William Bond and Joseph West from the whaler Essex. Although it was suspected to be the missing boat piloted by Hendricks, and the corpses those of Hendricks, Bond, and West, the remains have never been positively identified.\n Paul Johann Anselm Ritter von Feuerbach (57), German legal scholar, died on 29 May 1833. The circumstances remain unclear – his family as well as he himself shortly before his death believed that he had been poisoned due to his protection of and research work on Kaspar Hauser, who himself died the same year under suspicious circumstances (see below).\n The events that led to the death of German youth Kaspar Hauser (21) remain a mystery, just like many other points regarding his life and identity. On 14 December 1833, he came home with a deep stab wound in his chest of which he died three days later. While he had claimed to have been attacked, the court of enquiry doubted this due to inconsistencies in his claims and speculated that he wounded himself in order to seek attention and revive the fading public interest in him, a theory that is also supported by some historians today.\n Thomas Simpson (31), was a Scottish Arctic explorer, Hudson's Bay Company agent and cousin of Company Governor Sir George Simpson. His violent death in what is now the state of Minnesota allegedly by suicide after gunning down two traveling companions in the wilderness on 6 June 1840 has long been a subject of controversy and has never been solved.\n\n Edgar Allan Poe (40), American writer, editor, and literary critic, died on 7 October 1849, under circumstances that remain mysterious. The circumstances leading up to it are uncertain and the cause of death is disputed. On 3 October 1849 he was found delirious in Baltimore, Maryland, \"in great distress, and ... in need of immediate assistance\", according to the man who found him, Joseph W. Walker. He was taken to the Washington College Hospital, where he died days later.\n Zachary Taylor (65), was the 12th president of the United States, serving from March 1849 until his death in July 1850. Almost immediately after his death, rumors began to circulate that Taylor was poisoned by pro-slavery Southerners, and similar theories persisted into the 21st century. In 1978, Hamilton Smith based his assassination theory on the timing of drugs, the lack of confirmed cholera outbreaks, and other material. In the late 1980s, Clara Rising, a former professor at University of Florida, persuaded Taylor's closest living relative to agree to an exhumation so that his remains could be tested. His death cause remains unknown.\n Richard H. Barter (26), member of a stagecoach robbery gang active in California, was found dead outside Auburn on 12 July 1859. He had been ambushed and injured by law enforcement the day before, but it was unclear who had actually landed the fatal shot.\n Edward James Roye (57), was the first of Liberia's True Whig Party who had served as the fifth President of Liberia from 1870 until he was overthrown a year later and his death had followed on 11 February 1872. The cause of his death remains unknown.\n Zeng Guofan (60), a Chinese statesman, military general, and Confucian scholar of the late Qing dynasty. He is best known for raising and organizing the Xiang Army to aid the Qing military in suppressing the Taiping Rebellion and restoring the stability of the Qing Empire. Along with other prominent figures such as Zuo Zongtang and Li Hongzhang of his time, Zeng set the scene for the Tongzhi Restoration, an attempt to arrest the decline of the Qing dynasty, He died on 12 March 1872 of mysterious reasons.\nFor several weeks after 22 April 1822, unidentifiable dead bodies washed up off the coast of Ireland. They were believed to include that of Charles Lefebvre-Desnouettes (58), who had recently traveled, and perhaps died, there. This was never confirmed and their cause of death remains unknown.\n L'Inconnue de la Seine was the name given to an unidentified young woman who, according to an often-repeated story, was pulled out of the River Seine at the Quai du Louvre in Paris around the late 1880s. Since the body showed no signs of violence, suicide was suspected.\n Colorado rancher Gottlieb Fluhmann (55), was last seen alive in 1892. His disappearance was not resolved until his bones were found in a secluded Park County cave in 1944; the cause of his death could not be determined.\n Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (53), who was the composer of a Sixth Symphony, called the \"Pathétique\", died in Saint Petersburg in November 1893 just nine days after it had debuted. His death cause is debated and remains unsolved.\n Barney Barnato (46), an English Randlord and entrepreneur who was a prominent rival to Cecil Rhodes, was found dead at sea near Madeira, Portugal on June 14, 1897. While suicide was the prevailing theory, his family rejected it, saying that it was unlike him to do such a thing.\n\n1900–1924\n Sursinhji Takhtasinhji Gohil (26), popularly known by his pen name, Kalapi, was a Gujarati poet and the Thakor (prince) of Lathi state in Gujarat who died on 9 June 1900. He is mostly known for his poems depicting his own pathos. It is believed that Kalapi's love for a woman named Shobhana became a source of conflict with their acquaintance Rajba-Ramaba and gave her a motive to poison him.\n Gaetano Bresci (31), was an Italian anarchist who assassinated King Umberto I of Italy in Monza on 29 July 1900. Due to capital punishment being abolished 11 years earlier, he was sentenced to penal servitude at Santo Stefano Island, where he was found dead in his cell on 22 May 1901. While his death was reported as being suicide by hanging, it is believed that he had been murdered.\n David Park Barnitz (23), was a Harvard graduate and an American poet who died on 10 October 1901 from unclear circumstances as there are conflicting ideas about how he died.\n Paul Rée (51), was a German philosopher, author, and physician who died on 28 October 1901 after he fell into the Charnadüra Gorge in the Swiss Alps near Celerina when he was hiking. It is unknown where it was a suicide or if Rée fell by accident.\n Émile Zola (62), French author who died on 29 September 1902 from carbon monoxide poisoning that was caused by a sealed chimney. His enemies were blamed for his death, but were not proven to have been actually responsible. It is also possible that Zola committed suicide.\n In 1903 a skeleton was discovered in the Wichita Mountains in a grave site that was thought to have been that of Sequoyah (72–73), who had disappeared in August 1843. This could not be proven to be true and the skeleton's identity and cause of death remain unknown.\n German inventor Rudolf Diesel (55), disappeared in the English Channel in 1913 and was found dead at sea 10 days later. His cause of death is debated.\n Tom Thomson (39), a Canadian artist who was active in the early 20th century. Though his career was short, he managed to produce around 400 oil sketches on small wood panels, as well as around 50 larger works on canvas. Thomson disappeared on 8 July 1917 and was found dead a few days later. It is unknown whether his death was murder or suicide.\n Samuel Liddell MacGregor Mathers (64), English magician and occultist who died of an unknown cause between 5–20 November 1918 in Paris. The manner of death is unknown as his death certificate lists no cause for his death. Even though Violet Firth claimed Mathers’ death was the result of the Spanish influenza that occurred throughout 1918 and early 1919, the dearth of facts about Mathers' private life make it very difficult to determine what truly caused his death.\nIn 1919 smoked human bones were found in a fireplace with smoked men's bones near Cape Primetny, and were thought be those of Peter Tessem and Paul Knutsen who disappeared in 1918 while aboard the ship Maud during an Arctic expedition. Who they belonged to and cause of death is unknown.\n\n Silent film actress Virginia Rappe (26), was found to have died of peritonitis due to a ruptured bladder on 9 September 1921. While this could have been the result of some of her ongoing health problems, such as cystitis, or complications from a recent abortion (illegal at the time and thus very dangerous), Maude Delmont, an acquaintance, told the San Francisco Police Department that silent film comedian Fatty Arbuckle had sexually assaulted Rappe during a Labor Day party in his suite at the St. Francis Hotel, another possible cause of the ruptured bladder. Arbuckle was charged with rape and involuntary manslaughter but was acquitted.\nIn July 1922 an expedition was conducted during which a skeleton was discovered on the mainland shore which is across from Dikson Island. It is though to be either Peter Tessem or Paul Knutsen. It's death cause is not known for certain.\n George Mallory (37), was an English mountaineer who after taking part in the first three British expeditions to Mount Everest disappeared on either 8 or 9 June 1924. On 1 May 1999 Mallory's mummified body was found, and his cause of death is unknown.\n\n1925–1949\n Rudolf Steiner (64), Austrian esotericist who developed anthroposophy and Waldorf education, died from illness on 30 March 1925, but the nature of the illness was never confirmed and remains controversial, with theories suggesting cancer or poisoning as the most probable causes.\n Ottavio Bottecchia (32), 1927, Italian cyclist, was found by the side of a road, covered with bruises and with a serious skull fracture. His undamaged bicycle was discovered propped against a nearby tree. Bottecchia was taken to a hospital, but died soon afterwards. An official inquiry concluded accidental death, but many suspected that he had run afoul of the powerful and growing National Fascist Party in Italy at the time.\n José Rosario Oviedo (42), a Cuban rumba dancer known as \"Malanga\", died in 1927. The exact circumstances under which he died have never been known for certain. One common account has it that he was murdered after a dance contest through broken glass hidden in his food, but no death certificate was ever filed and the location of his grave is unknown.\n Pyotr Wrangel (49), was a Russian officer who died on 25 April 1928 from reasons that have been debated as his family stated that they think that he was poisoned by the butler of his brother. This was never proven for certain though.\n Cecil Kern (41–45), female American theater director stage and film actress who was reported to have died of a pulmonary hemorrhage on 1 June 1928 in a Manhattan hotel. The cause of her death is not known for certain.\n Alfred Loewenstein (51), was a Belgian financier who's believed to have fallen out of a plane's rear door while going to use the lavatory. He disappeared while crossing the North Sea on 4 July 1928, and his body was found in France 15 days later. His death cause is unknown.\n Starr Faithfull (25), a Greenwich Village flapper, was found drowned on the beach at Long Beach, Nassau County, New York on 8 June 1931. Although Faithfull had left a suicide note, her family contended that she was murdered by wealthy politician Andrew James Peters, former Mayor of Boston, who had allegedly sexually abused Faithfull for years beginning when she was 11 years old and paid the Faithfulls to keep silent about it. Despite a lengthy investigation, it was never determined whether Faithfull's death was homicide, suicide, or accident.\n Ivar Kreuger (52), a Swedish civil engineer, financier, entrepreneur and industrialist who died in a Paris hotel room on 12 March 1932. Though it was thought it have been a suicide it may have also have been a murder.\n Jay Ferdinand Towner III (23), a Princeton University undergraduate, was found dead on campus shortly after an 11 November 1933, football game. He had suffered broken wrists and severe internal injuries. His death was variously attributed to a fall suffered in the stands during the game or a car accident amid conflicting accounts of his whereabouts prior to his death; its exact cause has never been determined.\nZachary Smith Reynolds (20), was the son of American millionaire and businessman R. J. Reynolds who died from a gunshot wound to the head on 6 July 1932, at his home in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. It is unclear if it was a suicide or a murder.\nPaul Bern (42), was an American film director, screenwriter from Wandsbek, Hamburg, Germany. He became the assistant to Irving Thalberg after he became the producer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. He was found dead in Beverly Hills, California on 5 September 1932 after being shot. Even though he left a note saying that he committed suicide it is also believed that his former ex-common-law wife had killed him as she very shortly later herself committed suicide.\nIvo Pilar (59), was a Croatian lawyer, politician, publicist, and historian who was found dead on 3 September 1933 at his home in Zagreb, Kingdom of Yugoslavia and it is unknown whether he was killed or if it was a suicide.\nFranziska Kessel (28), was a German politician who after being sent to jail in Mainz was found dead in her cell on 23 April 1934. It is unknown whether Kessel committed suicide was murdered.\n Thelma Todd (29), was an actress notable for appearing in multiple comedy films where she starred alongside Buster Keaton, Charley Chase, Laurel and Hardy and the Marx Brothers. On the morning of Monday, 16 December 1935, she was found dead in her car inside the garage of Jewel Carmen, a former actress and former wife of Todd's lover and business partner, Roland West. Her death was determined to have been caused by carbon monoxide poisoning. The exact circumstances of the case could not be determined and sparked wide speculations and theories. The case was officially closed as \"accidental with possible suicide tendencies.\" It could never be determined and still sparks debate whether her death was accidental, suicide or murder.\nIn 1936 in Northampton, Massachusetts human bones that were found in a shallow grave were believed to be those of Alice Corbett who disappeared in 1925, but were identified as being those of historic Native American remains, and they remain unidentified and the cause of death is unknown.\n In the Requejada countryside dam which is located very close to Aguilar de Campoo, two bags were found that contained human bones that were thought to be missing girls from Spain who disappeared on 23 April 1992 in Reinosa, who were named Virginia Guerrero and Manuela Torres on 9 October 1994. This was later proven to be untrue and that they were from in between 1936 and 1939 and were unknown victims of the Spanish Civil War, and their identities and cause of death remain unknown.\n Robert Johnson (27), an early blues singer and guitarist, died on 16 August 1938, near Greenwood, Mississippi. The cause was not officially recorded. He was reportedly in extreme pain and suffering from convulsions; this has led to theories he had been poisoned with strychnine by a jealous husband; however, the alleged poisoning is said to have taken place several days earlier and most strychnine deaths take place within hours of ingestion. Another report claims he died of syphilis or pneumonia. The uncertain location of his gravesite has made it impossible to exhume his body for further investigation.\n Ghazi bin Faisal (27), who was King of Iraq, died in a mysterious accident involving a sports car he was driving on 4 April 1939. Some believe he was killed on the orders of Nuri as-Said.\nEugeniusz Kazimirowski (63), was a Polish male member of the realism movement and a very accomplished painter died from unknown causes in the city of Białystok on 23 September 1939.\nKyrylo Studynsky (30–31), was a western Ukrainian cultural and political figure who was forced to leave Lviv in July 1941 and died shortly after from unknown reasons.\n The Unidentified body on Christmas Island is a body who was found on a life raft in the Indian Ocean, off that island, on 6 February 1942. He is widely believed to originate from the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) cruiser HMAS Sydney, which sank off Western Australia in November 1941, after a mutually destructive battle with the German auxiliary cruiser Kormoran.\n Jeanette Loff (35), was an American actress, musician, and singer who came to prominence for her appearances in several Pathé Exchange and Universal Pictures films in the 1920s who died on 4 August 1942 from ammonia poisoning in Los Angeles. Though law enforcement was unable to determine whether her death was an accident or a suicide, Loff's family maintained that she had been murdered. The real cause behind her death remains unknown.\n Sidney Fox (34), was an American actress who acted both on stage and in movies. On 15 November 1942 Fox died in Hollywood from after taking too many sleeping pills, which was the result of either a suicide or an accidental overdose.\n Władysław Sikorski (62), prime minister of the Polish Government in exile, was among 16 people killed on 4 July 1943 when their plane crashed into the sea shortly after taking off from the Royal Air Force base at Gibraltar Airport. The plane had not managed to gain sufficient altitude due to its elevators being prevented from working properly; British investigators found the cause was most likely an accident while their Polish counterparts called it undetermined. The bodies of Sikorski's daughter, chief of staff and other key aides purportedly on the plane were never found, and the plane's only survivor, the pilot, had uncharacteristically worn his life preserver in the cockpit. Sabotage and a possible assassination have been suspected, with Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, or even rival factions in the Polish government in exile theorized to have been involved. Poland reopened the case in 2008; an exhumation of Sikorski's body found his injuries consistent with death from an air crash, ruling out some theories that he had been killed before being put on the plane, but the investigators still could not rule out the possibility of sabotage. British files on the case will remain sealed until 2050.\n Bernard Gavrin (29), an American army private, went missing during the Battle of Saipan sometime between June 15 and July 9, 1944. His fate remained unclear until his remains were recovered by a Japanese non-profit group searching for remains of Japanese soldiers. He was positively identified via DNA testing, but his exact cause of death was not determined.\n Emil Hácha (72), a Czech lawyer, the third President of Czechoslovakia from 1938 to 1939, who died in Pankrác Prison on 27 June 1945 under mysterious circumstances, and his death cause remains unknown. Hácha had collaborated with the Nazis during the German occupation, and had been arrested by the Red Army after the liberation of Prague.\n Lipót Klug (91), a Jewish-Hungarian mathematician, professor who died towards the end of the Second World War on 24 March 1945 in what were said to have been strange circumstances, his true cause of death having never been revealed.\n Viktors Eglītis (68), a Latvian art theorist and writer who died on 20 April 1945 in prison in Riga from unknown reasons.\n King Ananda Mahidol of Thailand (20), died of gunshot wounds, either the product of suicide, accident or assassination, on 9 June 1946. Mahidol's successor King Bhumibol Adulyadej, Prime Minister Pridi Banomyong, and the former Japanese intelligence officer Masanobu Tsuji have alternatively been accused of complicity.\n The Body in the cylinder refers to a male decedent discovered within a partially sealed steel cylinder on a derelict WWII bomb site in Liverpool, England. The discovery was made on 13 July 1945 and it is believed that the body had lain undiscovered for 60 years. Inquiries named a strong (but unconfirmed) candidate for the identity of the decedent; however, the cause of death and the reason for their presence in the cylinder remain a mystery.\n Alexander Alekhine (53), the fourth World Chess Champion, was found dead in a hotel room in Estoril, Portugal on 24 March 1946. Several causes of death have been proposed, but the two most likely are a heart attack or choking on a piece of meat which was found lodged in his throat in an autopsy.\n Vera West. West was an American fashion designer and film costume designer, who worked for Universal Pictures. She was found dead in her swimming pool on 29 June 1947, having possibly committed suicide by drowning, although police were never able to ascertain the precise circumstances surrounding her death.\n The Trow Ghyll skeleton, discovered in a cave in rural north Yorkshire, England in 1947, remains unidentified. The death probably occurred in 1941; the fact that the body was discovered with a glass bottle of cyanide has led to speculation that it was someone connected with espionage.\n\n Jan Masaryk (61), 1948, son of Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, Czech diplomat, politician and Foreign Minister of Czechoslovakia, was found dead in the courtyard of the Foreign Ministry below his bathroom window. The initial investigation concluded that he committed suicide by jumping out of the window, although many are convinced that he was pushed. A new investigation by the Czechoslovak government after the Velvet Revolution ruled his death a murder.\n Sadanori Shimoyama (47), 1948, first director of Japanese National Railways, was last seen leaving his official car to go into a department store on his way to work the morning of 5 July of that year. Others reported seeing him at various train stations, and walking along one line, that afternoon. His dismembered body was found at noon the next day on the Jōban Line. It had indisputably gotten that way as a result of being struck by a train, but the autopsy suggested he had died before being struck. That conclusion has been disputed, and whether his death was a suicide or murder remains undetermined.\n Tamam Shud case, also known as the Mystery of the Somerton Man, is an unsolved case of an unidentified man found dead in 1948 on the Somerton Park beach.\n Nora Gregor (47), whose full name was \"Eleonora Hermina Gregor\" was an Austrian actress who acted in both on stage and in movies who died on 20 January 1949 in Viña del Mar from a debated cause.\n\n1950–1974\n In 1951 human bones were found and were thought to be the remains of Percy Fawcett (57), who had disappeared on 29 May 1925 in Mato Grosso, Brazil, This was proven to be untrue and they remain unidentified and the cause of death is unknown.\n Syama Prasad Mukherjee (52), an Indian politician, died in a prison hospital 23 June 1953, one and a half months after his arrest for attempting to enter Jammu and Kashmir without a permit. The exact cause of death has never been disclosed; Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, whose government Mukherjee had resigned from in protest over Nehru's decision to normalise relations with Pakistan despite that country's treatment of its Hindu population, said at the time he made inquiries and was satisfied that his former minister's death was due to natural causes; speculation has continued that Mukherjee was actually murdered due to some unusual circumstances of his arrest and treatment.\n Raimondo Lanza di Trabia (39), was an Italian man who was successful in many fields. On 30 November 1954 in Rome, Lanza di Trabia died from circumstances that are suspicious after he fell out of a hotel room window.\n The Dyatlov Pass incident was the deaths of nine hikers on the Kholat Syakhl mountain in the northern Ural Mountains range on 2 February 1959; all the bodies were not recovered until that May. While most of the victims were found to have died of hypothermia after apparently abandoning their tent high on an exposed mountainside, two had fractured skulls, two had broken ribs, and one was missing her tongue. There were no witnesses or survivors to provide any testimony, and the cause of death was listed as a \"compelling natural force\", most likely an avalanche, by Soviet investigators.\n\n Barthélemy Boganda (48), who was Prime Minister of the Central African Republic died on 29 March 1959 in Boukpayanga during a mysterious plane crash.\n Diana Barrymore (38), was an American actress who acted both on the stage and in movies and is a relative of American actress Drew Barrymore. Diana died before Drew was born. On 25 January 1960, Diana Barrymore died in her hometown of New York City. At first her death was said to be the result of a drug overdose. After an autopsy was conducted, this was proven to be untrue. Speculation included a theory that she might have committed suicide, but this was never proven. She had admitted publicly she was a recovering alcoholic. In July 1957, she gave an American television interview to Mike Wallace in which she said [video available for online viewing], “At the moment, I don’t drink. I hope to be able, one day, in perhaps the near future [or] the very distant future, to be able to drink like a normal human being. That may never be possible.”\n Dag Hammarskjöld (56), a Swedish economist and diplomat who served as the second Secretary-General of the United Nations died on 18 September 1961 in Ndola, Northern Rhodesia in a mysterious plane crash.\n Lucas Samalenge (33), a Katangese and Congolese politician who died under suspicious circumstances on 19 November 1961 in Lubumbashi.\n Dr Gilbert Stanley Bogle (39), and Margaret Olive Chandler (29), were found dead, both partially undressed, near the banks of the Lane Cove River in Sydney, Australia, on 1 January 1963. Their bluish pallor and the presence of vomit and excrement led to a finding that they had been poisoned, but the coroner was unable to determine what the toxin was. It was suspected they had been murdered (possibly by Chandler's husband) although no suspect has ever been identified. A 2006 TV documentary suggested their deaths were not due to foul play but the result of hydrogen sulfide gas leaking from the river bed and reaching dangerously high concentrations in the low-lying depressions where their bodies were found.\n The death certificate of Dorothy Kilgallen (52), states that she died on 8 November 1965 from “acute ethanol and barbiturate intoxication / circumstances undetermined.” She was famous throughout the United States as a syndicated newspaper columnist and radio / television personality, most notably as a regular panelist on the longest running game show in history at the time, CBS's What's My Line. The New York City medical examiner James Luke categorized the cause of death as \"circumstances undetermined.”\n Lal Bahadur Shastri (61), an Indian politician who was the second Prime Minister of India mysteriously died on 11 January 1966, just hours after signing the Tashkent Declaration. His death cause is disputed.\n The Lead Masks Case involves the death of two Brazilian electronic technicians, Manoel Pereira da Cruz and Miguel José Viana, whose bodies were discovered on 20 August 1966, in Niterói, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. After an autopsy was performed the cause of death could not be proven since the organs were too badly ruined.\n Alvar Larsson (13), was a Swedish boy who disappeared on 16 April 1967 while going for a walk. In November 1982, a human skull was found on a small island 6 km away that was identified as belonging to Larsson. The disappearance attracted a lot of media coverage at the time and many theories as to what happened have been put forward. Thomas Quick has confessed to the crime, but has recanted all his confessions.\n John Frey, an Oakland, California, police officer, was fatally shot on the morning of 28 October 1967, during a traffic stop where he had pulled over Black Panther leader Huey P. Newton, who was wounded in the shootout and convicted of voluntary manslaughter the following year. The gun Newton purportedly used was never found, and following two hung juries after the conviction was overturned on appeal in 1970 the district attorney's office announced it would not try him a fourth time. Newton suggested that Frey may have been shot by his partner; there has been no new investigation to determine whether this was the case and whether this was an accident.\n Joan Robinson Hill (38), was a Texas socialite who died in 1969. At first ruled to have died of influenza following a brief hospitalization on 19 March, suspicions were aroused when her body was released to the funeral home and embalmed before a legally required autopsy could be carried out. Despite the compromised evidence, three autopsies, all with their own irregularities, were performed and her husband John eventually became the only person indicted by a Texas grand jury for murder by omission, or failing to take proper action in the face of a life-threatening situation. The first attempt to prosecute him ended in a mistrial in 1972; he was murdered before he could be retried and the gunman who was suspected of his murder died in a police shootout. Two other alleged accomplices were later convicted.\n Edward Mutesa (45), who was Kabaka of the Kingdom of Buganda in Uganda died on 21 November 1969 from alcohol poisoning, in his London flat. He may have committed suicide or been poisoned by someone.\n Mustafa Zaidi (40), Pakistani Urdu poet from India who died in Karachi from unknown reasons on 12 October 1970. The case has never been solved.\n Ronald Hughes (35), an American attorney who disappeared while on a camping trip in November 1970. He had been representing Leslie Van Houten in the Tate–LaBianca murder trial. His body was found in March 1971, but his cause of death could not be determined.\n The Isdal Woman was a partially charred unidentified corpse found on 29 November 1970, hidden off a hiking trail near Bergen, Norway. The official conclusion that her death was a suicide has not been widely accepted, since some believed she was murdered. Her identity remains unknown and is considered one of Norway's most profound mysteries. The case has been the subject of intense speculation for many years. Multiple investigations point to the possibility that she was a spy.\nMichael O'Sullivan (37), an American man who had a brief, but successful acting career, was found dead at his apartment in San Francisco, California on 24 July 1971 with a bottle of sleeping pills next to him from what may have been a death by suicide.\n Giangiacomo Feltrinelli (45), who had during the 1950s published the smuggled manuscript of Boris Pasternak's novel Doctor Zhivago, but later became a left-wing militant during Italy's Years of Lead, was found dead at the base of a power-line transmission tower outside Segrate, near his native Milan, on 15 March 1972. It was believed that he had died when a bomb he was attempting to plant on the tower went off, and later testimony by other members of the Red Brigades supported this. However, the death was always viewed suspiciously, and in the 2010s forensic reports surfaced that suggested he had been tied to the tower before the bomb went off, with various intelligence agencies inside and outside of Italy suspected of responsibility.\n Gia Scala (38), was American model and actress from Liverpool, Lancashire, England who on 30 April 1972 was found dead in her house that was in Hollywood Hills. Her cause of death remains undetermined.\n Nigel Green (47), was a character actor who was born in South Africa, and was raised in London, England, who died in Brighton, Sussex on \t15 May 1972 after taking too many sleeping pills. It is unknown if this was a suicide or not.\n Jeannette DePalma (16), was found dead and was believed to have been killed on or around 7 August 1972, in Springfield Township, New Jersey, but now her death is thought perhaps to have been caused by a drug overdose instead.\n Amaryllis Garnett was an English actress and diarist who appeared in various productions in the 1960s, with her most notabla appearance being Judith of Balbec from the original 1966 version of A Choice of Kings. With the onset of the 1970s, however, she fell into a deep depression, and on 6 May 1973, she was found drowned in the Chelsea river. Whether her drowning was accidental or a suicide remains unclear.\n Kafundanga Chingunji, served as the first Chief of Staff in the government of UNITA, pro-Western rebels, during the Angolan Civil War. Officially, Chingunji died from cerebral malaria in January 1974 on Angola's border with Zambia. His wife and others who saw his body say someone poisoned Chingunji. Rumors later alleged Jonas Savimbi, the head of UNITA, ordered his assassination. It is unknown for sure what the exact circumstances of the death are.\n Karen Silkwood (28), a nuclear power whistleblower, died in a car accident on 13 November 1974, while driving to a meeting with a New York Times reporter in Oklahoma City. Whether that accident involved another vehicle, whose driver may have deliberately run her off the road, or resulted from her own fatigue, remains a matter of debate.\n Aman Andom (50), was an Ethiopian military figure and was the acting head of state of Ethiopia who died on 23 November 1974. Sources say that he committed suicide, while others say that he was killed by political rivals among the coup leadership, possibly including Mengistu Haile Mariam.\n\n1975–1999\n Alexandra \"Sasha\" Bell (29), a daughter of David K. E. Bruce died under mysterious circumstances at her family home in Virginia in 1975. The cause of death may have been either a murder or suicide.\nManon Dubé (10), was a Canadian girl from Quebec who vanished while sledding with friends in Massawippi on 27 January 1978. Her body was found on 24 March 1978, but the exact cause of death was never determined.\nMarin Preda (57), was a Romanian director of Cartea Românească publishing house, wrote novels, and about wars that had ended. Preda was found dead on 16 May 1980 at Mogoșoaia Palace from asphixiation, that had been caused from unknown reasons.\n Marcia Moore (50), a writer on yoga and astrology, disappeared near her home in the Seattle, Washington, area during the winter of 1979. Her skeletal remains were found in nearby woods in 1981. It has been presumed in the absence of any evidence that would more conclusively establish a cause of death, that she died of hypothermia while wandering the woods under the influence of ketamine, a drug whose use she had promoted. However, true-crime writer Ann Rule, a friend, says what appeared to be a bullet hole was found in her jawbone, although authorities said it could just as easily have been a result of the bone decaying during the cold winters. Officially the cause of Moore's death remains undetermined.\n Douglas Crofut (38), American radiographer who died of both radiation poisoning and radiation burns on 27 July 1981 in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The event is thought to have been either a suicide or murder, but this remains uncertain.\n\n On 29 November 1981, actress Natalie Wood (43), who was a passenger on the yacht owned by her and her husband Robert Wagner, was found drowned near Santa Catalina Island, California. Two other people were on board the Wagners’ yacht at the time: actor Christopher Walken and Dennis Davern, a longtime employee of the Wagners who served as skipper of the yacht. While drowning has always been accepted as the direct cause of her death, the circumstances under which she went into the water have never been clear, and after reopening the investigation in 2012 the coroner changed the cause of death from \"accident\" to \"undetermined\", based on cuts and bruises on her body that may or may not have been suffered before her death. In 2018, Wagner was identified as a person of interest.\n Don Kemp (34–35), was a New York advertising executive who disappeared under mysterious circumstances in Wyoming in 1982, where he had planned to begin a new life. His remains were discovered in 1986, but the circumstances surrounding his death, and whether it is homicidal in nature or not, remain unclear.\n Eduardo Frei Montalva (71), who was president of Chile from 1964 to 1970, died on 22 January 1982. As of 2005, his death is being investigated because of allegations that he was poisoned.\n The cause of death of the baby born to Joanne Hayes in Ireland's 1984 Kerry Babies case was never established.\n Radomir Radović (32–33), a Yugoslav civil engineering technician and trade unionist who advocated for an independent trade union in the country, was found dead at his villa in Orašac on 30 April 1984. While the ruling party claimed that he had died by suicide, this claim was disputed by fellow intellectuals, and his true cause of death remains unclear.\n Kenji Iwamura, a 25-year old Japanese office worker purportedly died during the 1984-1990 SOS incident.\n The YOGTZE case refers to the death of unemployed German food engineer Günther Stoll (34), which occurred on 26 October 1984, under strange and largely unknown circumstances, after leaving behind the cryptic message \"YOGTZE.\"\n Samora Machel (53), a Mozambican politician, military commander, and revolutionary was killed on 19 October 1986 during a mysterious plane crash that was close to the Mozambican-South African border.\n Cam Lyman (54–55), was a multimillionaire dog breeder from Westwood, Massachusetts who disappeared in the summer of 1987 and his body was found in a septic tank on his estate in Hopkinton, Rhode Island by the new owners of the house in December 1997. Lyman's death remains a mystery.\n Fidel Figueroa, a well-known drug dealer and father of Lazaro Figueroa, was found deceased on 20 September 1987. His exact cause of death has never been determined, and the death is considered suspicious.\n On 11 October 1987, West German Christian Democratic Union politician Uwe Barschel (43) was found dead in a bathtub filled with water in his room at the Hotel Beau-Rivage in Geneva, Switzerland. He was fully clothed. Among others, the drug Lorazepam was found in his system. The circumstances of his death remain unclear and controversial, with suicide or murder both considered possible explanations and the case still being investigated in both directions.\n Whether the 17 August 1988 plane crash that killed Pakistani president Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq (64), the country's longest-serving leader, and 30 others including the country's top military leaders and the U.S. ambassador, was an accident or foul play, the result of sabotage or a shootdown, is a matter of debate. American investigators came to the former conclusion, while their Pakistani counterparts produced a report reaching the latter. Theories as to responsibility if it were an act of malice have put the blame on a number of domestic and foreign actors.\n Said S. Bedair (40), was an Egyptian scientist in electrical, electronic and microwave engineering and a colonel in the Egyptian army. He died on 14 July 1989 in Alexandria of unclear circumstances, though his wife thinks it might have been a suicide.\n Berlin police were called to a Lichtenberg apartment on the night of 3 December 1991 after neighbors complained of loud arguments, barking dogs and a parade of men coming and going. Inside they found the body of Beate Ulbricht (47), adopted daughter of Walter Ulbricht, the first Communist leader of East Germany, by then defunct. Visible facial injuries suggested a death by blunt force trauma, but whether that had resulted from an accident or foul play has never been determined. She had recently given a series of interviews about her family life in which she recalled her mother, Lotte, as harsh and unloving, in contrast to her late father; Lotte was unsurprised when a reporter informed her of Beate's death. The unsolved stabbing death two years later of a man thought to be Beate's lover in her last years may be connected. \n A skull fragment found in a wooded area of Baldwin, Pennsylvania in 1992 turned out to be that of Michael Rosenblum (25), of nearby Pittsburgh, who had not been seen since 14 February 1980, near where the bone was found. While the cause of death could not be determined, circumstantial evidence accumulated over the years suggested that Baldwin's police department had covered up its own officers' involvement in Rosenblum's disappearance; the chief was fired over the allegations and reinstated a short time later.\n The remains of Timothy Wiltsey (5), of South Amboy, New Jersey, were found in a muddy brook behind an office park in nearby Edison on 23 April 1992, almost a year after his mother, Michelle Lodzinski, had reported him missing from a carnival. Decomposition was too advanced to determine how Wiltsey had died. Suspicion accumulated around Lodzinski in later years due to reports that she had changed her account of his disappearance several times shortly after reporting it, and her conviction for an attempt to stage her own kidnapping in 1994 followed by another conviction for theft several years later. In 2014 she was arrested for her son's murder and convicted after trial two years later, but the state Supreme Court vacated that conviction in 2021 for insufficient evidence. \n Divya Bharti (19), an Indian actress died in April 1993, after falling from the balcony of her apartment in Mumbai. The mysterious circumstances of her death have spawned a number of conspiracy theories. Mumbai Police closed the investigation citing lack of evidences.\n Mansour Rashid El-Kikhia was a Libyan politician and human rights activist known for his opposition to Muammar Gaddafi's regime. On 10 December 1993, he was kidnapped while on a diplomatic visit to Cairo, Egypt, allegedly by Mukhabarat operatives. His fate remained unclear until October 2012, when his body was found in a refrigerator in Tripoli, indicating that he had likely died while in custody.\n Zviad Gamsakhurdia (54), former president of Georgia, died on 31 December 1993 from circumstances that remain very unclear. It is known that he died in the village of Khibula in the Samegrelo region of western Georgia.\n Gloria Ramirez (31), a woman from Riverside, California who was dubbed \"the Toxic Lady\" and \"the Toxic Woman\" by the media when several hospital workers became ill after exposure to her body and blood, died on 19 February 1994 from complications related to her cervical cancer. There are different ideas behind what caused the effects on the hospital workers, but the true cause remains unknown.\n Caroline Byrne (24), an Australian model, was found at the bottom of a cliff at The Gap in Sydney on 8 June 1995. Her boyfriend at the time of her death was charged with killing her and was convicted, but was acquitted of the conviction in February 2012 as the decision was overturned. It is unclear to whether her death is a murder or suicide.\n Rock County John Doe, commonly referred as John Clinton Doe, was the name given to an unidentified set of skeletal remains estimated to be a young adult or teenage white male, which were found alongside Turtle Creek near Clinton, Rock County, Wisconsin on 26 November 1995. His death cause is also unknown.\n Green Boots is the name given to the unidentified corpse of a climber that became a landmark on the main Northeast ridge route of Mount Everest. Though his identity has not been officially confirmed, he is believed to be Tsewang Paljor, an Indian climber who died on Mount Everest in 1996.\n Screenwriter Gary DeVore (55), left Santa Fe, New Mexico, on 28 June 1997, for Hollywood to drop off his final draft of the script for a remake of The Big Steal, a 1950 film about, in part, a man who stages his own disappearance. He never arrived, and was considered missing for a year until his body was found in his car in the California Aqueduct. His hands were missing, and it did not appear from the position in which it was found that the car had gone into the waterway after an accident. No cause of death has been conclusively established.\n Theodore Sindikubwabo, interim president during the Rwanda genocide, died in 1998, cause of death is unknown but it has been speculated that he died of HIV or killed by Interahamwe hardliners.\n Patricia Lee Partin, who was among four women who left Los Angeles, California and disappeared alongside Florinda Donner in 1998; her remains were found in the desert sands of Death Valley in 2003. Partin's cause of death remains unknown.\n Pol Pot, Cambodian war criminal who died in April 1998, shortly before his extradition on charges against humanity, died in custody, the official cause was a heart attack, but other reports hold that he committed suicide with drugs or was assassinated by General Ta Mok.\n Greek philosopher Dimitris Liantinis (55), disappeared on 1 June 1998. In July 2005 human bones were found in the area of the mountain Taygetos; forensic examinations verified that it was the body of Liantinis. No lethal substances were found to determine the cause of death.\n Sani Abacha, military dictator of Nigeria, who died on 8 June 1998, there is a popular theory in Nigeria that he died after consuming a Poisoned Apple, but one of his confidants reported that after Arafat's visit and shaking hands with the and his men began to feel bad and died shortly after.\n Kevin Hjalmarsson (4), Swedish boy who after going missing was found dead in Arvika on 16 August 1998. Though he was originally thought to have been murdered, it is now claimed by the police that he is thought to have died of an unknown accident.\n Yves Godard (43), was a French doctor who disappeared from a sailing boat with his two children in September 1999. In 2000, a skull fragment belonging to his daughter Camille was found while some bone fragments of Dr Godard were discovered six years later in the English Channel. No trace of his son or his wife (the latter did not go on the sailing trip and stayed at home) has ever been found, nor has any trace of the boat. However, investigators found traces of blood in the family home and in Godard's caravan, raising suspicion that Godard's wife was murdered. In 2012, the case was closed without charges. Prosecutors ruled out accidental death and believe that Dr Godard probably murdered his family before committing suicide at sea, but they also acknowledge that they are not certain of this.\n Hangthong Thammawattana (49), a Thai businessman and politician who was found dead in the early hours of 6 September 1999 in his family's mansion. from a gunshot wound. It is unknown if it was a suicide or murder.\n Jorge Matute (23), was a Chilean forestry student who mysteriously disappeared in a discotheque that was located close to Concepción on 20 November 1999. In February 2004 in a road in Santa Juana Matute's remains were found and identified. Matute's cause of death is unknown.\n\n2000–2010\n Lolo Ferrari (37), was a French dancer, singer and film actress who also performed in pornography and was known for her large surgically enhanced breasts. Ferrari was found deceased on the morning of 5 March 2000, of causes which have never been determined.\n Rodney Marks (32), an Australian astrophysicist, died of a sudden illness on 12 May 2000 at Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station in Antarctica. It was not possible for his body to be flown to New Zealand and autopsied until after the Antarctic winter ended six months later; the cause of death was found to have been methanol poisoning. Suicide was ruled out, as he did not seem to have a motive and had readily sought treatment for his apparent illness, nor did an accidental overdose seem likely, either, as there was plenty of alcoholic drink available for consumption at the base should he have wanted it. The New Zealand police believed instead that the methanol had been \"unknowingly\" introduced into Marks' system but could not conclusively call the case a homicide. Further investigation has been frustrated by the refusal of American agencies to share their findings, the global dispersal of researchers and personnel at the base that winter, the 2006 disappearance of the doctor who treated Marks, and the loss of any possible crime-scene evidence during the winter after Marks' death.\n Soad Hosny (58), was an actress from Cairo, Egypt, who died after in London after she mysteriously fell from the balcony of her friend's apartment on 21 June 2001.\n On 11 August 2001, Irish musician Paul Cunniffe (40), formerly of the bands Blaze X and the Saw Doctors, died in a fall in the London neighborhood of Whitechapel. The circumstances that led to the fall, or even exactly where it occurred, however, remain unknown. His is one of several deaths among friends and acquaintances of Pete Doherty.\n\n Tempe Girl is the name given to an unidentified decedent whose body was discovered on 27 April 2002 in Tempe, Arizona. She had died of cocaine intoxication – ruled to be neither an accident nor a homicide – one day before the discovery of her body. She is believed to have been of either Hispanic or Native American ethnicity and was allegedly picked up while hitchhiking, claiming she had been effectively disowned by her own mother for her frequent recreational drug use.\n Abu Nidal (65), Palestinian terrorist leader behind the 1985 Rome and Vienna airport attacks, already suffering from leukemia, was reported to have died from a gunshot wound in Baghdad on 16 August 2002. Iraq's government at the time claimed his death was a suicide; the Fatah Revolutionary Council Nidal founded claimed he was assassinated on Saddam Hussein's orders to prevent his possible capture during the American invasion of Iraq that began six months later.\n Jeremiah Duggan (23), a British student studying in Paris, was found dead on a highway in Wiesbaden, Germany, early on 27 March 2003. The initial investigation concluded he had committed suicide by running into traffic. However, his mother, noting that he had called her in great distress over his involvement with the LaRouche movement, who may have discovered that he was British and Jewish, within an hour of his death, never accepted that theory, and a later investigation found evidence that the accident may have been staged to cover an earlier beating. The case was reopened in 2012 after extensive litigation in England, resulting in a change of the cause of death to \"unexplained\", with the note that Duggan may have been involved in some sort of \"altercation\" beforehand.\n\nA human skull that was found off Vanikoro in April 2003 was thought to been that of Gaspard Duché de Vancy (35–36), who disappeared in 1788. Who it belonged to and it's death cause are unknown.\n Jürgen Möllemann (57), German Free Democratic Party politician, died on 5 June 2003 in a parachuting incident at Marl-Lohmühle. His death was investigated by the Essen district attorney's office, which published a final report on 9 July 2003. While outside interference was ruled out, no definite verdict was reached on whether Möllemann committed suicide or had died via misadventure. Shortly before his death, Möllemann, a passionate and experienced skydiver, had been confronted with allegations he had been involved in illegal arms deals and evaded taxes on millions of euros he allegedly earned from these activities. To enable a full investigation on these charges, the Bundestag lifted his parliamentary immunity on 5 June 2003 at 12:28, 22 minutes before his death. The tax evasion charges were dropped after his death.\n Singer-songwriter Elliott Smith (34), died of stab wounds inflicted in his Los Angeles home on 21 October 2003. His girlfriend claims she got out of the shower after an argument, having heard him scream, to find him with the knife sticking out of his chest, and found a short suicide note on a Post-It shortly thereafter. While he did indeed have a history of depression and drug addiction, friends say he was actively working to finish an album at the time and seemed optimistic. The coroner found the stab wounds were inconsistent with a suicide attempt but could not say it was a homicide either; the cause of the stabbing remains undetermined and has not been further investigated.\n Jonathan Luna (38), an assistant U.S. attorney from Baltimore, was found dead of multiple stab wounds inflicted with his own penknife in Denver, Pennsylvania, on the morning of 4 December 2003, in a stream underneath his car, which had been driven there overnight from Baltimore. The FBI, which has jurisdiction over the possible murder of any U.S. federal employee, found that Luna had mounting financial problems and was facing an investigation over missing money at his office, considered it a suicide or botched attempt at staging a kidnapping. However, the Lancaster County coroner's office, pointing to evidence suggesting he had been abducted and someone else was driving for at least the final stage of his drive, ruled it a homicide and considers the case open.\n Lamduan Armitage was a formerly unidentified woman whose body was discovered in 2004 on the mountain Pen-y-ghent in Yorkshire, England, leading her to become known as the Lady of the Hills. The woman was found to have originally come from somewhere in South-East Asia, but despite an international police investigation, the identity of the woman, and how she arrived at the location remained a mystery until 2019. The woman was identified in March 2019 through DNA testing. Her cause of death remains unknown.\n Alonzo Brooks (23), American man who went missing from La Cygne, Kansas on 3 April 2004 and was found dead about a month later on 1 May 2004. After the pathologists did an autopsy they have not yet been able to tell the cause of his death.\n The coroner investigating the death of Richard Lancelyn Green (51), a British Arthur Conan Doyle scholar who was found garrotted with a shoelace on his bed in his home on 27 April 2004, returned an open verdict. Many of his friends and family suspected homicide as he had complained of someone following him in his efforts to stop the auction of a cache of Doyle's personal papers that he believed to have been wrongfully acquired. However, despite suicide by garrotte being unusual and difficult, some investigators believed that he had followed the example of one of Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories in which a woman stages her suicide to look like a murder.\n John Garang (60), Sudanese politician and former rebel revolutionary leader, died on 30 July 2005 in New Cush, Sudan in a suspicious helicopter crash.\n Barbara Precht's (69) body was found on 29 November 2006 in Cincinnati, Ohio. She remained unidentified until November 2014. Her husband was later located and is considered a person of interest in her death, which has unknown circumstances.\n Joyce Carol Vincent (38), was found dead in her London flat in January 2006, two years after she had died, by which time the body had decomposed so much as to make identifying a cause of death impossible; her story was profiled in the 2011 documentary Dreams of a Life.\n Rey Rivera (32), American writer who was working for Stansberry and Associates who went missing from his house on 16 May 2006 and was found dead on Belvedere Hotel on 24 May 2006, in Mount Vernon, Baltimore Even though the Baltimore Police Department has claimed that his death was most likely to be a suicide, this has not been proven to be the case.\n Bob Woolmer (58), Pakistan's national cricket coach, was found dead in his hotel room on 18 March 2007, after losing in the Cricket World Cup 2007 in the West Indies. Investigators at first ruled the death a suicide, but the jury that heard the inquest returned an open verdict.\n Three years after the body of Corryn Rayney (44), was found in the Perth suburb of Kings Park, Western Australia a week after her 7 August 2007 disappearance, her husband Lloyd was charged in her murder even though a cause of death had not been determined. A judge acquitted him at his 2012 trial, finding the largely circumstantial case was further compromised by police misconduct. The verdict was upheld on appeal the following year; Rayney and his lawyers have called for two known sex criminals to be investigated as well.\n The Salish Sea human foot discoveries are the severed feet found from 20 August 2007 to 1 January 2019 that are known to belong to people who are thought to be dead. The circumstances behind these events remain unclear.\n Two-year-old Caylee Anthony, of Orlando, Florida, was reported missing by her grandmother in the summer of 2008, when she learned that her daughter Casey had not seen her in over a month. Casey claimed the girl had been kidnapped by a nanny and circumstantial evidence led to her arrest on murder charges that fall. A tip that could have led to the body's discovery in August was not fully acted upon until December; by then the body was so decomposed that it was impossible to establish how Caylee had died, although the coroner ruled it homicide. Casey Anthony, despite public sentiment strongly against her, was acquitted of the murder and child-abuse charges (but convicted of the lesser charges of lying to the police) after a heavily covered trial in 2011, where her lawyer claimed that Caylee had accidentally drowned in the family pool and Casey's domineering father had led a cover-up. Later, her father came forward with his own explanation: Casey had allegedly been known to drug Caylee to entice her to sleep so Casey could leave Caylee home alone and go out with friends for the evening. He alleges Casey or a friend accidentally overdosed Caylee, killing her, and in a panic, made up the kidnapping story as a cover.\n American guitarist Hiram Bullock (52), died on 25 July 2008 of an undetermined cause. While it was known that he had tongue cancer and was still in treatment, he was believed to have completely recovered from the disease, which is why some sources dispute cancer as the cause of death and suggest that he died as a result of his drug addiction problems.\n American professional wrestler Steven James Bisson (32), who went by the ring name of \"Steve Bradley\" was found dead on 4 December 2008 in Manchester, New Hampshire in a parking lot across the street from a pro wrestling school in where he once operated. Bradley's cause of death is undetermined, as the autopsy could not reveal what he died from, so his death remains a mystery.\n The Peter Bergmann case is an unsolved mystery pertaining to the death of an unidentified man in County Sligo, Ireland, whose naked body was found on a beach; the autopsy found no signs of drowning or foul play and thus the cause of death remains undetermined. From 12 to 16 June 2009, a man using the alias \"Peter Bergmann\" visited the coastal seaport town of Sligo in northwest Ireland. He used this alias to check into the Sligo City Hotel, where he stayed during the majority of his visit, and was described by hotel staff and tenants as having a heavy German accent. Despite conducting a five-month investigation into the death of \"Peter Bergmann\", the Garda Síochána have never been able to identify the man or develop any leads in the case.\n Skeletal remains found in a dry creek bed in California's Malibu Canyon on 9 August 2010, turned out to be those of Mitrice Richardson (25). She had last been seen on the night of 16 September 2009 in the backyard of a former local television news anchor, after being arrested for marijuana possession and failure to pay the bill at a local restaurant where she had been acting strangely, behavior that investigating officers did not believe was caused by alcohol or drugs. The coroner has said her death did not appear to be a homicide, but the body was too decayed to determine the exact cause of death.\n\n2010–2019\n On 23 August 2010, the partially decomposed body of Gareth Williams (32), a Welsh mathematician who worked for British intelligence GCHQ, but who was seconded to MI6 at the time of his death, was found in a padlocked bag in the bathroom of a safe house in the London neighbourhood of Pimlico. It was determined he had been dead for about a week. Due to the nature of his work, the investigation had to withhold details of it and some other aspects from any material made public; his family and friends allege that the Metropolitan Police compromised and mishandled key forensic evidence in the early stages of their response. An initial investigation by the coroner's office concluded that the death was a homicide; a later re-investigation by the police claimed that it was instead an accident.\n Rajiv Dixit (43), an Indian public speaker and social activist who died on 30 November 2010 in Bhilai, Chhattisgarh, after his meal was poisoned. It is claimed that Dixit refused to undergo emergency medical treatment, as he did not trust Allopathic medicine, and died shortly thereafter. No autopsy was ever conducted so it remains unknown whether Dixit was deliberately poisoned, committed suicide, or if a person or persons covered up the truth.\n British citizen Lee Bradley Brown (39), was arrested by Dubai police while on holiday there 6 April 2011 and charged with assault after an incident between him and a hotel maid; accounts of the circumstances differ. Held without bail, he died in custody six days later after, police claimed, being beaten by cellmates; later they said he had \"thrown himself on the ground repeatedly.\" An autopsy, however, found instead that Brown had, under the influence of hashish, choked on his own vomit. British officials who were allowed to examine the body disputed that conclusion, saying they saw no evidence of choking or blunt force trauma; Dubai authorities have declined repeated requests to share evidence such as CCTV footage from the original incident and the police station that might clarify matters. A coroner's inquest in the UK that considered only the autopsy report and the diplomats' reports returned an open verdict.\n Tom J. Anderson (35), formerly known by his birth name \"Ahmad Rezaee\" was a businessman and the eldest son of Iranian Major General Mohsen Rezaee. On 12 November 2011, he was found dead in the Gloria Hotel, located in Dubai Media City where he was staying. There are different theories about how he died, yet the cause of his death remains unknown.\n Stephen Corrigan (48), an Irish man who disappeared on 22 November 2011, and on 9 April 2020 some remains of his skeleton were found in Rathmines, Dublin. Corrigan's death cause is unknown.\n Candice Cohen-Ahnine (35), a French Jewish woman who successfully fought a legal battle against Saudi prince Sattam bin Khalid Al Saud over their illegitimate daughter, fell to her death in Paris on August 16, 2012. Her death is considered suspicious in nature due to the circumstances.\n Exiled Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky (67), was found dead in his home near Ascot, Berkshire on 23 March 2013. At first glance he had hanged himself; he had recently lost what remained of his fortune, and some other close friends had unexpectedly died, which had left him despondent. The police soon ruled the case a suicide, but at the inquest, Berezovsky's daughter, who believes her father was murdered at the behest of the Russian government, introduced a report by a German pathologist that cast enough doubt for the coroner to return an open verdict.\n A worker at a Fenton, Missouri, senior living facility found the body of Shirley Rae Neumann, 78, on the grounds outside the facility on the afternoon of October 31, 2013. At first it appeared that Neumann, who suffered from advanced arthritis and dementia, had fallen from the balcony of her apartment, since its railing had been broken, and the county coroner ruled the death accidental. But tests also found a level of the sedative Zolpidem in her blood that was eight times higher than a normal dose would have left. The last person to see Neumann alive was her daughter, Pam Hupp. Hupp told staff that her mother would not be leaving her apartment the next day, and stood to benefit financially from her mother's death. Hupp had also pleaded guilty to another murder that prosecutors alleged she had committed to point suspicion at the husband of a murdered friend of Hupp's who had been acquitted at a retrial after spending several years in prison, a murder in which Hupp herself has been implicated as the real killer. After these events, a new coroner changed the finding to undetermined.\n On 15–16 November 2013, skeletal remains of two adults and child were found in a field outside Red Oak, Oklahoma. A year later they were identified as the Jamison family, who had gone missing in 2009 while looking into some land they wanted to purchase. Their abandoned pickup truck was three miles (4.8 km) from where their bodies were found. No cause of death has been determined.\n The decomposing remains of Canadian journalist Dave Walker (57), were found in Cambodia's Angkor temple complex on 1 May 2014, ending a search that began shortly after he failed to return to his hotel's guest house on the night of 14 February. While the medical examiner concluded that he had died weeks earlier, the cause of Walker's death could not be determined.\n Bone fragments found along the Rio Culebra near Boquete, Panama, in late June 2014 were matched to Lisanne Froon, 22, and Kris Kremers, 21, of Amersfoort, the Netherlands. The two had last been seen alive on 1 April when they went for a hike on the popular El Pianista trail. After unsuccessful initial searches a backpack belonging to the women was turned in by a local. It contained their phones, a Canon camera and personal effects. After two months small fraction of their remains was found as well. The women's cell phones showed that they had repeatedly attempted to contact emergency numbers shortly after taking pictures of themselves at the Continental Divide. Those calls had continued over several days, and Froon's camera contained 90 photographs taken in the night of 8 April, seven days after their disappearance. Most of the photos showed the jungle in the dark, but some of them contained rock formations, and small pieces of paper and other items in close-up and one contained the back of Kremers's head. It was impossible to determine from the remains that were found exactly how they had died. Local officials believe the women suffered an accidental injury shortly after getting lost in a network of trails in the region's cloud forests and got lost in the wilderness around Volcán Barú; however, Panamanian lawyers for their families have pointed to failings of the investigation and suggested both women could have met with foul play.\n On 27 June 2014, the body of Andrew Sadek (20), was recovered from the Red River near Breckenridge, Minnesota, with a small-caliber gunshot wound and a backpack full of rocks. He had last been seen by a security camera leaving his dorm at North Dakota State College of Science in Wahpeton around 2 a.m. on 1 May. At the time of his disappearance he had been working as a confidential informant for local police as a result of his own arrest for selling marijuana on campus, which could otherwise have resulted in a long prison sentence. It has not been determined yet whether his death was suicide or murder. Like Rachel Hoffman's death, the case has been used as an example of the mishandling of youthful CIs by police.\n Gennadiy Tsypkalov (43), was a political and military figure of the unrecognized Luhansk People's Republic (LPR). According to officials of the Luhansk People's Republic, Tsypkalov had committed suicide on 17 May 2014, yet according to some of Tsypkalov's colleagues whom Igor Plotnitsky dismissed, the leadership of LPR murdered Tsypkalov. His true death cause is unknown.\n Lennon Lacy was a student who went to West Bladen High School located in Bladenboro, North Carolina who was found dead in the center of a mobile home community hanging from the frame of a swing set on 29 August 2014. It is unclear whether he committed suicide or was murdered.\n John Sheridan (72), formerly New Jersey's Transportation Commissioner, was found dead in his Skillman home along with his wife Joyce on the morning of 28 September 2014. The bodies were in an upstairs bedroom where a fire had been set; they were found with multiple stab wounds. An original ruling of murder-suicide was changed to undetermined in 2017 after a court challenge by the couple's sons, motivated by complaints of mishandled evidence and some evidence suggesting the couple had been attacked by an intruder. The sons are currently calling for the investigation to be reopened.\n The Unnao dead bodies row are the discovery on 14 January 2015 of over one hundred dead bodies who were found floating in the River Ganges in Unnao district located in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh who are unidentified. The cause behind their deaths are unknown.\n Alberto Nisman (51), an Argentine federal prosecutor, was found dead in his apartment of a single gunshot wound to the head on 18 January 2015. He had been investigating the 1994 AMIA bombing, Argentina's deadliest terror attack, and had publicly accused President Cristina Kirchner and other high officials close to her of covering up for suspects in the case for foreign-policy reasons; he was scheduled to present these allegations to Congress the next day. While some of the circumstances of his death are consistent with an early statement that he committed suicide, friends and relatives say that he was eagerly looking ahead to his appearance before Congress and did not seem depressed or despondent at all. Kirchner has suggested the country's intelligence services were behind the killing, since he was about to expose their attempts to bring her down, and called for them to be dismantled. The case remains under investigation.\n Canserbero (26), a Venezuelan hip hop artist and songwriter, was found dead from an apparent fall in front of his apartment complex in Maracay on January 20, 2015. Several hypotheses have been proposed as to what led to his death.\n Kayla Mueller (26), an American human rights activist and humanitarian aid worker who had been taken captive by the Islamic State in August 2013 in Aleppo, Syria, where she was helping Doctors Without Borders, was reported to have died in a Jordanian air strike during the Syrian Civil War in Raqqa on 6 February 2015. Her death was confirmed by the Pentagon, but the circumstances could not be established by the US. The Pentagon agreed the building she supposedly died in according to ISIS was hit in the bombings, but disputed that Mueller or any other civilian had been inside at the time. The site had been bombed by the coalition twice before, and was targeted again because ISIS soldiers sometimes return to bombed sites, thinking the coalition would not bomb those sites again, according to Pentagon spokesman John Kirby. After Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's death in October 2019, new speculations arose that Al-Baghdadi may have had her executed.\n On 22 April 2015, the body of Ambrose Ball (30), of London, was recovered from the River Lea in Tottenham. He had last been seen leaving his vehicle following a single-car accident early on the morning of 24 January after visiting a local pub with friends. The body was too decomposed to determine a cause of death; police requested an adjournment of the inquest in order to further investigate, implying a murder charge was in the works. No charges were ever filed, and threats were later made against Ball's friends and family after they set up a Facebook page appealing for help from the public and questioning the conduct of the investigation.\n On 8 February 2016, an unidentified bus driver was purportedly killed by a falling meteorite in Tamil Nadu, India. If the object truly was a meteorite, then it would be first human fatality to such a type of death in recorded history.\n On 10 December 2016, human remains were discovered in Charlestown, Rhode Island that were thought to be those of mobster Danny Walsh (43). The remains were found where he once had lived. This was later proved false, and the person to whom they belonged to and identity and death cause are unknown.\n Vladimir Cvijan, Serbian lawyer and politician, former MP (2012–2014) and legal advisor and General Secretary of President of Serbia (2004–2010). High-ranked member of ruling SNS of Aleksandar Vučić, from 2010 to 2014, and later dissident. He disappeared in 2017, allegedly fleeing to the United States, however, in March 2021 Serbian media published a document in which the Public Prosecutor of the Higher Public Prosecutors Office in Belgrade states that the Prosecutor's Office issued an order ordering the payment of costs to the Institute for Forensic Medicine of the Faculty of Medicine, University of Belgrade for the autopsy of Vladimir Cvijan's body on 20 November 2018 in Belgrade, Serbia. The cause, circumstances and exact date of his death are still unknown.\n\n Valery Bolotov (46), was a Ukrainian militant leader known for his involvement in the Donbass War in eastern Ukraine, and as the leader of the unrecognized Luhansk People's Republic. Bolotov was found dead on 27 January 2017 in his own home in Moscow, Russia. The preliminary results of clinical tests showed an acute heart failure as reason of death. Poisoning later was suspected. The causes of his death are currently being investigated and are not currently known.\n Otto Warmbier (22), was an American college student who was arrested and detained in North Korea since January 2016, on charges that he had attempted to steal a propaganda poster. During his imprisonment, he suffered an unspecified injury which caused him to go into a coma, from which he died on 19 June 2017.\n Sherin Mathews (3), was an Indian American toddler from Richardson, Texas. who disappeared on 7 October 2017. Her body was found on 22 October 2017 in a culvert under a road near her home. Her cause of death is not yet known.\n Rogelio Martinez (36), an agent of the United States Border Patrol died on 19 November 2017 in Culberson County, Texas while on duty. His cause of death is thought to be a murder, but this remains uncertain due to a lack of evidence, and a four-month investigation was conducted by the FBI into his death cause, but the results were inconclusive.\n Computer hacker Adrian Lamo (37), was found dead 14 March 2018 on a pile of sheets in the guest bedroom of the Wichita, Kansas, home of a couple he had been living with. After three months of investigating, the county coroner was unable to identify a cause of death. While there are some alternative theories suggesting his death had something to do with his controversial involvement in the criminal cases against Chelsea Manning and Julian Assange, the most likely theory is the possible adverse interactions of some of the medicines found near him with Kratom, which he often used.\nJeffrey Epstein, found dead in his cell, the official cause was suicide by hanging but speculation that he was murdered by powerful figures prevails.\n Hong Kong teenager Chan Yin-lam, who participated in the 2019 Hong Kong protests, was found dead and naked in the harbour off Tseung Kwan O on 22 September 2019. This sparked conspiracy theories in pro-protest circles, notably the online platform LIHKG that Chan had been killed by the police. On 11 September 2020, a coroner's inquest jury ruled that the cause of death could not be determined.\n\n2020s\n Ana Lucrecia Taglioretti (24), was a blind female Paraguayan actress and prodigy who had performed at events for charitable causes. She was found dead on 9 January 2020 in her apartment in Asunción, Paraguay, by her mother during a welfare check. Her cause of death is unknown.\n Facundo Astudillo Castro (22–23), was an Argentine man who disappeared on 30 April 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic after he was stopped by the police in Mayor Buratovich, Buenos Aires. Castro was found dead on 15 August 2020. Though Castro's death was revealed to be caused by drowning, it could not be determined if it was a result of homicide, suicide, or an accident.\n Esther Dingley (37), was an English hiker and blogger while going on a solo trip through the Pyrenees. Partial remains were found in July 2021, and later confirmed to be Dingley's following a DNA examination. Her cause of death is currently unknown.\n John Snorri Sigurjónsson (48), an Icelandic high-altitude mountaineer, went missing with two other climbers while climbing the Bottleneck area of Pakistan's K2 mountain on 5 February 2021. The three men's bodies were found on 26 July of that year, but cause of death could not be determined.\n Melissa Caddick (49), was an Australian financial advisor who vanished on 12 November 2020, amid allegations that she was running a Ponzi scheme. Her partial human remains were found floating in the ocean in February 2021, but cause of death is yet to be established.\n James Dean (35), English footballer and champion kickboxer who disappeared in the area of Oswaldtwistle on 5 May 2021. His body was found four days later. While authorities have said that the case is not treated as a homicide, no cause of death has been determined. The police announced his death was not being treated as suspicious.\n Skilyr Hicks (23), an American singer-songwriter best known for her appearance on the eighth season of America's Got Talent, was found dead at her home in North Augusta, South Carolina on 6 December 2021. Official cause of death has not been revealed, but it is suspected to be the result of an overdose.\n\nDate of death disputed\n Raoul Wallenberg (34), a Swedish humanitarian who worked in Budapest, Hungary, was most likely executed in the Soviet Union in or around 1947 after being captured by the Red Army in 1945. His death is dated by Soviet authorities as 16 July 1947, but this is disputed, and the case remains unsolved.\n In 1948, a German court ruled that Hans Kammler (43), an engineer and SS commander who oversaw many Nazi construction projects including concentration camps and, later, the V-2 missile program, died on 9 May 1945 of what was later claimed to be suicide by cyanide poisoning. Some other accounts, however, have him being killed by his own side to prevent his capture during an attack by Czech resistance fighters; others suggest those accounts of his death were put out to cover his surrender to the U.S. Army, in whose custody he supposedly hanged himself two years later.\n\nSee also\n\n Cold case (criminology)\n Forensic science\n List of kidnappings\n List of unidentified murder victims in the United States\n List of unsolved murders in the United Kingdom\n Lists of unsolved murders\n Lists of people by cause of death\n Lists of people who disappeared\n Unidentified decedent\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nUnsolved"
] |
[
"Jerry Garcia",
"Death",
"When was he found",
"August 9, 1995,",
"what time",
"4:23 am,",
"what was this close too",
"53rd birthday,",
"how close was this",
"eight days after",
"Where was he found at",
"Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic.",
"what was the cause of his death",
"The cause of death was a heart attack."
] | C_a95583dc963548a79d885ace2c196575_0 | What was this from | 7 | What was Jerry Garcia's heart attack from? | Jerry Garcia | On August 9, 1995, at 4:23 am, eight days after his 53rd birthday, Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes--all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb; I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred Garcia's former wives from the ceremony. On August 13, approximately 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn. On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons, accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges River at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes. CANNOTANSWER | Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, | Jerome John Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known for being a principal songwriter, the lead guitarist and a vocalist with the rock band the Grateful Dead, of which he was a founding member and which came to prominence during the counterculture of the 1960s. Although he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader of the band.
As one of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead for their entire 30-year career (1965–1995). Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), the Jerry Garcia Band, Old & In the Way, the Garcia/Grisman and Garcia/Kahn acoustic duos, Legion of Mary, and New Riders of the Purple Sage (which he co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known for his distinctive guitar playing, and was ranked 13th in Rolling Stones "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" cover story in 2003. In the 2015 version of the list he was ranked at #46.
Garcia was also renowned for his musical and technical ability, particularly his ability to play a variety of instruments and sustain long improvisations with the Grateful Dead. Garcia believed that improvisation took stress away from his playing and allowed him to make spur of the moment decisions that he would not have made intentionally. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Garcia noted that "my own preferences are for improvisation, for making it up as I go along. The idea of picking, of eliminating possibilities by deciding, that's difficult for me". Originating from the days of the "acid tests", these improvisations were a form of exploration rather than playing a song already written.
Later in life, Garcia struggled with diabetes and in 1986, went into a diabetic coma that nearly cost him his life. Although his overall health improved somewhat after that, he continued to struggle with obesity, smoking, and longstanding heroin and cocaine addictions. He was staying in a California drug rehabilitation facility when he died of a heart attack on August 9, 1995, at the age of 53.
Early life
Garcia's ancestors on his father's side were from Galicia in northwest Spain. His mother's ancestors were Irish and Swedish. He was born in the Excelsior District of San Francisco, California, on August 1, 1942, to Jose Ramon "Joe" Garcia and Ruth Marie "Bobbie" (née Clifford) Garcia, who was herself born in San Francisco. His parents named him after composer Jerome Kern. Jerome John was their second child, preceded by Clifford Ramon "Tiff", who was born in 1937. Shortly before Clifford's birth, their father and a partner leased a building in downtown San Francisco and turned it into a bar, partly in response to Jose being blackballed from a musicians' union for moonlighting.
Garcia was influenced by music at an early age, taking piano lessons for much of his childhood. His father was a retired professional musician and his mother enjoyed playing the piano. His father's extended family—which had immigrated from Spain in 1919—would often sing during reunions.
In 1946, two-thirds of four-year-old Garcia's right middle finger was cut off by his brother in a wood splitting accident, while the family was vacationing in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Garcia later confessed that he often used it to his advantage in his youth, showing it off to other children in his neighborhood.
Less than a year after this incident his father died in a fly fishing accident when the family was vacationing near Arcata in Northern California. He slipped after entering the Trinity River, part of the Six Rivers National Forest, and drowned before other fishermen could reach him. Although Garcia claimed he saw the incident, Dennis McNally, author of the book A Long Strange Trip: The Inside Story of the Grateful Dead, argues Garcia formed the memory after hearing others repeat the story. Blair Jackson, who wrote Garcia: An American Life, notes that a local newspaper article describing Jose's death did not mention Jerry being present when he died.
Excelsior District
Following his father's death, Garcia's mother Ruth took over her husband's bar, buying out his partner for full ownership. She began working full-time there, sending Jerry and his brother to live nearby with her parents, Tillie and William Clifford. During the five-year period in which he lived with his grandparents, Garcia enjoyed a large amount of autonomy and attended Monroe Elementary School. At the school, Garcia was greatly encouraged in his artistic abilities by his third grade teacher: through her, he discovered that "being a creative person was a viable possibility in life." According to Garcia, it was around this time that he was opened up to country and bluegrass music by his grandmother, whom he recalled enjoyed listening to the Grand Ole Opry. His elder brother, Clifford, however, staunchly believed the contrary, insisting that Garcia was "fantasizing all [that] ... she'd been to Opry, but she didn't listen to it on the radio." It was at this point that Garcia started playing the banjo, his first stringed instrument.
Menlo Park
In 1953, Garcia's mother married Wally Matusiewicz. Subsequently, Garcia and his brother moved back home with their mother and new stepfather. However, due to the roughneck reputation of their neighborhood at the time, Garcia's mother moved their family to Menlo Park. During their stay in Menlo Park, Garcia became acquainted with racism and antisemitism, things he disliked intensely. The same year, Garcia was also introduced to rock and roll and rhythm and blues by his brother, and enjoyed listening to Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, B. B. King, Hank Ballard, and, later, Chuck Berry. Clifford often memorized the vocals for his favorite songs, and would then make Garcia learn the harmony parts, a move to which Garcia later attributed much of his early ear training.
In mid-1957, Garcia began smoking cigarettes and was introduced to marijuana. Garcia would later reminisce about the first time he smoked marijuana: "Me and a friend of mine went up into the hills with two joints, the San Francisco foothills, and smoked these joints and just got so high and laughed and roared and went skipping down the streets doing funny things and just having a helluva time". During this time, Garcia also studied at what is now the San Francisco Art Institute. The teacher there was Wally Hedrick, an artist who came to prominence during the 1960s. During the classes, he often encouraged Garcia in his drawing and painting skills. Hedrick also introduced Garcia to the fiction of Jack Kerouac, whom Garcia later cited as a major influence.
San Francisco
In June, Garcia graduated from the local Menlo Oaks school. He then moved with his family back to San Francisco, where they lived in an apartment above the family bar, a newly built replacement for the original, that had been torn down to make way for a freeway entrance. Two months later, on Garcia's fifteenth birthday, his mother bought an accordion for him, to his great disappointment. Garcia had long been captivated by many rhythm and blues artists, especially Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, leaving him craving an electric guitar. After some pleading, his mother exchanged the accordion for a Danelectro with a small amplifier at a local pawnshop. Garcia's stepfather, who was somewhat proficient with instruments, helped tune his guitar to an unusual open tuning.
Cazadero
After a short stint at Denman Junior High School, Garcia attended tenth grade at Balboa High School in 1958, where he often got into trouble for skipping classes and fighting. Consequently, in 1959, Garcia's mother again moved the family to a safer environment, to Cazadero, a small town in Sonoma County, north of San Francisco. This turn of events did not sit well with Garcia, who had to travel by bus to Analy High School in Sebastopol, the nearest school. Garcia did, however, join a band at his school known as the Chords. After performing in and winning a contest, the band's reward was recording a song. They chose "Raunchy" by Bill Justis.
Recording career
Relocation and band beginnings
Garcia stole his mother's car in 1960, and was given the option of joining the United States Army in lieu of prison. He received basic training at Fort Ord. After training, he was transferred to Fort Winfield Scott in the Presidio of San Francisco. Garcia spent most of his time in the army at his leisure, missing roll call and accruing many counts of being AWOL. As a result, Garcia was given a general discharge on December 14, 1960.
In January 1961, Garcia drove down to East Palo Alto to see Laird Grant, an old friend from middle school. He had bought a 1950 Cadillac sedan from a cook in the army, which barely made it to Grant's residence before it broke down. Garcia spent the next few weeks sleeping where friends would allow, eventually using his car as a home. Through Grant, Garcia met Dave McQueen in February, who, after hearing Garcia perform some blues music, introduced him to local people and to the Chateau, a rooming house located near Stanford University which was then a popular hangout.
On February 20, 1961, Garcia got into a car with Paul Speegle, a sixteen-year-old artist and acquaintance of Garcia; Lee Adams, the house manager of the Chateau and driver of the car; and Alan Trist, a companion of theirs. After speeding past the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital, the driver encountered a curve and, speeding around , crashed into the guard rail, sending the car rolling turbulently. Garcia was hurled through the windshield of the car into a nearby field with such force he was literally thrown out of his shoes and would later be unable to recall the ejection. Lee Adams, the driver, and Alan Trist, who was seated in the back, were thrown from the car as well, suffering from abdominal injuries and a spine fracture, respectively. Garcia escaped with a broken collarbone, while Speegle, still in the car, was fatally injured.
Lee's reckless driving and crash served as an awakening for Garcia, who later commented: "That's where my life began. Before then I was always living at less than capacity. I was idling. That was the slingshot for the rest of my life. It was like a second chance. Then I got serious". It was at this time that Garcia began to realize that he needed to begin playing the guitar in earnest—a move which meant giving up his love of drawing and painting.
In April 1961, Garcia first met Robert Hunter, who would become a long-time friend of and lyricist for the Grateful Dead, collaborating principally with Garcia. The two involved themselves in the South Bay and San Francisco art and music scenes, sometimes playing at Menlo Park's Kepler's Books. Garcia performed his first concert with Hunter, each earning five dollars. Garcia and Hunter also played in bands (the Wildwood Boys and the Hart Valley Drifters) with David Nelson, who would later play with Garcia in the New Riders of the Purple Sage and contribute to several Grateful Dead album songs.
In 1962, Garcia met Phil Lesh, the eventual bassist of the Grateful Dead, during a party in Menlo Park's bohemian Perry Lane neighborhood (where author Ken Kesey lived). Lesh would later write in his autobiography that Garcia reminded him of pictures he had seen of the composer Claude Debussy, with his "dark, curly hair, goatee, Impressionist eyes". While attending another party in Palo Alto, Lesh approached Garcia to suggest they record Garcia on Lesh's tape recorder and produce a radio show for the progressive, community-supported Berkeley radio station KPFA. Using an old Wollensak tape recorder, they recorded "Matty Groves" and "The Long Black Veil", among several other tunes. The recordings became a central feature of a 90-minute KPFA special broadcast, "The Long Black Veil and Other Ballads: An Evening with Jerry Garcia". The link between KPFA and the Grateful Dead continues to this day, having included many fundraisers, interviews, live concert broadcasts, taped band performances and all-day or all-weekend "Dead-only" marathons.
Garcia soon began playing and teaching acoustic guitar and banjo. One of Garcia's students was Bob Matthews, who later engineered many of the Grateful Dead's albums. Matthews attended Menlo-Atherton High School and was friends with Bob Weir, and on New Year's Eve 1963, he introduced Weir and Garcia.
Between 1962 and 1964, Garcia sang and performed mainly bluegrass, old-time, and folk music. One of the bands Garcia performed with was the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers, a bluegrass act. The group consisted of Garcia on guitar, banjo, vocals, and harmonica, Marshall Leicester on banjo, guitar, and vocals, and Dick Arnold on fiddle and vocals. Soon after this, Garcia, Weir, Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, and several of their friends formed a jug band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions. Around this time, the psychedelic drug LSD was gaining popularity. Garcia first began using LSD in 1964; later, when asked how it changed his life, he remarked: "Well, it changed everything [...] the effect was that it freed me because I suddenly realized that my little attempt at having a straight life and doing that was really a fiction and just wasn't going to work out. Luckily I wasn't far enough into it for it to be shattering or anything; it was like a realization that just made me feel immensely relieved."
In 1965, Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions evolved into the Warlocks, with the addition of Phil Lesh on bass guitar and Bill Kreutzmann on percussion. However, the band discovered that another group (which would later become the Velvet Underground) had recently selected the same name. In response, Garcia came up with "Grateful Dead" by opening a Funk & Wagnalls dictionary to an entry for "Grateful dead". The definition for "Grateful dead" was "a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". The band's first reaction was disapproval. Garcia later explained the group's reaction: "I didn't like it really, I just found it to be really powerful. [Bob] Weir didn't like it, [Bill] Kreutzmann didn't like it and nobody really wanted to hear about it." Despite their dislike of the name, it quickly spread by word of mouth, and soon became their official title.
Career with the Grateful Dead
Garcia served as lead guitarist, as well as one of the principal vocalists and songwriters of the Grateful Dead for its entire career. Garcia composed such songs as "Dark Star", "Franklin's Tower", and "Scarlet Begonias", among many others. Robert Hunter, an ardent collaborator with the band, wrote the lyrics to all but a few of Garcia's songs.
Garcia was well-noted for his "soulful extended guitar improvisations", which would frequently feature interplay between him and his fellow band members. His fame, as well as the band's, arguably rested on their ability to never play a song the same way twice. Often, Garcia would take cues from rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, remarking that "there are some [...] kinds of ideas that would really throw me if I had to create a harmonic bridge between all the things going on rhythmically with two drums and Phil [Lesh's] innovative bass playing. Weir's ability to solve that sort of problem is extraordinary. [...] Harmonically, I take a lot of my solo cues from Bob."
When asked to describe his approach to soloing, Garcia commented: "It keeps on changing. I still basically revolve around the melody and the way it's broken up into phrases as I perceive them. With most solos, I tend to play something that phrases the way the melody does; my phrases may be more dense or have different value, but they'll occur in the same places in the song. [...]"
Garcia and the band toured almost constantly from their formation in 1965 until Garcia's death in 1995. Periodically, there were breaks due to exhaustion or health problems, often due to Garcia's drug use. During their three-decade span, the Grateful Dead played 2,314 shows.
Garcia's guitar-playing was eclectic. He melded elements from the various kinds of music that influenced him. Echoes of bluegrass playing (such as Arthur Smith and Doc Watson) could be heard. There was also early rock (like Lonnie Mack, James Burton, and Chuck Berry), contemporary blues (Freddie King and Lowell Fulsom), country and western (Roy Nichols and Don Rich), and jazz (Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt) to be heard in Garcia's style. Don Rich was the sparkling country guitar player in Buck Owens's "the Buckaroos" band of the 1960s, but besides Rich's style, both Garcia's pedal steel guitar playing (on Grateful Dead records and others) and his standard electric guitar work, were influenced by another of Owens's Buckaroos of that time, pedal steel player Tom Brumley. And as an improvisational soloist, John Coltrane was one of his greatest personal and musical influences.
Garcia later described his playing style as having "descended from barroom rock and roll, country guitar. Just 'cause that's where all my stuff comes from. It's like that blues instrumental stuff that was happening in the late Fifties and early Sixties, like Freddie King." Garcia's style could vary with the song being played and the instrument he was using, but his playing had a number of so-called "signatures". Among these were lead lines based on rhythmic triplets (examples include the songs "Good Morning Little School Girl", "New Speedway Boogie", "Brokedown Palace", "Deal", "Loser", "Truckin'", "That's It for the Other One", "U.S. Blues", "Sugaree", and "Don't Ease Me In").
Side projects
In addition to the Grateful Dead, Garcia had numerous side projects, the most notable being the Jerry Garcia Band. He was also involved with various acoustic projects such as Old & In the Way and other bluegrass bands, including collaborations with noted bluegrass mandolinist David Grisman. The documentary film Grateful Dawg, co-produced by Gillian Grisman and former NBC producer Pamela Hamilton chronicles the deep, long-term friendship between Garcia and Grisman. When Garcia and Grisman released Not For Kids Only, Hamilton produced their interview and concert for NBC. After several years of producing stories on the Grateful Dead and band members' side projects, Hamilton interviewed Bob Weir for a feature on Garcia's death marking the end of an era.
Other groups of which Garcia was a member at one time or another include the Black Mountain Boys, Legion of Mary, Reconstruction, and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. Garcia was also a fan of jazz artists and improvisation: he played with jazz keyboardists Merl Saunders and Howard Wales for many years in various groups and jam sessions, and he appeared on saxophonist Ornette Coleman's 1988 album, Virgin Beauty. His collaboration with Merl Saunders and Muruga Booker on the world music album Blues From the Rainforest launched the Rainforest Band.
Garcia also spent a lot of time in the recording studio helping out fellow musician friends in session work, often adding guitar, vocals, pedal steel, sometimes banjo and piano and even producing. He played on over 50 studio albums, the styles of which were eclectic and varied, including bluegrass, rock, folk, blues, country, jazz, electronic music, gospel, funk, and reggae. Artists who sought Garcia's help included the likes of Jefferson Airplane (most notably Surrealistic Pillow, Garcia being listed as their "spiritual advisor"). Garcia himself recalled in a mid-1967 interview that he'd played the high lead on "Today," played on "Plastic Fantastic Lover" and "Comin' Back to Me" on that album. Others include Tom Fogerty, David Bromberg, Robert Hunter (Liberty, on Relix Records), Paul Pena, Peter Rowan, Warren Zevon, Country Joe McDonald, Pete Sears, Ken Nordine, Ornette Coleman, Bruce Hornsby, Bob Dylan, It's a Beautiful Day, and many more. In 1995 Garcia played on three tracks for the CD Blue Incantation by guitarist Sanjay Mishra, making it his last studio collaboration.
Throughout the early 1970s, Garcia, Lesh, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, and David Crosby collaborated intermittently with MIT-educated composer and biologist Ned Lagin on several projects in the realm of early ambient music; these include the album Seastones (released by the Ned Lagin on the Round Records subsidiary) and L, an unfinished dance work composed by Ned Lagin. In 1970, Garcia participated in the soundtrack for the film Zabriskie Point.
Garcia also played pedal steel guitar for fellow-San Francisco musicians New Riders of the Purple Sage from their initial dates in 1969 to October 1971, when increased commitments with the Dead forced him to opt out of the group. He appears as a band member on their debut album New Riders of the Purple Sage, and produced Home, Home on the Road, a 1974 live album by the band. He also contributed pedal steel guitar to the enduring hit "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. Garcia also played steel guitar licks on Brewer & Shipley's 1970 album Tarkio. Despite considering himself a novice on the pedal steel, Garcia routinely ranked high in player polls. After a long lapse from playing the pedal steel, he played it once more during several of the Dead's concerts with Bob Dylan in the summer of 1987.
In 1988, Garcia agreed to perform at several major benefits including the "Soviet American Peace Walk" concert at the Band Shell, in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, that drew 25,000 people. He was asked to play by longtime friend and fellow musician, Pete Sears, who played piano with all the bands that day, and also procured all the other musicians. Garcia, Mickey Hart and Steve Parish played the show, then were given a police escort to a Grateful Dead show across the bay later that night. Garcia also played with Nick Gravenites and Pete Sears at a benefit given for Vietnam Veteran and peace activist Brian Willson, who lost both legs below the knee when he attempted to block a train carrying weapons to military dictatorships in El Salvador.
Having previously studied at the San Francisco Art Institute as a teenager, Garcia embarked on a second career in the visual arts in the late 1980s. He created a number of drawings, etchings, and water colors. Garcia's artistic endeavors were represented by the Weir Gallery in Berkeley, California from 1989 to 1996. During this period, Roberta Weir (unrelated to Garcia's bandmate Bob Weir) provided Garcia with new art techniques to use, sponsored his first solo show in 1990, and prepared blank etching plates for him to draw on. These would then be processed and printed by gallery staff and brought back to Garcia for approval and signature, usually with a passing of stacks of paper backstage at a Dead show. His annual shows at the Weir Gallery garnered much attention, leading to further shows in New York and other cities. Garcia was an early adopter of digital art media; his artistic style was as varied as his musical output, and he carried small notebooks for pen and ink sketches wherever he toured. Roberta Weir continues to maintain an archive of the artwork of Jerry Garcia. Perhaps the most widely seen pieces of Jerry Garcia's art are the many editions of men's neckties produced by Stonehenge Ltd. and Mulberry Neckware. Some began as etchings, other designs came from his drawings, paintings, and digital art. Garcia's artwork has since expanded into everything from hotel rooms, wet suits, men's sport shirts, a women's wear line, boxer shorts, hair accessories, cummerbunds, silk scarves and wool rugs.
Personal life
Garcia met his first wife, Sara Ruppenthal, in 1963. She was working at the coffee house in the back of Kepler's Books, where Garcia, Hunter, and Nelson regularly performed. They married on April 23, 1963, and on December 8 of that year their daughter Heather was born.
Carolyn Adams, a Merry Prankster also known as "Mountain Girl" or "M.G.," had a daughter, Sunshine, with Ken Kesey. Mountain Girl married another Prankster, George Walker, but they soon separated. She and Sunshine then moved into 710 Ashbury with Garcia in late 1966 where they would ultimately live together until 1975. In 1994, Sara and Jerry officially divorced after a long separation. Adams gave birth to Garcia's second and third daughters, Annabelle Walker Garcia (February 2, 1970) and Theresa Adams "Trixie" Garcia (September 21, 1974).
In August 1970, Garcia's mother Ruth was involved in a car crash near Twin Peaks in San Francisco. Garcia, who was recording the album American Beauty at the time, often left the sessions to visit his mother with his brother Clifford. She died on September 28, 1970.
In the midst of a March 1973 Grateful Dead engagement at Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, Garcia met Deborah Koons, an aspiring filmmaker from a wealthy Cincinnati, Ohio-based family who would much later marry him and become his widow. After a brief correspondence, he began his relationship with her in mid-1974. This gradually strained his relationship with Adams and culminated in Garcia leaving Adams for Koons in late 1975. The end of his relationship with Koons in 1977 precipitated a brief reconciliation with Adams, including the reestablishment of their household. However, she did not agree with the guitarist's persistent use of narcotics and moved with the children to the Eugene, Oregon area, living near Kesey, in 1978.
Following Adams' departure, Garcia had an affair with Amy Moore. She was a Kentucky-born member of the extended "Grateful Dead family", and the mistress of Texas oil heir Roy Cullen. Their affair lasted circa 1980–1981, and inspired the Garcia-Hunter song "Run for the Roses."
Adams and Garcia were married on December 31, 1981, largely as a result of mutual tax exigencies. Despite the legal codification of their union, she remained in Oregon, while Garcia continued to live near the Grateful Dead's offices in San Rafael, California. Garcia lived with a variety of housemates, including longtime Grateful Dead employee and Jerry Garcia Band manager Rock Scully. Scully, who co-managed the Grateful Dead throughout the mid-to-late 1960s before serving as the band's "advance man" and publicist, was dismissed by the group in 1984 for enabling Garcia's addictions and for allegedly embezzling the Garcia Band's profits. Another housemate was Nora Sage, a Deadhead who became Garcia's housekeeper while studying at the Golden Gate University School of Law. The exact nature of their relationship remains unclear, although it is believed to have been platonic due to Garcia's addictions. She later became his art representative.
While they would briefly reunite following his diabetic coma, Garcia and Adams ultimately divorced in 1994. Phil Lesh has subsequently stated that he rarely saw Adams on any of the band tours. In a 1991 Rolling Stone interview, Garcia stated that "we haven't really lived together since the Seventies".
During the autumn of 1978, Garcia developed a friendship with Shimer College student Manasha Matheson, an artist and music enthusiast. They remained friends over the following nine years before initiating a romantic relationship in Hartford, Connecticut on the Grateful Dead's spring 1987 tour. Jerry and Manasha became parents with the birth of their daughter, Keelin Noel Garcia, on December 20, 1987. On August 17, 1990, Jerry and Manasha married at their San Anselmo, California home in a spiritual ceremony free of legal convention. In 1991, Garcia expressed his delight in finding the time to "actually be a father" to Keelin in contrast to his past relationships with his children. A year later, Garcia dedicated his first art book, Paintings, Drawings and Sketches, "For Manasha, with love, Jerry."
In January 1993, Barbara "Brigid" Meier, a former girlfriend from the early 1960s, reentered Garcia's life for a brief period. Meier claimed, Garcia had considered her to be the "love of his life" and proposed to her during a Hawaiian vacation shortly after their relationship recommenced. Garcia's "love of his life" sentiment was not reserved for one lover, as he expressed the same feelings to several other women in his life. At Garcia's 1995 funeral, Koons declared that she was "the love of his life" while paying her final respects, whereupon Meier and Ruppenthal, who were both in attendance, simultaneously exclaimed, "He said that to me!"
The affair with Meier marked the breakup of Jerry's family life with Manasha and Keelin. Garcia ended the affair with Meier forty-five days later while on tour in Chicago with the Grateful Dead after she confronted him about his drug use.
Shortly thereafter, Garcia renewed his acquaintance with Deborah Koons in the spring of 1993. They married on February 14, 1994, in Sausalito, California. Garcia and Koons were married at the time of his death.
Lifestyle and health
Because of their public profile, Garcia and his collaborators were occasionally singled out in the American government's war on drugs. On October 2, 1967, 710 Ashbury Street in San Francisco (where the Grateful Dead had taken up residence the year before) was raided after a police tip-off. Grateful Dead members Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Ron "Pigpen" McKernan were apprehended on marijuana charges which were later dropped, although Garcia himself was not arrested. The following year, Garcia's picture was used in a defamatory context in a campaign commercial for Richard Nixon.
Most of the band were arrested again in January 1970, after they flew to New Orleans from Hawaii. After returning to their hotel from a performance, the band checked into their rooms, only to be quickly raided by police. Approximately fifteen people were arrested on the spot, including many of the road crew, management, and nearly all of the Grateful Dead except for Garcia, who arrived later, outgoing keyboardist Tom Constanten, who abstained from all drugs as a member of the Church of Scientology, and McKernan, who eschewed illegal drugs in favor of alcohol.
According to Bill Kreutzmann, the band's use of cocaine accelerated throughout the early 1970s. After using heroin in a brothel in 1974 (likely on the band's second European tour), Garcia was introduced to a smokeable form of the drug (initially advertised as refined opium) colloquially known as "Persian" or "Persian Base" during the group's 1975 hiatus. Influenced by the stresses of creating and releasing The Grateful Dead Movie and the acrimonious collapse of the band's independent record labels over the next two years, Garcia became increasingly dependent upon both substances. These factors, combined with the alcohol and drug abuse of several other members of the Grateful Dead, resulted in a turbulent atmosphere. By 1978, the band's chemistry began "cracking and crumbling", resulting in poor group cohesion. As a result, Keith and Donna Jean Godchaux left the band in February 1979.
With the addition of keyboardist/vocalist Brent Mydland that year amid the ongoing coalescence of the Deadhead subculture, the band reached new commercial heights as a touring group on the American arena circuit in the early 1980s, enabling them to forsake studio recording for several years. Nevertheless, this was offset by such factors as the band's atypically large payroll and Garcia's $700-a-day () drug addiction, resulting in the guitarist taking on a frenetic slate of solo touring outside of the Grateful Dead's rigorous schedule, including abbreviated acoustic duo concerts with Jerry Garcia Band bassist John Kahn that were widely rumored to be a funding conduit for their respective addictions.
Though things seemed to be getting better for the band, Garcia's health was declining. By 1983, Garcia's demeanor onstage had appeared to change. Despite still playing the guitar with great passion and intensity, there were times that he would appear disengaged; as such, shows were often inconsistent. Years of heavy tobacco smoking had affected his voice, and he gained considerable weight. By 1984, he would often rest his chin on the microphone during performances. The so-called "endless tour"—the result of years of financial risks, drug use, and poor business decisions—had taken its toll.
Garcia's decade-long heroin addiction culminated in the rest of the band holding an intervention in January 1985. Given the choice between the band or the drugs, Garcia agreed to check into a rehabilitation center in Oakland, California. A few days later in January, before the start of his program in Oakland, Garcia was arrested for drug possession in Golden Gate Park; he subsequently attended a drug diversion program. Throughout 1985, he tapered his drug use on tour and at home with the assistance of Nora Sage; by the spring of 1986, he was completely abstinent.
Precipitated by an unhealthy weight, dehydration, bad eating habits, and a recent relapse on the Grateful Dead's first stadium tour, Garcia collapsed into a diabetic coma in July 1986, waking up five days later. He later spoke about this period of unconsciousness as surreal: "Well, I had some very weird experiences. My main experience was one of furious activity and tremendous struggle in a sort of futuristic, space-ship vehicle with insectoid presences. After I came out of my coma, I had this image of myself as these little hunks of protoplasm that were stuck together kind of like stamps with perforations between them that you could snap off." Garcia's coma had a profound effect on him: it forced him to have to relearn how to play the guitar, as well as other, more basic skills. Within a handful of months, he had recovered, playing with the Jerry Garcia Band and the Grateful Dead again later that year.
After Garcia's recovery, the band released a comeback album In the Dark in 1987, which became their best-selling studio album. Inspired by Garcia's improved health, a successful album and the continuing emergence of Mydland as a third frontman, the band's energy and chemistry reached a new peak in the late 1980s.
Amid a litany of personal problems, Mydland died of a speedball overdose in July 1990. His death greatly affected Garcia, leading him to believe that the band's chemistry would never be the same. Before beginning the fall tour, the band acquired keyboardists Vince Welnick and Bruce Hornsby. The power of Hornsby's performances drove Garcia to new heights on stage. However, as the band continued through 1991, Garcia became concerned with the band's future. He was exhausted from five straight years of touring. He thought a break was necessary, mainly so that the band could come back with fresh material. The idea was put off by the pressures of management, and the touring continued. Garcia began using heroin again after several years of intermittent prescription opiate use. Though his relapse was brief, the band was quick to react. Soon after the last show of the tour in Denver, Garcia was confronted by the band with another intervention. After a disastrous meeting, Garcia invited Phil Lesh over to his home in San Rafael, California, where he explained that after the meeting he would start attending a methadone clinic. Garcia said that he wanted to clean up in his own way, and return to making music.
After returning from the band's 1992 summer tour, Garcia became sick, a throwback to his diabetic coma in 1986. Manasha Garcia nursed Jerry back to health and organized a team of health professionals which included acupuncturist Yen Wei Choong and Randy Baker, MD, a holistic family physician to treat him at home. Garcia recovered over the following days, despite the Grateful Dead having to cancel their fall tour to allow him time to recuperate. Garcia reduced his cigarette smoking and began losing weight. He also became a vegetarian.
Despite these improvements, Garcia's physical and mental condition continued to decline throughout 1993 and 1994. He began to use narcotics again to dull the pain.
In light of his second drug relapse and current condition, Garcia checked himself into the Betty Ford Center during July 1995. His stay was limited, lasting only two weeks. Motivated by the experience, he then checked into the Serenity Knolls treatment center in Forest Knolls, California, where he died.
Death
Garcia died in his room at the rehabilitation clinic on August 9, 1995. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes—all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that, upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb. I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former pro basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred two of Garcia's former wives from the ceremony.
On August 13, about 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Haight-Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn.
On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes.
Musical equipment
Garcia played many guitars during his career, which ranged from student and budget models to custom-made instruments. During his thirty-five year career as a professional musician, Garcia used about 25 guitars.
In 1965, when Garcia was playing with the Warlocks, he used a Guild Starfire, which he also used on the début album of the Grateful Dead. Beginning in late 1967 and ending in 1968, Garcia played black or gold mid-1950s Gibson Les Paul guitars with P-90 pickups. In 1969, he picked up the Gibson SG and used it for most of that year and 1970, except for a small period in between where he used a sunburst Fender Stratocaster.
During Garcia's "pedal steel flirtation period" (as Bob Weir referred to it in Anthem to Beauty), from approximately 1969 to 1972, he initially played a Fender instrument before upgrading to the ZB Custom D-10, especially in his earlier public performances. Although this was a double neck guitar, Garcia used the "E9 neck and the three pedals to raise the tone and two levers to lower it." He employed an Emmons D-10 at the Grateful Dead's and New Riders of the Purple Sage's final appearances at the Fillmore East in April 1971.
In 1969, Garcia played pedal steel on three notable outside recordings: the track "The Farm" on the Jefferson Airplane album Volunteers, the track "Oh Mommy" by Brewer and Shipley and the hit single "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young from their album Déjà Vu, released in 1970. Garcia played on the latter album in exchange for harmony lessons for the Grateful Dead, who were at the time recording Workingman's Dead.
In 1971, Garcia began playing a sunburst Les Paul. In March and April 1971 – the time period during which the Grateful Dead recorded its second live album, Grateful Dead – Garcia played the "Peanut," a guitar he had received from Rick Turner, who had custom built the guitar's body and incorporated the neck, pickups, and hardware from an early '60s Les Paul.
In May, Garcia began using a 1957 natural finish Stratocaster that had been given to him by Graham Nash. Garcia added an alligator sticker to the pickguard in the fall of that year. "Alligator" would remain Garcia's principal electric guitar until August 1973.
In the summer of 1971, Garcia also played a double-cutaway Les Paul TV Junior.
While Alligator was in the shop in the summer of 1972, he briefly reverted to the sunburst Stratocaster; this can be seen in Sunshine Daydream.
In late 1972, Garcia purchased the first guitar ("Eagle") made by Alembic luthier Doug Irwin for $850 (). Enamored of Irwin's talents, he immediately commissioned his own custom instrument. This guitar, nicknamed "Wolf" for a memorable sticker Garcia added below the tailpiece, was delivered in May 1973 and replaced Alligator on stage in September. It cost $1,500 (), an extremely high price for the era.
Wolf was made with an ebony fingerboard and featured numerous embellishments like alternating grain designs in the headstock, ivory inlays, and fret marker dots made of sterling silver. The body was composed of western maple wood which had a core of purpleheart. Garcia later had Irwin (who ultimately left Alembic to start his own business) replace the electronics inside the guitar, at which point he added his own logo to the headstock alongside the Alembic logo. The system included two interchangeable plates for configuring pickups: one was made for strictly single coils, while the other accommodated humbuckers. Shortly after receiving the modified instrument, Garcia commissioned another custom guitar from Irwin with one caveat: "Don't hold back."
During the Grateful Dead's 1974 European tour, Wolf was dropped on several occasions, one of which caused a minor crack in the headstock. Following filming of The Grateful Dead Movie (in which the guitar is prominently visible) a month later, Garcia returned it to Irwin for repairs. Throughout its absence, Garcia predominantly played several Travis Bean guitars, including the TB1000A (1975) and the TB500 (1976-1977). On September 28, 1977, Irwin delivered the refurbished Wolf back to Garcia. The wolf sticker which gave the guitar its name had now been inlaid into the instrument; it also featured an effects loop between the pick-ups and controls (so inline effects would "see" the same signal at all times) which was bypassable. Irwin also put a new face on the headstock with only his logo (he later claimed to have built the guitar himself, though pictures through time clearly show the progression of logos, from Alembic, to Alembic & Irwin, to only Irwin).
Nearly seven years after he commissioned it, Garcia received his second custom guitar ("Tiger") from Irwin in the summer of 1979.
He first employed the instrument in concert at a Grateful Dead performance at the Oakland Auditorium Arena on August 4, 1979. Its name was derived from the inlay on the preamp cover.
The body of Tiger was of rich quality: the top layer was cocobolo, with the preceding layers being maple stripe, vermilion, and flame maple, in that order. The neck was made of western maple with an ebony fingerboard. The pickups consisted of a single coil DiMarzio SDS-1 and two humbucker DiMarzio Super IIs which were easily removable due to Garcia's preference for replacing his pickups every year or two. The electronics were composed of an effects bypass loop, which allowed Garcia to control the sound of his effects through the tone and volume controls on the guitar, and a preamplifier/buffer which rested behind a plate in the back of the guitar. Fully outfitted, Tiger weighed . This was Garcia's principal guitar for the next eleven years, and most played.
In the late 1980s Garcia, Weir and CSN (along with many others) endorsed Alvarez Yairi acoustic guitars. There are many photographs circulating (mostly promotional) of Garcia playing a DY99 Virtuoso Custom with a Modulus Graphite neck. He opted to play with the less decorated model but the promotional photo from the Alvarez Yairi catalog has him holding the "tree of life" model. This hand-built guitar was notable for the collaboration between Japanese luthier Kazuo Yairi and Modulus Graphite of San Rafael. As with most things Garcia, with his passing, the DY99 model is highly valued among collectors.
In 1990, Irwin completed "Rosebud", Garcia's fourth custom guitar. It was similar to his previous guitar Tiger in many respects, but featured different inlays and electronics, tone and volume controls, and weight. Rosebud, unlike Tiger, was configured with three humbuckers; the neck and bridge pickups shared a tone control, while the middle had its own. Atop the guitar was a Roland GK-2 pickup which fed the controller set inside the guitar. The GK2 was used in junction with the Roland GR-50 rack mount synthesizer. The GR-50 synthesizer in turn drove a Korg M1R synthesizer producing the MIDI effects heard during live performances of this period as heard on the Grateful Dead recording Without a Net. Sections of the guitar were hollowed out to bring the weight down to . The inlay, a dancing skeleton holding a rose, covers a plate just below the bridge. The final cost of the instrument was $11,000 ().
In 1993, carpenter-turned-luthier Stephen Cripe tried his hand at making an instrument for Garcia. After researching Tiger through pictures and films, Cripe set out on what would soon become known as "Lightning Bolt", again named for its inlay.
The guitar used Brazilian rosewood for the fingerboard and East Indian rosewood for the body, which, with admitted irony from Cripe, had been taken from a 19th-century bed used by opium smokers. Built purely from guesswork, Lightning Bolt was a hit with Garcia, who began using the guitar exclusively. Soon after, Garcia requested that Cripe build a backup of the guitar. Cripe, who had not measured or photographed the original, was told simply to "wing it."
Cripe later delivered the backup, which was known by the name "Top Hat". Garcia bought it from him for $6,500, making it the first guitar that Cripe had ever sold. However, infatuated with Lightning Bolt, Garcia rarely used the backup.
After Garcia's death, the ownership of Wolf and Tiger came into question. According to Garcia's will, his guitars were bequeathed to Doug Irwin, who had constructed them.
The remaining Grateful Dead members disagreed – they considered his guitars to be property of the band, leading to a lawsuit between the two parties. In 2001, Irwin won the case. However, nearly having been left destitute from a traffic accident in 1998, he decided to place the guitars up for auction in hopes of being able to start another guitar workshop.
On May 8, 2002, Wolf and Tiger, among other memorabilia, were placed for auction at Studio 54 in New York City. Tiger was sold for $957,500, and Wolf for $789,500. Together, the pair sold for $1.74 million, setting a new world record. Wolf went into in the private collection of Daniel Pritzker who kept it in a secure climate controlled room in a private residence at Utica, N.Y. Tiger went to the private collection of Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.
In May 2017, Wolf was again auctioned, but this time for charity. Pritzker decided to sell the guitar and donate all proceeds to the Montgomery, Alabama based Southern Poverty Law Center.
Brian Halligan placed the winning bid totaling $1.9M.
For the majority of 2019 Wolf and Tiger were included in the Play it Loud exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. On June 23, 2019 John Mayer played Wolf with Dead & Co. at Citi Field.
Legacy
Garcia was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Grateful Dead in 1994. He declined to attend the ceremony; the band jokingly brought a cardboard cutout of Garcia out on stage in his absence.
In 1987, Vermont ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's introduced their Cherry Garcia flavor dedicated to him. It was the first ice cream flavor dedicated to a musician.
In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Jerry Garcia 13th in their list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
According to fellow Bay Area guitar player Henry Kaiser, Garcia is "the most recorded guitarist in history. With more than 2,200 Grateful Dead concerts, and 1,000 Jerry Garcia Band concerts captured on tape – as well as numerous studio sessions – there are about 15,000 hours of his guitar work preserved for the ages."
On July 30, 2004, Melvin Seals was the first Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) member to headline an outdoor music and camping festival called "The Grateful Garcia Gathering". Jerry Garcia Band drummer David Kemper joined Melvin Seals and JGB in 2007. Other musicians and friends of Garcia include Donna Jean Godchaux, Mookie Siegel, Pete Sears, G.E. Smith, Chuck Hammer, Barry Sless, Jackie Greene, Brian Lesh, Sanjay Mishra, and Mark Karan.
On July 21, 2005, the San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission passed a resolution to name the amphitheater in McLaren Park "The Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." The amphitheater is located in the Excelsior District, where Garcia grew up. The first show to happen at the Jerry Garcia Amphitheater was Jerry Day 2005 on August 7, 2005. Jerry's brother, Tiff Garcia, was the first person to welcome everybody to the "Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." Jerry Day is an annual celebration of Garcia in his childhood neighborhood. The dedication ceremony (Jerry Day 2) on October 29, 2005, was officiated by mayor Gavin Newsom.
On September 24, 2005, the Comes a Time: A Celebration of the Music & Spirit of Jerry Garcia tribute concert was held at the Hearst Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California. The concert featured Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, Bruce Hornsby, Trey Anastasio, Warren Haynes, Jimmy Herring, Michael Kang, Jay Lane, Jeff Chimenti, Mark Karan, Robin Sylvester, Kenny Brooks, Melvin Seals, Merl Saunders, Marty Holland, Stu Allen, Gloria Jones, and Jackie LaBranch.
Georgia-based composer Lee Johnson released an orchestral tribute to the music of the Grateful Dead, recorded with the Russian National Orchestra, entitled "Dead Symphony: Lee Johnson Symphony No. 6." Johnson was interviewed on NPR on the July 26, 2008 broadcast of Weekend Edition, and gave much credit to the genius and craft of Garcia's songwriting. A live performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Johnson himself, was held Friday, August 1.
In 2010 the Santa Barbara Bowl in California opened Jerry Garcia Glen along the walk up to the venue. There is a statue of Garcia's right hand along the way.
Seattle rock band Soundgarden wrote and recorded the instrumental song "Jerry Garcia's Finger", dedicated to the singer, which was released as a b-side with their single "Pretty Noose".
Numerous music festivals across the United States and Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK hold annual events in memory of Jerry Garcia.
On May 14, 2015, an all-star lineup held a tribute concert for Garcia at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. The event was called "Dear Jerry".
In 2015, Hunter and Garcia were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Hunter accepted the award along with Garcia's daughter, Trixie Garcia, who accepted on behalf of her father.
In 2015, Jerry Garcia's wife, Manasha Garcia and their daughter, Keelin Garcia launched The Jerry Garcia Foundation, a nonprofit charity that supports projects for artistic, environmental, and humanitarian causes. The Foundation's Board members are Bob Weir, Peter Shapiro, Glenn Fischer, Irwin Sternberg, Daniel Shiner, TRI Studios CEO, Christopher McCutcheon and Fender Music Foundation Executive Director,
Lynn Robison. Keelin Garcia said, "It is a tremendous honor to participate in nonprofit work that is in accordance with my father's values."
In 2018, Jerry Garcia family members, Keelin Garcia and Manasha Garcia launched the Jerry Garcia Music Arts independent music label.
On November 18, 2021, it was announced Jonah Hill would portray Garcia in a forthcoming Grateful Dead biopic written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski directed by Martin Scorsese for Apple TV+.
Discography
New Riders of the Purple Sage – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1971
Hooteroll? – Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia – 1971
Garcia – Jerry Garcia – 1972
Live at Keystone – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1973
Compliments – Jerry Garcia – 1974
Old & In the Way – Old & In the Way – 1975
Reflections – Jerry Garcia – 1976
Cats Under the Stars – Jerry Garcia Band – 1978
Run for the Roses – Jerry Garcia – 1982
Vintage NRPS – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1986
Keystone Encores – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1988
Almost Acoustic – Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band – 1988
Jerry Garcia / David Grisman – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1991
Jerry Garcia Band – Jerry Garcia Band – 1991
Not for Kids Only – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1993
Notes
References
Sources
External links
The official homepage of Jerry Garcia
Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jerry Garcia on Fretbase
The Jerry Site
Official Grateful Dead website
Jerry Garcia discography at deaddisc.com
Jerry Garcia autopsy
Jerry Day: A Civic and Cultural Celebration of Jerry Garcia held in San Francisco
FBI Records: The Vault - Jerry Garcia at vault.fbi.gov
Jerry Garcia's Army personnel file at the National Archives
TEAM
Garcia's Guitars & Gear Directory
American banjoists
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American country rock musicians | true | [
"\"Love Never Fails\" is a song by Christian contemporary-alternative rock musician Brandon Heath from his second studio album, What If We. It was released on February 5, 2009, as the third single from the album.\n\nBackground \nThis song was produced by Dan Muckala. Brandon Heath sang this song at Carrie Underwood's and Mike Fisher's wedding.\n\nComposition \n\"Love Never Fails\" was written by Brandon Heath, Chad Cates.\n\nRelease \nThe song \"Love Never Fails\" was digitally released as the third and last single from What If We on February 5, 2009.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences \n\n2009 singles\nBrandon Heath songs\nSongs written by Brandon Heath\n2008 songs\nSong recordings produced by Dan Muckala",
"This is a list of former state routes in Ohio since 1923 with route numbers from 1 through 49 inclusive.\n\nSR 1 (1912–1926)\n\nSR 1, formerly known as Inter-county Highway 1 until 1921 and State Highway 1 in 1922, was the designation for the National Road and National Old Trails Road through central Ohio between 1912 and 1926. US 40 was first signed along the length of the route in 1926 and became the road's only designation by 1927.\n\nSR 1 (1961–1965)\n\nSR 1 was the designation for a proposed toll road connecting Cincinnati and Pennsylvania that existed between 1961 and 1965. As the freeway portions were not built yet, SR 1 was routed along local roads until a corresponding freeway section was completed. SR 1 generally followed what is now I-75 between Cincinnati and Dayton, SR 4 between Dayton and Fairborn, US 40 and I-70 between Fairborn and Columbus, I-71 between Columbus and Cleveland, and I-90 between Cleveland and the Pennsylvania state line at Conneaut.\n\nSR 5 (1923–1931)\n\nSR 5 was the designation for what is now current routing of US 30 across Ohio. When it was first designated in 1923, SR 5 ran from the Indiana state line in Benton Township to the West Virginia state line in East Liverpool. In 1927, following the designation of US 30, the long segments of SR 5 that overlapped US 30 were removed leaving the section between Delphos and Wooster, Ohio, though it did overlap US 42 between Mansfield and Ashland, what was then SR 6 (now US 250) between Ashland and Plain Township, and US 30 to Wooster. The route was truncated at its eastern end to Mansfield by 1929 removing the additional overlaps. By 1932, SR 5 became part of the newly designated northern alternate route of US 30, US 30N.\n\nSR 6 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 6 was the route of what became US 25 through western Ohio connecting Cincinnati and Toledo, Ohio at the Michigan state line between 1923 and 1926.\n\nSR 6 (1927–1928)\n\nSR 6 was the route of is now US 250 between Bridgeport and Norwalk for two years from 1927 to 1928.\n\nSR 6 (1929-1931)\n\nSR 6 was the designation for what is now SR 283 between Cleveland and Painesville along the Lake Erie shoreline. The route existed between 1929 and 1931 following the route's former designation of SR 175 but was renumbered due to the addition of US 6 in the state.\n\nSR 9 (1923-1930)\n\nSR 9 was the route of what is now U.S. Route 127 in Ohio between Cincinnati and Bryan and SR 15 between Bryan and the Michigan state line near Pioneer.\n\nSR 10 (1923-1926)\n\nSR 10 was the route that follows what is now SR 309 between Delphos and Ontario and US 30 between Ontario and the community of Jefferson (within Plain Township, Wayne County) at what was SR 5. The route existed from 1923 until 1926 when it was replaced by US 30.\n\nSR 10 (1927-1931)\n\nSR 10 was the route that replaced SR 40 in 1927 due to the designation of US 40. The route ran from Washington Court House to Zanesville by way of Circleville and Lancaster. By 1932, US 22 was extended from its previous terminus in Cambridge to Cincinnati taking over all of SR 10.\n\nSR 10 (1932)\n\nSR 10 was a short-lived designation for the road that became US 68 in 1932. The entire route was concurrent with other routes for its entire length: with US 52 and US 62 between Aberdeen and Ripley, completely concurrent with SR 221 to Georgetown (SR 221 had been moved to its current alignment within one year), SR 53 to Kenton, SR 31 to Findlay, US 25 to Perrysburg, and US 23 for the remainder to Toledo.\n\nSR 11 (1923–1935)\n\nSR 11 was the designation that now carries US 35 through Ohio. It existed from 1923 through 1935.\n\nSR 13 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 13 was the route that carries US 250 between Bridgeport and Dover and US 21 from Dover to Cleveland. The two U.S. routes replaced the three-year-old SR 13 in 1926.\n\nSR 15 (1912–1926)\n\nSR 15, formerly known as Inter-county Highway 15 until 1921 and State Highway 15 in 1922,' was an original state route that traveled between Cleveland and the Pennsylvania state line near Williamsfield. The entire length of the route became US 322 in 1926.\n\nSR 16 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 16 was the route that ran along modern-day US 422 between Cleveland and Coitsville Township at the Pennsylvania state line (east of Youngstown). The route existed from 1923 and 1926. Unlike US 422, SR 16 traveled through Niles with SR 169 bypassed the city.\n\nSR 17 (1923–1933)\n\nSR 17 was a route that existed between 1923 and 1935. Prior to 1926, SR 17 started at the Indiana state line near Hicksville and traveled east across Ohio (mostly along modern-day SR 18 between Hicksville and Tiffin and US 224 east of there) before ending at the Pennsylvania state line near Lowellville. In 1927, the route was changed to follow what is now the entirety of US 224 through Ohio. SR 17 was removed in favor of US 224 in 1933.\n\nSR 19 (1923–1931)\n\nSR 19 carried what is now mostly US 62 between Columbus and the Pennsylvania state line near Masury. It existed from 1923 through 1931.\n\nSR 20 (1923–1931)\n\nSR 20 was a route that ran from Columbus to East Liverpool by way of Newark, Coshocton, and New Philadelphia. The modern route of SR 20 consists of SR 16 from Columbus to Coshocton, the former US 36 between Coshocton and Newcomerstown, the old US 21 between Newcomerstown and New Philadelphia, and SR 39 from New Philadelphia to East Liverpool. The route existed from 1923 to 1926.\n\nSR 21 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 21 ran from Columbus to Findlay between 1923 and 1926. In 1926, the route was renumbered to SR 31 due to the addition of US 21 in the eastern part of the state. Today, the route consists of the old routing of US 33 between Columbus and Marysville, SR 31 between Marysville and Kenton, and US 68 to Findlay.\n\nSR 22 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 22 was a route that ran from Marion to the Indiana state line in Van Wert County between 1923 and 1926. In 1926, the route was renumbered to US 23 from Marion to Carey, SR 15 between Carey and Ney, and the entire length of SR 249.\n\nSR 23 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 23 was a route in northwestern Ohio that existed between 1923 and 1926. Today, the route runs along US 20 from the Indiana state line to northwestern Toledo, SR 120 through Toledo, and SR 2 from Toledo to its intersection with SR 163 between Lacarne and Port Clinton.\n\nSR 24 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 24 was the designation for what became SR 124 through southern Ohio between Hillsboro and Pomeroy. The route existed from 1923 to 1926.\n\nSR 25 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 25 was the designation for what became SR 125 through southern Ohio between Cincinnati and Friendship at what was then SR 7 (now US 52). The route was in existence from 1923 to 1926.\n\nSR 27 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 27 was the designation of a route in southern Ohio from 1923 through 1926. The route now consists of US 50 from Cincinnati to Milford, SR 28 from Milford to Chillicothe, SR 159 north of Chillicothe, SR 180 to Enterprise, and US 33 into Logan.\n\nSR 28 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 28 was the state highway that traveled between Cincinnati and West Jefferson. It existed from 1923 to 1926 and was replaced in 1926 by US 42 from Cincinnati to London, and SR 142 for the remainder of the route.\n\nSR 30 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 30 was a north-south state highway that nearly crossed the length of Ohio. The route existed from 1923 through 1926 and was replaced by SR 13 that year. Most of the route from Chauncey to Milan still follows SR 13 except for the section north of Milan, now US 250 carries the former route into Sandusky.\n\nSR 31 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 31 was the route that became US 24 between the Indiana state line near Antwerp to downtown Toledo. The route existed from 1923 through 1926.\n\nSR 32 (1923–1937)\n\nSR 32 was the designation for the route that generally follows what is now SR 29 from the Indiana state line near Wabash (within Washington Township, Mercer County) to St. Marys and US 33 from there to Marysville. The route passed through Celina, St. Marys, Wapakoneta, Russells Point, Bellefontaine, and Marysville during the route's existence from 1923 through 1937.\n\nSR 33 (1923–1937)\n\nSR 33 was the predecessor to SR 108 in northwestern Ohio. From its first designation in 1923 through 1929, the route started in Lima and traveled north through Ottawa, Napoleon, and Wauseon before ending at the Michigan state line in rural Chesterfield Township, Fulton County. By 1930, the route's southern end had been truncated to Ottawa (the former route south of there became SR 65). The route would exist in this configuration for another seven years before being renumbered to SR 108 due to the addition of US 33.\n\nSR 35 (1923–1934)\n\nSR 35 was the designation for what is now the entirety of SR 9 between Armstrongs Mills and Salem. The route also included what is now SR 145 from Malaga to its northern terminus, and SR 148 between SR 145 and SR 9. The route existed from 1923 through 1934 when it was renumbered due to the addition of US 35 in Ohio.\n\nSR 36 (1923–1931)\n\nSR 36 was the route that preceded the designation of SR 5 between Wooster and community of Cornelion within Kinsman Township at the Pennsylvania state line. The route existed from 1923 through 1931. Though by 1932 most of route was renumbered to SR 5 due to the existence of US 36, today the route follows SR 585 from Wooster to Norton, local roads through Norton, Barberton, Akron, and Cuyahoga Falls; SR 59 through Kent and Ravenna, and SR 5 to Kinsman. North of Kinsman however, SR 36 traveled northeast to Cornelion on modern-day Trumbull County Road 360 while SR 5 when it was created in 1932 travels along the route it still follows.\n\nSR 40 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 40 was the section of modern-day US 22 between Washington Court House and Zanesville. The route existed from 1923 until 1926 when it was renumbered to SR 10 due to the designation of US 40 through Ohio.\n\nSR 42 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 42 was a state route across central Ohio that existed from 1923 through 1926. By 1927, the route had been renumbered to SR 95 due to the addition of US 42 but today, many routes follow the old route. The modern routing of SR 42 follows SR 95 from Marion to Fredericktown, SR 13 south to Mount Vernon, US 36 to SR 715, the length of SR 715, US 36 again to Coshocton, SR 541 to Kimbolton, and local roads to what was then SR 8 (later US 21).\n\nSR 47 (1923–1931)\n\nSR 47 was a route across central Ohio. When it was first created in 1923 and through 1929, the route ran from Granville at SR 16 to SR 67 in Marseilles. In 1930, the route was extended at both ends; the route was extended slightly south to US 40 near Hebron and was extended north along local roads to Findlay. The extension was only in place for two years because it was replaced by an extended SR 37.\n\nSR 48 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 48 was a state route through southeastern Ohio that existed from 1923 to 1926. The route ran from Fly to Dennison along what is now the southernmost section of SR 800. The route was renumbered in 1926 by a relocated SR 8, SR 800's predecessor.\n\nSR 49 (1923–1926)\n\nSR 49 was a state route that connected Cambridge and Steubenville from 1923 through 1926. The route was replaced by US 22 by 1927.\n\nReferences\n\n 1\nF-1"
] |
[
"Jerry Garcia",
"Death",
"When was he found",
"August 9, 1995,",
"what time",
"4:23 am,",
"what was this close too",
"53rd birthday,",
"how close was this",
"eight days after",
"Where was he found at",
"Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic.",
"what was the cause of his death",
"The cause of death was a heart attack.",
"What was this from",
"Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction,"
] | C_a95583dc963548a79d885ace2c196575_0 | What else troubled him | 8 | Besides drug addiction, what else troubled Jerry Garcia? | Jerry Garcia | On August 9, 1995, at 4:23 am, eight days after his 53rd birthday, Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes--all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb; I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred Garcia's former wives from the ceremony. On August 13, approximately 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn. On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons, accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges River at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes. CANNOTANSWER | weight problems, sleep apnea, | Jerome John Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known for being a principal songwriter, the lead guitarist and a vocalist with the rock band the Grateful Dead, of which he was a founding member and which came to prominence during the counterculture of the 1960s. Although he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader of the band.
As one of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead for their entire 30-year career (1965–1995). Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), the Jerry Garcia Band, Old & In the Way, the Garcia/Grisman and Garcia/Kahn acoustic duos, Legion of Mary, and New Riders of the Purple Sage (which he co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known for his distinctive guitar playing, and was ranked 13th in Rolling Stones "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" cover story in 2003. In the 2015 version of the list he was ranked at #46.
Garcia was also renowned for his musical and technical ability, particularly his ability to play a variety of instruments and sustain long improvisations with the Grateful Dead. Garcia believed that improvisation took stress away from his playing and allowed him to make spur of the moment decisions that he would not have made intentionally. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Garcia noted that "my own preferences are for improvisation, for making it up as I go along. The idea of picking, of eliminating possibilities by deciding, that's difficult for me". Originating from the days of the "acid tests", these improvisations were a form of exploration rather than playing a song already written.
Later in life, Garcia struggled with diabetes and in 1986, went into a diabetic coma that nearly cost him his life. Although his overall health improved somewhat after that, he continued to struggle with obesity, smoking, and longstanding heroin and cocaine addictions. He was staying in a California drug rehabilitation facility when he died of a heart attack on August 9, 1995, at the age of 53.
Early life
Garcia's ancestors on his father's side were from Galicia in northwest Spain. His mother's ancestors were Irish and Swedish. He was born in the Excelsior District of San Francisco, California, on August 1, 1942, to Jose Ramon "Joe" Garcia and Ruth Marie "Bobbie" (née Clifford) Garcia, who was herself born in San Francisco. His parents named him after composer Jerome Kern. Jerome John was their second child, preceded by Clifford Ramon "Tiff", who was born in 1937. Shortly before Clifford's birth, their father and a partner leased a building in downtown San Francisco and turned it into a bar, partly in response to Jose being blackballed from a musicians' union for moonlighting.
Garcia was influenced by music at an early age, taking piano lessons for much of his childhood. His father was a retired professional musician and his mother enjoyed playing the piano. His father's extended family—which had immigrated from Spain in 1919—would often sing during reunions.
In 1946, two-thirds of four-year-old Garcia's right middle finger was cut off by his brother in a wood splitting accident, while the family was vacationing in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Garcia later confessed that he often used it to his advantage in his youth, showing it off to other children in his neighborhood.
Less than a year after this incident his father died in a fly fishing accident when the family was vacationing near Arcata in Northern California. He slipped after entering the Trinity River, part of the Six Rivers National Forest, and drowned before other fishermen could reach him. Although Garcia claimed he saw the incident, Dennis McNally, author of the book A Long Strange Trip: The Inside Story of the Grateful Dead, argues Garcia formed the memory after hearing others repeat the story. Blair Jackson, who wrote Garcia: An American Life, notes that a local newspaper article describing Jose's death did not mention Jerry being present when he died.
Excelsior District
Following his father's death, Garcia's mother Ruth took over her husband's bar, buying out his partner for full ownership. She began working full-time there, sending Jerry and his brother to live nearby with her parents, Tillie and William Clifford. During the five-year period in which he lived with his grandparents, Garcia enjoyed a large amount of autonomy and attended Monroe Elementary School. At the school, Garcia was greatly encouraged in his artistic abilities by his third grade teacher: through her, he discovered that "being a creative person was a viable possibility in life." According to Garcia, it was around this time that he was opened up to country and bluegrass music by his grandmother, whom he recalled enjoyed listening to the Grand Ole Opry. His elder brother, Clifford, however, staunchly believed the contrary, insisting that Garcia was "fantasizing all [that] ... she'd been to Opry, but she didn't listen to it on the radio." It was at this point that Garcia started playing the banjo, his first stringed instrument.
Menlo Park
In 1953, Garcia's mother married Wally Matusiewicz. Subsequently, Garcia and his brother moved back home with their mother and new stepfather. However, due to the roughneck reputation of their neighborhood at the time, Garcia's mother moved their family to Menlo Park. During their stay in Menlo Park, Garcia became acquainted with racism and antisemitism, things he disliked intensely. The same year, Garcia was also introduced to rock and roll and rhythm and blues by his brother, and enjoyed listening to Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, B. B. King, Hank Ballard, and, later, Chuck Berry. Clifford often memorized the vocals for his favorite songs, and would then make Garcia learn the harmony parts, a move to which Garcia later attributed much of his early ear training.
In mid-1957, Garcia began smoking cigarettes and was introduced to marijuana. Garcia would later reminisce about the first time he smoked marijuana: "Me and a friend of mine went up into the hills with two joints, the San Francisco foothills, and smoked these joints and just got so high and laughed and roared and went skipping down the streets doing funny things and just having a helluva time". During this time, Garcia also studied at what is now the San Francisco Art Institute. The teacher there was Wally Hedrick, an artist who came to prominence during the 1960s. During the classes, he often encouraged Garcia in his drawing and painting skills. Hedrick also introduced Garcia to the fiction of Jack Kerouac, whom Garcia later cited as a major influence.
San Francisco
In June, Garcia graduated from the local Menlo Oaks school. He then moved with his family back to San Francisco, where they lived in an apartment above the family bar, a newly built replacement for the original, that had been torn down to make way for a freeway entrance. Two months later, on Garcia's fifteenth birthday, his mother bought an accordion for him, to his great disappointment. Garcia had long been captivated by many rhythm and blues artists, especially Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, leaving him craving an electric guitar. After some pleading, his mother exchanged the accordion for a Danelectro with a small amplifier at a local pawnshop. Garcia's stepfather, who was somewhat proficient with instruments, helped tune his guitar to an unusual open tuning.
Cazadero
After a short stint at Denman Junior High School, Garcia attended tenth grade at Balboa High School in 1958, where he often got into trouble for skipping classes and fighting. Consequently, in 1959, Garcia's mother again moved the family to a safer environment, to Cazadero, a small town in Sonoma County, north of San Francisco. This turn of events did not sit well with Garcia, who had to travel by bus to Analy High School in Sebastopol, the nearest school. Garcia did, however, join a band at his school known as the Chords. After performing in and winning a contest, the band's reward was recording a song. They chose "Raunchy" by Bill Justis.
Recording career
Relocation and band beginnings
Garcia stole his mother's car in 1960, and was given the option of joining the United States Army in lieu of prison. He received basic training at Fort Ord. After training, he was transferred to Fort Winfield Scott in the Presidio of San Francisco. Garcia spent most of his time in the army at his leisure, missing roll call and accruing many counts of being AWOL. As a result, Garcia was given a general discharge on December 14, 1960.
In January 1961, Garcia drove down to East Palo Alto to see Laird Grant, an old friend from middle school. He had bought a 1950 Cadillac sedan from a cook in the army, which barely made it to Grant's residence before it broke down. Garcia spent the next few weeks sleeping where friends would allow, eventually using his car as a home. Through Grant, Garcia met Dave McQueen in February, who, after hearing Garcia perform some blues music, introduced him to local people and to the Chateau, a rooming house located near Stanford University which was then a popular hangout.
On February 20, 1961, Garcia got into a car with Paul Speegle, a sixteen-year-old artist and acquaintance of Garcia; Lee Adams, the house manager of the Chateau and driver of the car; and Alan Trist, a companion of theirs. After speeding past the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital, the driver encountered a curve and, speeding around , crashed into the guard rail, sending the car rolling turbulently. Garcia was hurled through the windshield of the car into a nearby field with such force he was literally thrown out of his shoes and would later be unable to recall the ejection. Lee Adams, the driver, and Alan Trist, who was seated in the back, were thrown from the car as well, suffering from abdominal injuries and a spine fracture, respectively. Garcia escaped with a broken collarbone, while Speegle, still in the car, was fatally injured.
Lee's reckless driving and crash served as an awakening for Garcia, who later commented: "That's where my life began. Before then I was always living at less than capacity. I was idling. That was the slingshot for the rest of my life. It was like a second chance. Then I got serious". It was at this time that Garcia began to realize that he needed to begin playing the guitar in earnest—a move which meant giving up his love of drawing and painting.
In April 1961, Garcia first met Robert Hunter, who would become a long-time friend of and lyricist for the Grateful Dead, collaborating principally with Garcia. The two involved themselves in the South Bay and San Francisco art and music scenes, sometimes playing at Menlo Park's Kepler's Books. Garcia performed his first concert with Hunter, each earning five dollars. Garcia and Hunter also played in bands (the Wildwood Boys and the Hart Valley Drifters) with David Nelson, who would later play with Garcia in the New Riders of the Purple Sage and contribute to several Grateful Dead album songs.
In 1962, Garcia met Phil Lesh, the eventual bassist of the Grateful Dead, during a party in Menlo Park's bohemian Perry Lane neighborhood (where author Ken Kesey lived). Lesh would later write in his autobiography that Garcia reminded him of pictures he had seen of the composer Claude Debussy, with his "dark, curly hair, goatee, Impressionist eyes". While attending another party in Palo Alto, Lesh approached Garcia to suggest they record Garcia on Lesh's tape recorder and produce a radio show for the progressive, community-supported Berkeley radio station KPFA. Using an old Wollensak tape recorder, they recorded "Matty Groves" and "The Long Black Veil", among several other tunes. The recordings became a central feature of a 90-minute KPFA special broadcast, "The Long Black Veil and Other Ballads: An Evening with Jerry Garcia". The link between KPFA and the Grateful Dead continues to this day, having included many fundraisers, interviews, live concert broadcasts, taped band performances and all-day or all-weekend "Dead-only" marathons.
Garcia soon began playing and teaching acoustic guitar and banjo. One of Garcia's students was Bob Matthews, who later engineered many of the Grateful Dead's albums. Matthews attended Menlo-Atherton High School and was friends with Bob Weir, and on New Year's Eve 1963, he introduced Weir and Garcia.
Between 1962 and 1964, Garcia sang and performed mainly bluegrass, old-time, and folk music. One of the bands Garcia performed with was the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers, a bluegrass act. The group consisted of Garcia on guitar, banjo, vocals, and harmonica, Marshall Leicester on banjo, guitar, and vocals, and Dick Arnold on fiddle and vocals. Soon after this, Garcia, Weir, Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, and several of their friends formed a jug band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions. Around this time, the psychedelic drug LSD was gaining popularity. Garcia first began using LSD in 1964; later, when asked how it changed his life, he remarked: "Well, it changed everything [...] the effect was that it freed me because I suddenly realized that my little attempt at having a straight life and doing that was really a fiction and just wasn't going to work out. Luckily I wasn't far enough into it for it to be shattering or anything; it was like a realization that just made me feel immensely relieved."
In 1965, Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions evolved into the Warlocks, with the addition of Phil Lesh on bass guitar and Bill Kreutzmann on percussion. However, the band discovered that another group (which would later become the Velvet Underground) had recently selected the same name. In response, Garcia came up with "Grateful Dead" by opening a Funk & Wagnalls dictionary to an entry for "Grateful dead". The definition for "Grateful dead" was "a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". The band's first reaction was disapproval. Garcia later explained the group's reaction: "I didn't like it really, I just found it to be really powerful. [Bob] Weir didn't like it, [Bill] Kreutzmann didn't like it and nobody really wanted to hear about it." Despite their dislike of the name, it quickly spread by word of mouth, and soon became their official title.
Career with the Grateful Dead
Garcia served as lead guitarist, as well as one of the principal vocalists and songwriters of the Grateful Dead for its entire career. Garcia composed such songs as "Dark Star", "Franklin's Tower", and "Scarlet Begonias", among many others. Robert Hunter, an ardent collaborator with the band, wrote the lyrics to all but a few of Garcia's songs.
Garcia was well-noted for his "soulful extended guitar improvisations", which would frequently feature interplay between him and his fellow band members. His fame, as well as the band's, arguably rested on their ability to never play a song the same way twice. Often, Garcia would take cues from rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, remarking that "there are some [...] kinds of ideas that would really throw me if I had to create a harmonic bridge between all the things going on rhythmically with two drums and Phil [Lesh's] innovative bass playing. Weir's ability to solve that sort of problem is extraordinary. [...] Harmonically, I take a lot of my solo cues from Bob."
When asked to describe his approach to soloing, Garcia commented: "It keeps on changing. I still basically revolve around the melody and the way it's broken up into phrases as I perceive them. With most solos, I tend to play something that phrases the way the melody does; my phrases may be more dense or have different value, but they'll occur in the same places in the song. [...]"
Garcia and the band toured almost constantly from their formation in 1965 until Garcia's death in 1995. Periodically, there were breaks due to exhaustion or health problems, often due to Garcia's drug use. During their three-decade span, the Grateful Dead played 2,314 shows.
Garcia's guitar-playing was eclectic. He melded elements from the various kinds of music that influenced him. Echoes of bluegrass playing (such as Arthur Smith and Doc Watson) could be heard. There was also early rock (like Lonnie Mack, James Burton, and Chuck Berry), contemporary blues (Freddie King and Lowell Fulsom), country and western (Roy Nichols and Don Rich), and jazz (Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt) to be heard in Garcia's style. Don Rich was the sparkling country guitar player in Buck Owens's "the Buckaroos" band of the 1960s, but besides Rich's style, both Garcia's pedal steel guitar playing (on Grateful Dead records and others) and his standard electric guitar work, were influenced by another of Owens's Buckaroos of that time, pedal steel player Tom Brumley. And as an improvisational soloist, John Coltrane was one of his greatest personal and musical influences.
Garcia later described his playing style as having "descended from barroom rock and roll, country guitar. Just 'cause that's where all my stuff comes from. It's like that blues instrumental stuff that was happening in the late Fifties and early Sixties, like Freddie King." Garcia's style could vary with the song being played and the instrument he was using, but his playing had a number of so-called "signatures". Among these were lead lines based on rhythmic triplets (examples include the songs "Good Morning Little School Girl", "New Speedway Boogie", "Brokedown Palace", "Deal", "Loser", "Truckin'", "That's It for the Other One", "U.S. Blues", "Sugaree", and "Don't Ease Me In").
Side projects
In addition to the Grateful Dead, Garcia had numerous side projects, the most notable being the Jerry Garcia Band. He was also involved with various acoustic projects such as Old & In the Way and other bluegrass bands, including collaborations with noted bluegrass mandolinist David Grisman. The documentary film Grateful Dawg, co-produced by Gillian Grisman and former NBC producer Pamela Hamilton chronicles the deep, long-term friendship between Garcia and Grisman. When Garcia and Grisman released Not For Kids Only, Hamilton produced their interview and concert for NBC. After several years of producing stories on the Grateful Dead and band members' side projects, Hamilton interviewed Bob Weir for a feature on Garcia's death marking the end of an era.
Other groups of which Garcia was a member at one time or another include the Black Mountain Boys, Legion of Mary, Reconstruction, and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. Garcia was also a fan of jazz artists and improvisation: he played with jazz keyboardists Merl Saunders and Howard Wales for many years in various groups and jam sessions, and he appeared on saxophonist Ornette Coleman's 1988 album, Virgin Beauty. His collaboration with Merl Saunders and Muruga Booker on the world music album Blues From the Rainforest launched the Rainforest Band.
Garcia also spent a lot of time in the recording studio helping out fellow musician friends in session work, often adding guitar, vocals, pedal steel, sometimes banjo and piano and even producing. He played on over 50 studio albums, the styles of which were eclectic and varied, including bluegrass, rock, folk, blues, country, jazz, electronic music, gospel, funk, and reggae. Artists who sought Garcia's help included the likes of Jefferson Airplane (most notably Surrealistic Pillow, Garcia being listed as their "spiritual advisor"). Garcia himself recalled in a mid-1967 interview that he'd played the high lead on "Today," played on "Plastic Fantastic Lover" and "Comin' Back to Me" on that album. Others include Tom Fogerty, David Bromberg, Robert Hunter (Liberty, on Relix Records), Paul Pena, Peter Rowan, Warren Zevon, Country Joe McDonald, Pete Sears, Ken Nordine, Ornette Coleman, Bruce Hornsby, Bob Dylan, It's a Beautiful Day, and many more. In 1995 Garcia played on three tracks for the CD Blue Incantation by guitarist Sanjay Mishra, making it his last studio collaboration.
Throughout the early 1970s, Garcia, Lesh, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, and David Crosby collaborated intermittently with MIT-educated composer and biologist Ned Lagin on several projects in the realm of early ambient music; these include the album Seastones (released by the Ned Lagin on the Round Records subsidiary) and L, an unfinished dance work composed by Ned Lagin. In 1970, Garcia participated in the soundtrack for the film Zabriskie Point.
Garcia also played pedal steel guitar for fellow-San Francisco musicians New Riders of the Purple Sage from their initial dates in 1969 to October 1971, when increased commitments with the Dead forced him to opt out of the group. He appears as a band member on their debut album New Riders of the Purple Sage, and produced Home, Home on the Road, a 1974 live album by the band. He also contributed pedal steel guitar to the enduring hit "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. Garcia also played steel guitar licks on Brewer & Shipley's 1970 album Tarkio. Despite considering himself a novice on the pedal steel, Garcia routinely ranked high in player polls. After a long lapse from playing the pedal steel, he played it once more during several of the Dead's concerts with Bob Dylan in the summer of 1987.
In 1988, Garcia agreed to perform at several major benefits including the "Soviet American Peace Walk" concert at the Band Shell, in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, that drew 25,000 people. He was asked to play by longtime friend and fellow musician, Pete Sears, who played piano with all the bands that day, and also procured all the other musicians. Garcia, Mickey Hart and Steve Parish played the show, then were given a police escort to a Grateful Dead show across the bay later that night. Garcia also played with Nick Gravenites and Pete Sears at a benefit given for Vietnam Veteran and peace activist Brian Willson, who lost both legs below the knee when he attempted to block a train carrying weapons to military dictatorships in El Salvador.
Having previously studied at the San Francisco Art Institute as a teenager, Garcia embarked on a second career in the visual arts in the late 1980s. He created a number of drawings, etchings, and water colors. Garcia's artistic endeavors were represented by the Weir Gallery in Berkeley, California from 1989 to 1996. During this period, Roberta Weir (unrelated to Garcia's bandmate Bob Weir) provided Garcia with new art techniques to use, sponsored his first solo show in 1990, and prepared blank etching plates for him to draw on. These would then be processed and printed by gallery staff and brought back to Garcia for approval and signature, usually with a passing of stacks of paper backstage at a Dead show. His annual shows at the Weir Gallery garnered much attention, leading to further shows in New York and other cities. Garcia was an early adopter of digital art media; his artistic style was as varied as his musical output, and he carried small notebooks for pen and ink sketches wherever he toured. Roberta Weir continues to maintain an archive of the artwork of Jerry Garcia. Perhaps the most widely seen pieces of Jerry Garcia's art are the many editions of men's neckties produced by Stonehenge Ltd. and Mulberry Neckware. Some began as etchings, other designs came from his drawings, paintings, and digital art. Garcia's artwork has since expanded into everything from hotel rooms, wet suits, men's sport shirts, a women's wear line, boxer shorts, hair accessories, cummerbunds, silk scarves and wool rugs.
Personal life
Garcia met his first wife, Sara Ruppenthal, in 1963. She was working at the coffee house in the back of Kepler's Books, where Garcia, Hunter, and Nelson regularly performed. They married on April 23, 1963, and on December 8 of that year their daughter Heather was born.
Carolyn Adams, a Merry Prankster also known as "Mountain Girl" or "M.G.," had a daughter, Sunshine, with Ken Kesey. Mountain Girl married another Prankster, George Walker, but they soon separated. She and Sunshine then moved into 710 Ashbury with Garcia in late 1966 where they would ultimately live together until 1975. In 1994, Sara and Jerry officially divorced after a long separation. Adams gave birth to Garcia's second and third daughters, Annabelle Walker Garcia (February 2, 1970) and Theresa Adams "Trixie" Garcia (September 21, 1974).
In August 1970, Garcia's mother Ruth was involved in a car crash near Twin Peaks in San Francisco. Garcia, who was recording the album American Beauty at the time, often left the sessions to visit his mother with his brother Clifford. She died on September 28, 1970.
In the midst of a March 1973 Grateful Dead engagement at Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, Garcia met Deborah Koons, an aspiring filmmaker from a wealthy Cincinnati, Ohio-based family who would much later marry him and become his widow. After a brief correspondence, he began his relationship with her in mid-1974. This gradually strained his relationship with Adams and culminated in Garcia leaving Adams for Koons in late 1975. The end of his relationship with Koons in 1977 precipitated a brief reconciliation with Adams, including the reestablishment of their household. However, she did not agree with the guitarist's persistent use of narcotics and moved with the children to the Eugene, Oregon area, living near Kesey, in 1978.
Following Adams' departure, Garcia had an affair with Amy Moore. She was a Kentucky-born member of the extended "Grateful Dead family", and the mistress of Texas oil heir Roy Cullen. Their affair lasted circa 1980–1981, and inspired the Garcia-Hunter song "Run for the Roses."
Adams and Garcia were married on December 31, 1981, largely as a result of mutual tax exigencies. Despite the legal codification of their union, she remained in Oregon, while Garcia continued to live near the Grateful Dead's offices in San Rafael, California. Garcia lived with a variety of housemates, including longtime Grateful Dead employee and Jerry Garcia Band manager Rock Scully. Scully, who co-managed the Grateful Dead throughout the mid-to-late 1960s before serving as the band's "advance man" and publicist, was dismissed by the group in 1984 for enabling Garcia's addictions and for allegedly embezzling the Garcia Band's profits. Another housemate was Nora Sage, a Deadhead who became Garcia's housekeeper while studying at the Golden Gate University School of Law. The exact nature of their relationship remains unclear, although it is believed to have been platonic due to Garcia's addictions. She later became his art representative.
While they would briefly reunite following his diabetic coma, Garcia and Adams ultimately divorced in 1994. Phil Lesh has subsequently stated that he rarely saw Adams on any of the band tours. In a 1991 Rolling Stone interview, Garcia stated that "we haven't really lived together since the Seventies".
During the autumn of 1978, Garcia developed a friendship with Shimer College student Manasha Matheson, an artist and music enthusiast. They remained friends over the following nine years before initiating a romantic relationship in Hartford, Connecticut on the Grateful Dead's spring 1987 tour. Jerry and Manasha became parents with the birth of their daughter, Keelin Noel Garcia, on December 20, 1987. On August 17, 1990, Jerry and Manasha married at their San Anselmo, California home in a spiritual ceremony free of legal convention. In 1991, Garcia expressed his delight in finding the time to "actually be a father" to Keelin in contrast to his past relationships with his children. A year later, Garcia dedicated his first art book, Paintings, Drawings and Sketches, "For Manasha, with love, Jerry."
In January 1993, Barbara "Brigid" Meier, a former girlfriend from the early 1960s, reentered Garcia's life for a brief period. Meier claimed, Garcia had considered her to be the "love of his life" and proposed to her during a Hawaiian vacation shortly after their relationship recommenced. Garcia's "love of his life" sentiment was not reserved for one lover, as he expressed the same feelings to several other women in his life. At Garcia's 1995 funeral, Koons declared that she was "the love of his life" while paying her final respects, whereupon Meier and Ruppenthal, who were both in attendance, simultaneously exclaimed, "He said that to me!"
The affair with Meier marked the breakup of Jerry's family life with Manasha and Keelin. Garcia ended the affair with Meier forty-five days later while on tour in Chicago with the Grateful Dead after she confronted him about his drug use.
Shortly thereafter, Garcia renewed his acquaintance with Deborah Koons in the spring of 1993. They married on February 14, 1994, in Sausalito, California. Garcia and Koons were married at the time of his death.
Lifestyle and health
Because of their public profile, Garcia and his collaborators were occasionally singled out in the American government's war on drugs. On October 2, 1967, 710 Ashbury Street in San Francisco (where the Grateful Dead had taken up residence the year before) was raided after a police tip-off. Grateful Dead members Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Ron "Pigpen" McKernan were apprehended on marijuana charges which were later dropped, although Garcia himself was not arrested. The following year, Garcia's picture was used in a defamatory context in a campaign commercial for Richard Nixon.
Most of the band were arrested again in January 1970, after they flew to New Orleans from Hawaii. After returning to their hotel from a performance, the band checked into their rooms, only to be quickly raided by police. Approximately fifteen people were arrested on the spot, including many of the road crew, management, and nearly all of the Grateful Dead except for Garcia, who arrived later, outgoing keyboardist Tom Constanten, who abstained from all drugs as a member of the Church of Scientology, and McKernan, who eschewed illegal drugs in favor of alcohol.
According to Bill Kreutzmann, the band's use of cocaine accelerated throughout the early 1970s. After using heroin in a brothel in 1974 (likely on the band's second European tour), Garcia was introduced to a smokeable form of the drug (initially advertised as refined opium) colloquially known as "Persian" or "Persian Base" during the group's 1975 hiatus. Influenced by the stresses of creating and releasing The Grateful Dead Movie and the acrimonious collapse of the band's independent record labels over the next two years, Garcia became increasingly dependent upon both substances. These factors, combined with the alcohol and drug abuse of several other members of the Grateful Dead, resulted in a turbulent atmosphere. By 1978, the band's chemistry began "cracking and crumbling", resulting in poor group cohesion. As a result, Keith and Donna Jean Godchaux left the band in February 1979.
With the addition of keyboardist/vocalist Brent Mydland that year amid the ongoing coalescence of the Deadhead subculture, the band reached new commercial heights as a touring group on the American arena circuit in the early 1980s, enabling them to forsake studio recording for several years. Nevertheless, this was offset by such factors as the band's atypically large payroll and Garcia's $700-a-day () drug addiction, resulting in the guitarist taking on a frenetic slate of solo touring outside of the Grateful Dead's rigorous schedule, including abbreviated acoustic duo concerts with Jerry Garcia Band bassist John Kahn that were widely rumored to be a funding conduit for their respective addictions.
Though things seemed to be getting better for the band, Garcia's health was declining. By 1983, Garcia's demeanor onstage had appeared to change. Despite still playing the guitar with great passion and intensity, there were times that he would appear disengaged; as such, shows were often inconsistent. Years of heavy tobacco smoking had affected his voice, and he gained considerable weight. By 1984, he would often rest his chin on the microphone during performances. The so-called "endless tour"—the result of years of financial risks, drug use, and poor business decisions—had taken its toll.
Garcia's decade-long heroin addiction culminated in the rest of the band holding an intervention in January 1985. Given the choice between the band or the drugs, Garcia agreed to check into a rehabilitation center in Oakland, California. A few days later in January, before the start of his program in Oakland, Garcia was arrested for drug possession in Golden Gate Park; he subsequently attended a drug diversion program. Throughout 1985, he tapered his drug use on tour and at home with the assistance of Nora Sage; by the spring of 1986, he was completely abstinent.
Precipitated by an unhealthy weight, dehydration, bad eating habits, and a recent relapse on the Grateful Dead's first stadium tour, Garcia collapsed into a diabetic coma in July 1986, waking up five days later. He later spoke about this period of unconsciousness as surreal: "Well, I had some very weird experiences. My main experience was one of furious activity and tremendous struggle in a sort of futuristic, space-ship vehicle with insectoid presences. After I came out of my coma, I had this image of myself as these little hunks of protoplasm that were stuck together kind of like stamps with perforations between them that you could snap off." Garcia's coma had a profound effect on him: it forced him to have to relearn how to play the guitar, as well as other, more basic skills. Within a handful of months, he had recovered, playing with the Jerry Garcia Band and the Grateful Dead again later that year.
After Garcia's recovery, the band released a comeback album In the Dark in 1987, which became their best-selling studio album. Inspired by Garcia's improved health, a successful album and the continuing emergence of Mydland as a third frontman, the band's energy and chemistry reached a new peak in the late 1980s.
Amid a litany of personal problems, Mydland died of a speedball overdose in July 1990. His death greatly affected Garcia, leading him to believe that the band's chemistry would never be the same. Before beginning the fall tour, the band acquired keyboardists Vince Welnick and Bruce Hornsby. The power of Hornsby's performances drove Garcia to new heights on stage. However, as the band continued through 1991, Garcia became concerned with the band's future. He was exhausted from five straight years of touring. He thought a break was necessary, mainly so that the band could come back with fresh material. The idea was put off by the pressures of management, and the touring continued. Garcia began using heroin again after several years of intermittent prescription opiate use. Though his relapse was brief, the band was quick to react. Soon after the last show of the tour in Denver, Garcia was confronted by the band with another intervention. After a disastrous meeting, Garcia invited Phil Lesh over to his home in San Rafael, California, where he explained that after the meeting he would start attending a methadone clinic. Garcia said that he wanted to clean up in his own way, and return to making music.
After returning from the band's 1992 summer tour, Garcia became sick, a throwback to his diabetic coma in 1986. Manasha Garcia nursed Jerry back to health and organized a team of health professionals which included acupuncturist Yen Wei Choong and Randy Baker, MD, a holistic family physician to treat him at home. Garcia recovered over the following days, despite the Grateful Dead having to cancel their fall tour to allow him time to recuperate. Garcia reduced his cigarette smoking and began losing weight. He also became a vegetarian.
Despite these improvements, Garcia's physical and mental condition continued to decline throughout 1993 and 1994. He began to use narcotics again to dull the pain.
In light of his second drug relapse and current condition, Garcia checked himself into the Betty Ford Center during July 1995. His stay was limited, lasting only two weeks. Motivated by the experience, he then checked into the Serenity Knolls treatment center in Forest Knolls, California, where he died.
Death
Garcia died in his room at the rehabilitation clinic on August 9, 1995. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes—all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that, upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb. I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former pro basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred two of Garcia's former wives from the ceremony.
On August 13, about 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Haight-Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn.
On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes.
Musical equipment
Garcia played many guitars during his career, which ranged from student and budget models to custom-made instruments. During his thirty-five year career as a professional musician, Garcia used about 25 guitars.
In 1965, when Garcia was playing with the Warlocks, he used a Guild Starfire, which he also used on the début album of the Grateful Dead. Beginning in late 1967 and ending in 1968, Garcia played black or gold mid-1950s Gibson Les Paul guitars with P-90 pickups. In 1969, he picked up the Gibson SG and used it for most of that year and 1970, except for a small period in between where he used a sunburst Fender Stratocaster.
During Garcia's "pedal steel flirtation period" (as Bob Weir referred to it in Anthem to Beauty), from approximately 1969 to 1972, he initially played a Fender instrument before upgrading to the ZB Custom D-10, especially in his earlier public performances. Although this was a double neck guitar, Garcia used the "E9 neck and the three pedals to raise the tone and two levers to lower it." He employed an Emmons D-10 at the Grateful Dead's and New Riders of the Purple Sage's final appearances at the Fillmore East in April 1971.
In 1969, Garcia played pedal steel on three notable outside recordings: the track "The Farm" on the Jefferson Airplane album Volunteers, the track "Oh Mommy" by Brewer and Shipley and the hit single "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young from their album Déjà Vu, released in 1970. Garcia played on the latter album in exchange for harmony lessons for the Grateful Dead, who were at the time recording Workingman's Dead.
In 1971, Garcia began playing a sunburst Les Paul. In March and April 1971 – the time period during which the Grateful Dead recorded its second live album, Grateful Dead – Garcia played the "Peanut," a guitar he had received from Rick Turner, who had custom built the guitar's body and incorporated the neck, pickups, and hardware from an early '60s Les Paul.
In May, Garcia began using a 1957 natural finish Stratocaster that had been given to him by Graham Nash. Garcia added an alligator sticker to the pickguard in the fall of that year. "Alligator" would remain Garcia's principal electric guitar until August 1973.
In the summer of 1971, Garcia also played a double-cutaway Les Paul TV Junior.
While Alligator was in the shop in the summer of 1972, he briefly reverted to the sunburst Stratocaster; this can be seen in Sunshine Daydream.
In late 1972, Garcia purchased the first guitar ("Eagle") made by Alembic luthier Doug Irwin for $850 (). Enamored of Irwin's talents, he immediately commissioned his own custom instrument. This guitar, nicknamed "Wolf" for a memorable sticker Garcia added below the tailpiece, was delivered in May 1973 and replaced Alligator on stage in September. It cost $1,500 (), an extremely high price for the era.
Wolf was made with an ebony fingerboard and featured numerous embellishments like alternating grain designs in the headstock, ivory inlays, and fret marker dots made of sterling silver. The body was composed of western maple wood which had a core of purpleheart. Garcia later had Irwin (who ultimately left Alembic to start his own business) replace the electronics inside the guitar, at which point he added his own logo to the headstock alongside the Alembic logo. The system included two interchangeable plates for configuring pickups: one was made for strictly single coils, while the other accommodated humbuckers. Shortly after receiving the modified instrument, Garcia commissioned another custom guitar from Irwin with one caveat: "Don't hold back."
During the Grateful Dead's 1974 European tour, Wolf was dropped on several occasions, one of which caused a minor crack in the headstock. Following filming of The Grateful Dead Movie (in which the guitar is prominently visible) a month later, Garcia returned it to Irwin for repairs. Throughout its absence, Garcia predominantly played several Travis Bean guitars, including the TB1000A (1975) and the TB500 (1976-1977). On September 28, 1977, Irwin delivered the refurbished Wolf back to Garcia. The wolf sticker which gave the guitar its name had now been inlaid into the instrument; it also featured an effects loop between the pick-ups and controls (so inline effects would "see" the same signal at all times) which was bypassable. Irwin also put a new face on the headstock with only his logo (he later claimed to have built the guitar himself, though pictures through time clearly show the progression of logos, from Alembic, to Alembic & Irwin, to only Irwin).
Nearly seven years after he commissioned it, Garcia received his second custom guitar ("Tiger") from Irwin in the summer of 1979.
He first employed the instrument in concert at a Grateful Dead performance at the Oakland Auditorium Arena on August 4, 1979. Its name was derived from the inlay on the preamp cover.
The body of Tiger was of rich quality: the top layer was cocobolo, with the preceding layers being maple stripe, vermilion, and flame maple, in that order. The neck was made of western maple with an ebony fingerboard. The pickups consisted of a single coil DiMarzio SDS-1 and two humbucker DiMarzio Super IIs which were easily removable due to Garcia's preference for replacing his pickups every year or two. The electronics were composed of an effects bypass loop, which allowed Garcia to control the sound of his effects through the tone and volume controls on the guitar, and a preamplifier/buffer which rested behind a plate in the back of the guitar. Fully outfitted, Tiger weighed . This was Garcia's principal guitar for the next eleven years, and most played.
In the late 1980s Garcia, Weir and CSN (along with many others) endorsed Alvarez Yairi acoustic guitars. There are many photographs circulating (mostly promotional) of Garcia playing a DY99 Virtuoso Custom with a Modulus Graphite neck. He opted to play with the less decorated model but the promotional photo from the Alvarez Yairi catalog has him holding the "tree of life" model. This hand-built guitar was notable for the collaboration between Japanese luthier Kazuo Yairi and Modulus Graphite of San Rafael. As with most things Garcia, with his passing, the DY99 model is highly valued among collectors.
In 1990, Irwin completed "Rosebud", Garcia's fourth custom guitar. It was similar to his previous guitar Tiger in many respects, but featured different inlays and electronics, tone and volume controls, and weight. Rosebud, unlike Tiger, was configured with three humbuckers; the neck and bridge pickups shared a tone control, while the middle had its own. Atop the guitar was a Roland GK-2 pickup which fed the controller set inside the guitar. The GK2 was used in junction with the Roland GR-50 rack mount synthesizer. The GR-50 synthesizer in turn drove a Korg M1R synthesizer producing the MIDI effects heard during live performances of this period as heard on the Grateful Dead recording Without a Net. Sections of the guitar were hollowed out to bring the weight down to . The inlay, a dancing skeleton holding a rose, covers a plate just below the bridge. The final cost of the instrument was $11,000 ().
In 1993, carpenter-turned-luthier Stephen Cripe tried his hand at making an instrument for Garcia. After researching Tiger through pictures and films, Cripe set out on what would soon become known as "Lightning Bolt", again named for its inlay.
The guitar used Brazilian rosewood for the fingerboard and East Indian rosewood for the body, which, with admitted irony from Cripe, had been taken from a 19th-century bed used by opium smokers. Built purely from guesswork, Lightning Bolt was a hit with Garcia, who began using the guitar exclusively. Soon after, Garcia requested that Cripe build a backup of the guitar. Cripe, who had not measured or photographed the original, was told simply to "wing it."
Cripe later delivered the backup, which was known by the name "Top Hat". Garcia bought it from him for $6,500, making it the first guitar that Cripe had ever sold. However, infatuated with Lightning Bolt, Garcia rarely used the backup.
After Garcia's death, the ownership of Wolf and Tiger came into question. According to Garcia's will, his guitars were bequeathed to Doug Irwin, who had constructed them.
The remaining Grateful Dead members disagreed – they considered his guitars to be property of the band, leading to a lawsuit between the two parties. In 2001, Irwin won the case. However, nearly having been left destitute from a traffic accident in 1998, he decided to place the guitars up for auction in hopes of being able to start another guitar workshop.
On May 8, 2002, Wolf and Tiger, among other memorabilia, were placed for auction at Studio 54 in New York City. Tiger was sold for $957,500, and Wolf for $789,500. Together, the pair sold for $1.74 million, setting a new world record. Wolf went into in the private collection of Daniel Pritzker who kept it in a secure climate controlled room in a private residence at Utica, N.Y. Tiger went to the private collection of Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.
In May 2017, Wolf was again auctioned, but this time for charity. Pritzker decided to sell the guitar and donate all proceeds to the Montgomery, Alabama based Southern Poverty Law Center.
Brian Halligan placed the winning bid totaling $1.9M.
For the majority of 2019 Wolf and Tiger were included in the Play it Loud exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. On June 23, 2019 John Mayer played Wolf with Dead & Co. at Citi Field.
Legacy
Garcia was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Grateful Dead in 1994. He declined to attend the ceremony; the band jokingly brought a cardboard cutout of Garcia out on stage in his absence.
In 1987, Vermont ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's introduced their Cherry Garcia flavor dedicated to him. It was the first ice cream flavor dedicated to a musician.
In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Jerry Garcia 13th in their list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
According to fellow Bay Area guitar player Henry Kaiser, Garcia is "the most recorded guitarist in history. With more than 2,200 Grateful Dead concerts, and 1,000 Jerry Garcia Band concerts captured on tape – as well as numerous studio sessions – there are about 15,000 hours of his guitar work preserved for the ages."
On July 30, 2004, Melvin Seals was the first Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) member to headline an outdoor music and camping festival called "The Grateful Garcia Gathering". Jerry Garcia Band drummer David Kemper joined Melvin Seals and JGB in 2007. Other musicians and friends of Garcia include Donna Jean Godchaux, Mookie Siegel, Pete Sears, G.E. Smith, Chuck Hammer, Barry Sless, Jackie Greene, Brian Lesh, Sanjay Mishra, and Mark Karan.
On July 21, 2005, the San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission passed a resolution to name the amphitheater in McLaren Park "The Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." The amphitheater is located in the Excelsior District, where Garcia grew up. The first show to happen at the Jerry Garcia Amphitheater was Jerry Day 2005 on August 7, 2005. Jerry's brother, Tiff Garcia, was the first person to welcome everybody to the "Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." Jerry Day is an annual celebration of Garcia in his childhood neighborhood. The dedication ceremony (Jerry Day 2) on October 29, 2005, was officiated by mayor Gavin Newsom.
On September 24, 2005, the Comes a Time: A Celebration of the Music & Spirit of Jerry Garcia tribute concert was held at the Hearst Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California. The concert featured Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, Bruce Hornsby, Trey Anastasio, Warren Haynes, Jimmy Herring, Michael Kang, Jay Lane, Jeff Chimenti, Mark Karan, Robin Sylvester, Kenny Brooks, Melvin Seals, Merl Saunders, Marty Holland, Stu Allen, Gloria Jones, and Jackie LaBranch.
Georgia-based composer Lee Johnson released an orchestral tribute to the music of the Grateful Dead, recorded with the Russian National Orchestra, entitled "Dead Symphony: Lee Johnson Symphony No. 6." Johnson was interviewed on NPR on the July 26, 2008 broadcast of Weekend Edition, and gave much credit to the genius and craft of Garcia's songwriting. A live performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Johnson himself, was held Friday, August 1.
In 2010 the Santa Barbara Bowl in California opened Jerry Garcia Glen along the walk up to the venue. There is a statue of Garcia's right hand along the way.
Seattle rock band Soundgarden wrote and recorded the instrumental song "Jerry Garcia's Finger", dedicated to the singer, which was released as a b-side with their single "Pretty Noose".
Numerous music festivals across the United States and Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK hold annual events in memory of Jerry Garcia.
On May 14, 2015, an all-star lineup held a tribute concert for Garcia at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. The event was called "Dear Jerry".
In 2015, Hunter and Garcia were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Hunter accepted the award along with Garcia's daughter, Trixie Garcia, who accepted on behalf of her father.
In 2015, Jerry Garcia's wife, Manasha Garcia and their daughter, Keelin Garcia launched The Jerry Garcia Foundation, a nonprofit charity that supports projects for artistic, environmental, and humanitarian causes. The Foundation's Board members are Bob Weir, Peter Shapiro, Glenn Fischer, Irwin Sternberg, Daniel Shiner, TRI Studios CEO, Christopher McCutcheon and Fender Music Foundation Executive Director,
Lynn Robison. Keelin Garcia said, "It is a tremendous honor to participate in nonprofit work that is in accordance with my father's values."
In 2018, Jerry Garcia family members, Keelin Garcia and Manasha Garcia launched the Jerry Garcia Music Arts independent music label.
On November 18, 2021, it was announced Jonah Hill would portray Garcia in a forthcoming Grateful Dead biopic written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski directed by Martin Scorsese for Apple TV+.
Discography
New Riders of the Purple Sage – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1971
Hooteroll? – Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia – 1971
Garcia – Jerry Garcia – 1972
Live at Keystone – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1973
Compliments – Jerry Garcia – 1974
Old & In the Way – Old & In the Way – 1975
Reflections – Jerry Garcia – 1976
Cats Under the Stars – Jerry Garcia Band – 1978
Run for the Roses – Jerry Garcia – 1982
Vintage NRPS – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1986
Keystone Encores – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1988
Almost Acoustic – Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band – 1988
Jerry Garcia / David Grisman – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1991
Jerry Garcia Band – Jerry Garcia Band – 1991
Not for Kids Only – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1993
Notes
References
Sources
External links
The official homepage of Jerry Garcia
Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jerry Garcia on Fretbase
The Jerry Site
Official Grateful Dead website
Jerry Garcia discography at deaddisc.com
Jerry Garcia autopsy
Jerry Day: A Civic and Cultural Celebration of Jerry Garcia held in San Francisco
FBI Records: The Vault - Jerry Garcia at vault.fbi.gov
Jerry Garcia's Army personnel file at the National Archives
TEAM
Garcia's Guitars & Gear Directory
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"Matthew 2:3 is the third verse of the second chapter of the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament. In the previous verse the magi had informed King Herod that they had seen portents showing the birth of the King of the Jews. In this verse he reacts to this news.\n\nContent\nIn the King James Version of the Bible the text reads:\nWhen Herod the king had heard these things, he \nwas troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.\n\nThe Novum Testamentum Graece text is:\nἀκούσας δὲ ὁ βασιλεὺς Ἡρῴδης\nἐταράχθη, καὶ πᾶσα Ἱεροσόλυμα μετ’ αὐτοῦ,\n\nAnalysis\nThat Herod should be troubled by the King of the Jews being born is not surprising. As an Edomite Herod was open to challenge from someone claiming to be the heir of King David, and the central theme of Matthew 1 is Jesus' Davidic status. Moreover, Herod was renowned for his paranoia, killing several of his own sons who threatened him.\n\nThat all Jerusalem is agitated also seems to conflict with later in the Gospel when the people are oblivious to Jesus. R. T. France suggests that the passage could perhaps be read as showing that the people of Jerusalem were troubled because of the possibility of Herod's wrath. Other scholars see this interpretation as being fairly implausible. Brown notes that this phrase originates in Exodus. There is a theory that this part of Matthew is heavily influenced by the story of Moses. In Exodus all Egypt is troubled by Moses, not just the Pharaoh. Thus in parallel all Jerusalem must also be troubled. This view was shared by St. Chrysostom.\n\nGundry sees this passage as influenced by the politics of the time it was written, a foreshadowing of the rejection of Jesus and his church by the leaders of Jerusalem. Paul L. Maier disagrees, \"If Matthew had concocted the account for such apologetic purposes, he failed quite miserably.\" R.T. France says \"The supposed parallel is far from exact.\"\n\nKeener argues that Matthew is contrasting the goodness of the pagan Magi against the residents of Jerusalem as part of his overall advocacy of Christian outreach beyond the Jewish community. Matthew challenges his reader's negative views of outsiders by contrasting these foreigners with the behaviour of those in Jerusalem. Levin believes the verse reflects Matthew's social critique against the wealthy and powerful city dwellers.\n\nGundry notes that this verse again makes sure to note Herod is a king. He sees this as an effort by the author of Matthew to create a deliberate contrast with Jesus, with Herod being the embodiment of all the things Jesus is not.\n\nCommentary from the Church Fathers\nAugustine: As the Magi seek a Redeemer, so Herod fears a successor.\n\nGlossa Ordinaria: The King, he is called, though in comparison with him whom they are seeking he is an alien and a foreigner.\n\nPseudo-Chrysostom: Herod was troubled when he heard that a King was born of Jewish lineage, lest, himself being an Idumæan, the kingdom should return again to native princes, and himself be expelled, and his seed after him. Great station is ever obnoxious to great fears, as the boughs of trees planted in high ground move when never so little wind blows, so high men are troubled with little rumours; while the lowly, like trees in the valley, remain at peace.\n\nAugustine: If His birth as an infant makes proud kings tremble, what will His tribunal as a Judge do? Let princes fear Him sitting at the right hand of His Father, whom this impious king feared while He hanged yet on His mother's breast.\n\nPope Leo I: Thou art troubled, Herod, without cause. Thy nature cannot contain Christ, nor is the Lord of the world content with the narrow bounds of thy dominion. He, whom thou wouldest not should reign in Judæa, reigns everywhere.\n\nGlossa Ordinaria: Perhaps he was troubled not on his own account, but for fear of the displeasure of the Romans. They would not allow the title of King or of God to any without their permission.\n\nGregory the Great: At the birth of a King of Heaven, a king of earth is troubled; surely, earthly greatness is confounded, when heavenly greatness shows itself.\n\nPope Leo I: Herod represents the Devil; who as he then instigated him, so now he unweariedly imitates him. For he is grieved by the calling of the Gentiles, and by the daily ruin of his power.\n\nPseudo-Chrysostom: Both have their own causes of jealousy, both fear a successor in their kingdom; Herod an earthly successor, the Devil a spiritual. Even Jerusalem is troubled, which should have rejoiced at that news, when a Jewish King was said to be risen up. But they were troubled, for the wicked cannot rejoice at the coming of the good. Or perhaps it was in fear that Herod should wreak his wrath against a Jewish King on his race.\n\nGlossa Ordinaria: Jerusalem was troubled with him, as willing to favour him whom it feared; the vulgar always pay undue honour to one who tyrannizes over it. Observe the diligence of his enquiry. If he should find him, he would do to him as he showed afterwards his disposition; if he should not, he would at least be excused to the Romans.\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\n02:03\nHerod the Great",
"\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer"
] |
[
"Jerry Garcia",
"Death",
"When was he found",
"August 9, 1995,",
"what time",
"4:23 am,",
"what was this close too",
"53rd birthday,",
"how close was this",
"eight days after",
"Where was he found at",
"Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic.",
"what was the cause of his death",
"The cause of death was a heart attack.",
"What was this from",
"Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction,",
"What else troubled him",
"weight problems, sleep apnea,"
] | C_a95583dc963548a79d885ace2c196575_0 | What else troubled him | 9 | Besides weight problems and sleep apnea, what else troubled Jerry Garcia? | Jerry Garcia | On August 9, 1995, at 4:23 am, eight days after his 53rd birthday, Garcia was found dead in his room at the rehabilitation clinic. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes--all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb; I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred Garcia's former wives from the ceremony. On August 13, approximately 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn. On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons, accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges River at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes. CANNOTANSWER | weight problems, sleep apnea, | Jerome John Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter, best known for being a principal songwriter, the lead guitarist and a vocalist with the rock band the Grateful Dead, of which he was a founding member and which came to prominence during the counterculture of the 1960s. Although he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader of the band.
As one of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead for their entire 30-year career (1965–1995). Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders–Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), the Jerry Garcia Band, Old & In the Way, the Garcia/Grisman and Garcia/Kahn acoustic duos, Legion of Mary, and New Riders of the Purple Sage (which he co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known for his distinctive guitar playing, and was ranked 13th in Rolling Stones "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time" cover story in 2003. In the 2015 version of the list he was ranked at #46.
Garcia was also renowned for his musical and technical ability, particularly his ability to play a variety of instruments and sustain long improvisations with the Grateful Dead. Garcia believed that improvisation took stress away from his playing and allowed him to make spur of the moment decisions that he would not have made intentionally. In an interview with Rolling Stone, Garcia noted that "my own preferences are for improvisation, for making it up as I go along. The idea of picking, of eliminating possibilities by deciding, that's difficult for me". Originating from the days of the "acid tests", these improvisations were a form of exploration rather than playing a song already written.
Later in life, Garcia struggled with diabetes and in 1986, went into a diabetic coma that nearly cost him his life. Although his overall health improved somewhat after that, he continued to struggle with obesity, smoking, and longstanding heroin and cocaine addictions. He was staying in a California drug rehabilitation facility when he died of a heart attack on August 9, 1995, at the age of 53.
Early life
Garcia's ancestors on his father's side were from Galicia in northwest Spain. His mother's ancestors were Irish and Swedish. He was born in the Excelsior District of San Francisco, California, on August 1, 1942, to Jose Ramon "Joe" Garcia and Ruth Marie "Bobbie" (née Clifford) Garcia, who was herself born in San Francisco. His parents named him after composer Jerome Kern. Jerome John was their second child, preceded by Clifford Ramon "Tiff", who was born in 1937. Shortly before Clifford's birth, their father and a partner leased a building in downtown San Francisco and turned it into a bar, partly in response to Jose being blackballed from a musicians' union for moonlighting.
Garcia was influenced by music at an early age, taking piano lessons for much of his childhood. His father was a retired professional musician and his mother enjoyed playing the piano. His father's extended family—which had immigrated from Spain in 1919—would often sing during reunions.
In 1946, two-thirds of four-year-old Garcia's right middle finger was cut off by his brother in a wood splitting accident, while the family was vacationing in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Garcia later confessed that he often used it to his advantage in his youth, showing it off to other children in his neighborhood.
Less than a year after this incident his father died in a fly fishing accident when the family was vacationing near Arcata in Northern California. He slipped after entering the Trinity River, part of the Six Rivers National Forest, and drowned before other fishermen could reach him. Although Garcia claimed he saw the incident, Dennis McNally, author of the book A Long Strange Trip: The Inside Story of the Grateful Dead, argues Garcia formed the memory after hearing others repeat the story. Blair Jackson, who wrote Garcia: An American Life, notes that a local newspaper article describing Jose's death did not mention Jerry being present when he died.
Excelsior District
Following his father's death, Garcia's mother Ruth took over her husband's bar, buying out his partner for full ownership. She began working full-time there, sending Jerry and his brother to live nearby with her parents, Tillie and William Clifford. During the five-year period in which he lived with his grandparents, Garcia enjoyed a large amount of autonomy and attended Monroe Elementary School. At the school, Garcia was greatly encouraged in his artistic abilities by his third grade teacher: through her, he discovered that "being a creative person was a viable possibility in life." According to Garcia, it was around this time that he was opened up to country and bluegrass music by his grandmother, whom he recalled enjoyed listening to the Grand Ole Opry. His elder brother, Clifford, however, staunchly believed the contrary, insisting that Garcia was "fantasizing all [that] ... she'd been to Opry, but she didn't listen to it on the radio." It was at this point that Garcia started playing the banjo, his first stringed instrument.
Menlo Park
In 1953, Garcia's mother married Wally Matusiewicz. Subsequently, Garcia and his brother moved back home with their mother and new stepfather. However, due to the roughneck reputation of their neighborhood at the time, Garcia's mother moved their family to Menlo Park. During their stay in Menlo Park, Garcia became acquainted with racism and antisemitism, things he disliked intensely. The same year, Garcia was also introduced to rock and roll and rhythm and blues by his brother, and enjoyed listening to Ray Charles, John Lee Hooker, B. B. King, Hank Ballard, and, later, Chuck Berry. Clifford often memorized the vocals for his favorite songs, and would then make Garcia learn the harmony parts, a move to which Garcia later attributed much of his early ear training.
In mid-1957, Garcia began smoking cigarettes and was introduced to marijuana. Garcia would later reminisce about the first time he smoked marijuana: "Me and a friend of mine went up into the hills with two joints, the San Francisco foothills, and smoked these joints and just got so high and laughed and roared and went skipping down the streets doing funny things and just having a helluva time". During this time, Garcia also studied at what is now the San Francisco Art Institute. The teacher there was Wally Hedrick, an artist who came to prominence during the 1960s. During the classes, he often encouraged Garcia in his drawing and painting skills. Hedrick also introduced Garcia to the fiction of Jack Kerouac, whom Garcia later cited as a major influence.
San Francisco
In June, Garcia graduated from the local Menlo Oaks school. He then moved with his family back to San Francisco, where they lived in an apartment above the family bar, a newly built replacement for the original, that had been torn down to make way for a freeway entrance. Two months later, on Garcia's fifteenth birthday, his mother bought an accordion for him, to his great disappointment. Garcia had long been captivated by many rhythm and blues artists, especially Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley, leaving him craving an electric guitar. After some pleading, his mother exchanged the accordion for a Danelectro with a small amplifier at a local pawnshop. Garcia's stepfather, who was somewhat proficient with instruments, helped tune his guitar to an unusual open tuning.
Cazadero
After a short stint at Denman Junior High School, Garcia attended tenth grade at Balboa High School in 1958, where he often got into trouble for skipping classes and fighting. Consequently, in 1959, Garcia's mother again moved the family to a safer environment, to Cazadero, a small town in Sonoma County, north of San Francisco. This turn of events did not sit well with Garcia, who had to travel by bus to Analy High School in Sebastopol, the nearest school. Garcia did, however, join a band at his school known as the Chords. After performing in and winning a contest, the band's reward was recording a song. They chose "Raunchy" by Bill Justis.
Recording career
Relocation and band beginnings
Garcia stole his mother's car in 1960, and was given the option of joining the United States Army in lieu of prison. He received basic training at Fort Ord. After training, he was transferred to Fort Winfield Scott in the Presidio of San Francisco. Garcia spent most of his time in the army at his leisure, missing roll call and accruing many counts of being AWOL. As a result, Garcia was given a general discharge on December 14, 1960.
In January 1961, Garcia drove down to East Palo Alto to see Laird Grant, an old friend from middle school. He had bought a 1950 Cadillac sedan from a cook in the army, which barely made it to Grant's residence before it broke down. Garcia spent the next few weeks sleeping where friends would allow, eventually using his car as a home. Through Grant, Garcia met Dave McQueen in February, who, after hearing Garcia perform some blues music, introduced him to local people and to the Chateau, a rooming house located near Stanford University which was then a popular hangout.
On February 20, 1961, Garcia got into a car with Paul Speegle, a sixteen-year-old artist and acquaintance of Garcia; Lee Adams, the house manager of the Chateau and driver of the car; and Alan Trist, a companion of theirs. After speeding past the Palo Alto Veterans Hospital, the driver encountered a curve and, speeding around , crashed into the guard rail, sending the car rolling turbulently. Garcia was hurled through the windshield of the car into a nearby field with such force he was literally thrown out of his shoes and would later be unable to recall the ejection. Lee Adams, the driver, and Alan Trist, who was seated in the back, were thrown from the car as well, suffering from abdominal injuries and a spine fracture, respectively. Garcia escaped with a broken collarbone, while Speegle, still in the car, was fatally injured.
Lee's reckless driving and crash served as an awakening for Garcia, who later commented: "That's where my life began. Before then I was always living at less than capacity. I was idling. That was the slingshot for the rest of my life. It was like a second chance. Then I got serious". It was at this time that Garcia began to realize that he needed to begin playing the guitar in earnest—a move which meant giving up his love of drawing and painting.
In April 1961, Garcia first met Robert Hunter, who would become a long-time friend of and lyricist for the Grateful Dead, collaborating principally with Garcia. The two involved themselves in the South Bay and San Francisco art and music scenes, sometimes playing at Menlo Park's Kepler's Books. Garcia performed his first concert with Hunter, each earning five dollars. Garcia and Hunter also played in bands (the Wildwood Boys and the Hart Valley Drifters) with David Nelson, who would later play with Garcia in the New Riders of the Purple Sage and contribute to several Grateful Dead album songs.
In 1962, Garcia met Phil Lesh, the eventual bassist of the Grateful Dead, during a party in Menlo Park's bohemian Perry Lane neighborhood (where author Ken Kesey lived). Lesh would later write in his autobiography that Garcia reminded him of pictures he had seen of the composer Claude Debussy, with his "dark, curly hair, goatee, Impressionist eyes". While attending another party in Palo Alto, Lesh approached Garcia to suggest they record Garcia on Lesh's tape recorder and produce a radio show for the progressive, community-supported Berkeley radio station KPFA. Using an old Wollensak tape recorder, they recorded "Matty Groves" and "The Long Black Veil", among several other tunes. The recordings became a central feature of a 90-minute KPFA special broadcast, "The Long Black Veil and Other Ballads: An Evening with Jerry Garcia". The link between KPFA and the Grateful Dead continues to this day, having included many fundraisers, interviews, live concert broadcasts, taped band performances and all-day or all-weekend "Dead-only" marathons.
Garcia soon began playing and teaching acoustic guitar and banjo. One of Garcia's students was Bob Matthews, who later engineered many of the Grateful Dead's albums. Matthews attended Menlo-Atherton High School and was friends with Bob Weir, and on New Year's Eve 1963, he introduced Weir and Garcia.
Between 1962 and 1964, Garcia sang and performed mainly bluegrass, old-time, and folk music. One of the bands Garcia performed with was the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers, a bluegrass act. The group consisted of Garcia on guitar, banjo, vocals, and harmonica, Marshall Leicester on banjo, guitar, and vocals, and Dick Arnold on fiddle and vocals. Soon after this, Garcia, Weir, Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, and several of their friends formed a jug band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions. Around this time, the psychedelic drug LSD was gaining popularity. Garcia first began using LSD in 1964; later, when asked how it changed his life, he remarked: "Well, it changed everything [...] the effect was that it freed me because I suddenly realized that my little attempt at having a straight life and doing that was really a fiction and just wasn't going to work out. Luckily I wasn't far enough into it for it to be shattering or anything; it was like a realization that just made me feel immensely relieved."
In 1965, Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions evolved into the Warlocks, with the addition of Phil Lesh on bass guitar and Bill Kreutzmann on percussion. However, the band discovered that another group (which would later become the Velvet Underground) had recently selected the same name. In response, Garcia came up with "Grateful Dead" by opening a Funk & Wagnalls dictionary to an entry for "Grateful dead". The definition for "Grateful dead" was "a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". The band's first reaction was disapproval. Garcia later explained the group's reaction: "I didn't like it really, I just found it to be really powerful. [Bob] Weir didn't like it, [Bill] Kreutzmann didn't like it and nobody really wanted to hear about it." Despite their dislike of the name, it quickly spread by word of mouth, and soon became their official title.
Career with the Grateful Dead
Garcia served as lead guitarist, as well as one of the principal vocalists and songwriters of the Grateful Dead for its entire career. Garcia composed such songs as "Dark Star", "Franklin's Tower", and "Scarlet Begonias", among many others. Robert Hunter, an ardent collaborator with the band, wrote the lyrics to all but a few of Garcia's songs.
Garcia was well-noted for his "soulful extended guitar improvisations", which would frequently feature interplay between him and his fellow band members. His fame, as well as the band's, arguably rested on their ability to never play a song the same way twice. Often, Garcia would take cues from rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, remarking that "there are some [...] kinds of ideas that would really throw me if I had to create a harmonic bridge between all the things going on rhythmically with two drums and Phil [Lesh's] innovative bass playing. Weir's ability to solve that sort of problem is extraordinary. [...] Harmonically, I take a lot of my solo cues from Bob."
When asked to describe his approach to soloing, Garcia commented: "It keeps on changing. I still basically revolve around the melody and the way it's broken up into phrases as I perceive them. With most solos, I tend to play something that phrases the way the melody does; my phrases may be more dense or have different value, but they'll occur in the same places in the song. [...]"
Garcia and the band toured almost constantly from their formation in 1965 until Garcia's death in 1995. Periodically, there were breaks due to exhaustion or health problems, often due to Garcia's drug use. During their three-decade span, the Grateful Dead played 2,314 shows.
Garcia's guitar-playing was eclectic. He melded elements from the various kinds of music that influenced him. Echoes of bluegrass playing (such as Arthur Smith and Doc Watson) could be heard. There was also early rock (like Lonnie Mack, James Burton, and Chuck Berry), contemporary blues (Freddie King and Lowell Fulsom), country and western (Roy Nichols and Don Rich), and jazz (Charlie Christian and Django Reinhardt) to be heard in Garcia's style. Don Rich was the sparkling country guitar player in Buck Owens's "the Buckaroos" band of the 1960s, but besides Rich's style, both Garcia's pedal steel guitar playing (on Grateful Dead records and others) and his standard electric guitar work, were influenced by another of Owens's Buckaroos of that time, pedal steel player Tom Brumley. And as an improvisational soloist, John Coltrane was one of his greatest personal and musical influences.
Garcia later described his playing style as having "descended from barroom rock and roll, country guitar. Just 'cause that's where all my stuff comes from. It's like that blues instrumental stuff that was happening in the late Fifties and early Sixties, like Freddie King." Garcia's style could vary with the song being played and the instrument he was using, but his playing had a number of so-called "signatures". Among these were lead lines based on rhythmic triplets (examples include the songs "Good Morning Little School Girl", "New Speedway Boogie", "Brokedown Palace", "Deal", "Loser", "Truckin'", "That's It for the Other One", "U.S. Blues", "Sugaree", and "Don't Ease Me In").
Side projects
In addition to the Grateful Dead, Garcia had numerous side projects, the most notable being the Jerry Garcia Band. He was also involved with various acoustic projects such as Old & In the Way and other bluegrass bands, including collaborations with noted bluegrass mandolinist David Grisman. The documentary film Grateful Dawg, co-produced by Gillian Grisman and former NBC producer Pamela Hamilton chronicles the deep, long-term friendship between Garcia and Grisman. When Garcia and Grisman released Not For Kids Only, Hamilton produced their interview and concert for NBC. After several years of producing stories on the Grateful Dead and band members' side projects, Hamilton interviewed Bob Weir for a feature on Garcia's death marking the end of an era.
Other groups of which Garcia was a member at one time or another include the Black Mountain Boys, Legion of Mary, Reconstruction, and the Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band. Garcia was also a fan of jazz artists and improvisation: he played with jazz keyboardists Merl Saunders and Howard Wales for many years in various groups and jam sessions, and he appeared on saxophonist Ornette Coleman's 1988 album, Virgin Beauty. His collaboration with Merl Saunders and Muruga Booker on the world music album Blues From the Rainforest launched the Rainforest Band.
Garcia also spent a lot of time in the recording studio helping out fellow musician friends in session work, often adding guitar, vocals, pedal steel, sometimes banjo and piano and even producing. He played on over 50 studio albums, the styles of which were eclectic and varied, including bluegrass, rock, folk, blues, country, jazz, electronic music, gospel, funk, and reggae. Artists who sought Garcia's help included the likes of Jefferson Airplane (most notably Surrealistic Pillow, Garcia being listed as their "spiritual advisor"). Garcia himself recalled in a mid-1967 interview that he'd played the high lead on "Today," played on "Plastic Fantastic Lover" and "Comin' Back to Me" on that album. Others include Tom Fogerty, David Bromberg, Robert Hunter (Liberty, on Relix Records), Paul Pena, Peter Rowan, Warren Zevon, Country Joe McDonald, Pete Sears, Ken Nordine, Ornette Coleman, Bruce Hornsby, Bob Dylan, It's a Beautiful Day, and many more. In 1995 Garcia played on three tracks for the CD Blue Incantation by guitarist Sanjay Mishra, making it his last studio collaboration.
Throughout the early 1970s, Garcia, Lesh, Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart, and David Crosby collaborated intermittently with MIT-educated composer and biologist Ned Lagin on several projects in the realm of early ambient music; these include the album Seastones (released by the Ned Lagin on the Round Records subsidiary) and L, an unfinished dance work composed by Ned Lagin. In 1970, Garcia participated in the soundtrack for the film Zabriskie Point.
Garcia also played pedal steel guitar for fellow-San Francisco musicians New Riders of the Purple Sage from their initial dates in 1969 to October 1971, when increased commitments with the Dead forced him to opt out of the group. He appears as a band member on their debut album New Riders of the Purple Sage, and produced Home, Home on the Road, a 1974 live album by the band. He also contributed pedal steel guitar to the enduring hit "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. Garcia also played steel guitar licks on Brewer & Shipley's 1970 album Tarkio. Despite considering himself a novice on the pedal steel, Garcia routinely ranked high in player polls. After a long lapse from playing the pedal steel, he played it once more during several of the Dead's concerts with Bob Dylan in the summer of 1987.
In 1988, Garcia agreed to perform at several major benefits including the "Soviet American Peace Walk" concert at the Band Shell, in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, that drew 25,000 people. He was asked to play by longtime friend and fellow musician, Pete Sears, who played piano with all the bands that day, and also procured all the other musicians. Garcia, Mickey Hart and Steve Parish played the show, then were given a police escort to a Grateful Dead show across the bay later that night. Garcia also played with Nick Gravenites and Pete Sears at a benefit given for Vietnam Veteran and peace activist Brian Willson, who lost both legs below the knee when he attempted to block a train carrying weapons to military dictatorships in El Salvador.
Having previously studied at the San Francisco Art Institute as a teenager, Garcia embarked on a second career in the visual arts in the late 1980s. He created a number of drawings, etchings, and water colors. Garcia's artistic endeavors were represented by the Weir Gallery in Berkeley, California from 1989 to 1996. During this period, Roberta Weir (unrelated to Garcia's bandmate Bob Weir) provided Garcia with new art techniques to use, sponsored his first solo show in 1990, and prepared blank etching plates for him to draw on. These would then be processed and printed by gallery staff and brought back to Garcia for approval and signature, usually with a passing of stacks of paper backstage at a Dead show. His annual shows at the Weir Gallery garnered much attention, leading to further shows in New York and other cities. Garcia was an early adopter of digital art media; his artistic style was as varied as his musical output, and he carried small notebooks for pen and ink sketches wherever he toured. Roberta Weir continues to maintain an archive of the artwork of Jerry Garcia. Perhaps the most widely seen pieces of Jerry Garcia's art are the many editions of men's neckties produced by Stonehenge Ltd. and Mulberry Neckware. Some began as etchings, other designs came from his drawings, paintings, and digital art. Garcia's artwork has since expanded into everything from hotel rooms, wet suits, men's sport shirts, a women's wear line, boxer shorts, hair accessories, cummerbunds, silk scarves and wool rugs.
Personal life
Garcia met his first wife, Sara Ruppenthal, in 1963. She was working at the coffee house in the back of Kepler's Books, where Garcia, Hunter, and Nelson regularly performed. They married on April 23, 1963, and on December 8 of that year their daughter Heather was born.
Carolyn Adams, a Merry Prankster also known as "Mountain Girl" or "M.G.," had a daughter, Sunshine, with Ken Kesey. Mountain Girl married another Prankster, George Walker, but they soon separated. She and Sunshine then moved into 710 Ashbury with Garcia in late 1966 where they would ultimately live together until 1975. In 1994, Sara and Jerry officially divorced after a long separation. Adams gave birth to Garcia's second and third daughters, Annabelle Walker Garcia (February 2, 1970) and Theresa Adams "Trixie" Garcia (September 21, 1974).
In August 1970, Garcia's mother Ruth was involved in a car crash near Twin Peaks in San Francisco. Garcia, who was recording the album American Beauty at the time, often left the sessions to visit his mother with his brother Clifford. She died on September 28, 1970.
In the midst of a March 1973 Grateful Dead engagement at Long Island's Nassau Coliseum, Garcia met Deborah Koons, an aspiring filmmaker from a wealthy Cincinnati, Ohio-based family who would much later marry him and become his widow. After a brief correspondence, he began his relationship with her in mid-1974. This gradually strained his relationship with Adams and culminated in Garcia leaving Adams for Koons in late 1975. The end of his relationship with Koons in 1977 precipitated a brief reconciliation with Adams, including the reestablishment of their household. However, she did not agree with the guitarist's persistent use of narcotics and moved with the children to the Eugene, Oregon area, living near Kesey, in 1978.
Following Adams' departure, Garcia had an affair with Amy Moore. She was a Kentucky-born member of the extended "Grateful Dead family", and the mistress of Texas oil heir Roy Cullen. Their affair lasted circa 1980–1981, and inspired the Garcia-Hunter song "Run for the Roses."
Adams and Garcia were married on December 31, 1981, largely as a result of mutual tax exigencies. Despite the legal codification of their union, she remained in Oregon, while Garcia continued to live near the Grateful Dead's offices in San Rafael, California. Garcia lived with a variety of housemates, including longtime Grateful Dead employee and Jerry Garcia Band manager Rock Scully. Scully, who co-managed the Grateful Dead throughout the mid-to-late 1960s before serving as the band's "advance man" and publicist, was dismissed by the group in 1984 for enabling Garcia's addictions and for allegedly embezzling the Garcia Band's profits. Another housemate was Nora Sage, a Deadhead who became Garcia's housekeeper while studying at the Golden Gate University School of Law. The exact nature of their relationship remains unclear, although it is believed to have been platonic due to Garcia's addictions. She later became his art representative.
While they would briefly reunite following his diabetic coma, Garcia and Adams ultimately divorced in 1994. Phil Lesh has subsequently stated that he rarely saw Adams on any of the band tours. In a 1991 Rolling Stone interview, Garcia stated that "we haven't really lived together since the Seventies".
During the autumn of 1978, Garcia developed a friendship with Shimer College student Manasha Matheson, an artist and music enthusiast. They remained friends over the following nine years before initiating a romantic relationship in Hartford, Connecticut on the Grateful Dead's spring 1987 tour. Jerry and Manasha became parents with the birth of their daughter, Keelin Noel Garcia, on December 20, 1987. On August 17, 1990, Jerry and Manasha married at their San Anselmo, California home in a spiritual ceremony free of legal convention. In 1991, Garcia expressed his delight in finding the time to "actually be a father" to Keelin in contrast to his past relationships with his children. A year later, Garcia dedicated his first art book, Paintings, Drawings and Sketches, "For Manasha, with love, Jerry."
In January 1993, Barbara "Brigid" Meier, a former girlfriend from the early 1960s, reentered Garcia's life for a brief period. Meier claimed, Garcia had considered her to be the "love of his life" and proposed to her during a Hawaiian vacation shortly after their relationship recommenced. Garcia's "love of his life" sentiment was not reserved for one lover, as he expressed the same feelings to several other women in his life. At Garcia's 1995 funeral, Koons declared that she was "the love of his life" while paying her final respects, whereupon Meier and Ruppenthal, who were both in attendance, simultaneously exclaimed, "He said that to me!"
The affair with Meier marked the breakup of Jerry's family life with Manasha and Keelin. Garcia ended the affair with Meier forty-five days later while on tour in Chicago with the Grateful Dead after she confronted him about his drug use.
Shortly thereafter, Garcia renewed his acquaintance with Deborah Koons in the spring of 1993. They married on February 14, 1994, in Sausalito, California. Garcia and Koons were married at the time of his death.
Lifestyle and health
Because of their public profile, Garcia and his collaborators were occasionally singled out in the American government's war on drugs. On October 2, 1967, 710 Ashbury Street in San Francisco (where the Grateful Dead had taken up residence the year before) was raided after a police tip-off. Grateful Dead members Phil Lesh, Bob Weir, and Ron "Pigpen" McKernan were apprehended on marijuana charges which were later dropped, although Garcia himself was not arrested. The following year, Garcia's picture was used in a defamatory context in a campaign commercial for Richard Nixon.
Most of the band were arrested again in January 1970, after they flew to New Orleans from Hawaii. After returning to their hotel from a performance, the band checked into their rooms, only to be quickly raided by police. Approximately fifteen people were arrested on the spot, including many of the road crew, management, and nearly all of the Grateful Dead except for Garcia, who arrived later, outgoing keyboardist Tom Constanten, who abstained from all drugs as a member of the Church of Scientology, and McKernan, who eschewed illegal drugs in favor of alcohol.
According to Bill Kreutzmann, the band's use of cocaine accelerated throughout the early 1970s. After using heroin in a brothel in 1974 (likely on the band's second European tour), Garcia was introduced to a smokeable form of the drug (initially advertised as refined opium) colloquially known as "Persian" or "Persian Base" during the group's 1975 hiatus. Influenced by the stresses of creating and releasing The Grateful Dead Movie and the acrimonious collapse of the band's independent record labels over the next two years, Garcia became increasingly dependent upon both substances. These factors, combined with the alcohol and drug abuse of several other members of the Grateful Dead, resulted in a turbulent atmosphere. By 1978, the band's chemistry began "cracking and crumbling", resulting in poor group cohesion. As a result, Keith and Donna Jean Godchaux left the band in February 1979.
With the addition of keyboardist/vocalist Brent Mydland that year amid the ongoing coalescence of the Deadhead subculture, the band reached new commercial heights as a touring group on the American arena circuit in the early 1980s, enabling them to forsake studio recording for several years. Nevertheless, this was offset by such factors as the band's atypically large payroll and Garcia's $700-a-day () drug addiction, resulting in the guitarist taking on a frenetic slate of solo touring outside of the Grateful Dead's rigorous schedule, including abbreviated acoustic duo concerts with Jerry Garcia Band bassist John Kahn that were widely rumored to be a funding conduit for their respective addictions.
Though things seemed to be getting better for the band, Garcia's health was declining. By 1983, Garcia's demeanor onstage had appeared to change. Despite still playing the guitar with great passion and intensity, there were times that he would appear disengaged; as such, shows were often inconsistent. Years of heavy tobacco smoking had affected his voice, and he gained considerable weight. By 1984, he would often rest his chin on the microphone during performances. The so-called "endless tour"—the result of years of financial risks, drug use, and poor business decisions—had taken its toll.
Garcia's decade-long heroin addiction culminated in the rest of the band holding an intervention in January 1985. Given the choice between the band or the drugs, Garcia agreed to check into a rehabilitation center in Oakland, California. A few days later in January, before the start of his program in Oakland, Garcia was arrested for drug possession in Golden Gate Park; he subsequently attended a drug diversion program. Throughout 1985, he tapered his drug use on tour and at home with the assistance of Nora Sage; by the spring of 1986, he was completely abstinent.
Precipitated by an unhealthy weight, dehydration, bad eating habits, and a recent relapse on the Grateful Dead's first stadium tour, Garcia collapsed into a diabetic coma in July 1986, waking up five days later. He later spoke about this period of unconsciousness as surreal: "Well, I had some very weird experiences. My main experience was one of furious activity and tremendous struggle in a sort of futuristic, space-ship vehicle with insectoid presences. After I came out of my coma, I had this image of myself as these little hunks of protoplasm that were stuck together kind of like stamps with perforations between them that you could snap off." Garcia's coma had a profound effect on him: it forced him to have to relearn how to play the guitar, as well as other, more basic skills. Within a handful of months, he had recovered, playing with the Jerry Garcia Band and the Grateful Dead again later that year.
After Garcia's recovery, the band released a comeback album In the Dark in 1987, which became their best-selling studio album. Inspired by Garcia's improved health, a successful album and the continuing emergence of Mydland as a third frontman, the band's energy and chemistry reached a new peak in the late 1980s.
Amid a litany of personal problems, Mydland died of a speedball overdose in July 1990. His death greatly affected Garcia, leading him to believe that the band's chemistry would never be the same. Before beginning the fall tour, the band acquired keyboardists Vince Welnick and Bruce Hornsby. The power of Hornsby's performances drove Garcia to new heights on stage. However, as the band continued through 1991, Garcia became concerned with the band's future. He was exhausted from five straight years of touring. He thought a break was necessary, mainly so that the band could come back with fresh material. The idea was put off by the pressures of management, and the touring continued. Garcia began using heroin again after several years of intermittent prescription opiate use. Though his relapse was brief, the band was quick to react. Soon after the last show of the tour in Denver, Garcia was confronted by the band with another intervention. After a disastrous meeting, Garcia invited Phil Lesh over to his home in San Rafael, California, where he explained that after the meeting he would start attending a methadone clinic. Garcia said that he wanted to clean up in his own way, and return to making music.
After returning from the band's 1992 summer tour, Garcia became sick, a throwback to his diabetic coma in 1986. Manasha Garcia nursed Jerry back to health and organized a team of health professionals which included acupuncturist Yen Wei Choong and Randy Baker, MD, a holistic family physician to treat him at home. Garcia recovered over the following days, despite the Grateful Dead having to cancel their fall tour to allow him time to recuperate. Garcia reduced his cigarette smoking and began losing weight. He also became a vegetarian.
Despite these improvements, Garcia's physical and mental condition continued to decline throughout 1993 and 1994. He began to use narcotics again to dull the pain.
In light of his second drug relapse and current condition, Garcia checked himself into the Betty Ford Center during July 1995. His stay was limited, lasting only two weeks. Motivated by the experience, he then checked into the Serenity Knolls treatment center in Forest Knolls, California, where he died.
Death
Garcia died in his room at the rehabilitation clinic on August 9, 1995. The cause of death was a heart attack. Garcia had long struggled with drug addiction, weight problems, sleep apnea, heavy smoking, and diabetes—all of which contributed to his physical decline. Lesh remarked that, upon hearing of Garcia's death, "I was struck numb. I had lost my oldest surviving friend, my brother." Garcia's funeral was held on August 12, at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Belvedere. It was attended by his family, the remaining Grateful Dead members, and their friends, including former pro basketball player Bill Walton and musician Bob Dylan. Deborah Koons barred two of Garcia's former wives from the ceremony.
On August 13, about 25,000 people attended a municipally sanctioned public memorial at the Polo Fields of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. Crowds produced hundreds of flowers, gifts, images, and a bagpipe rendition of "Amazing Grace" in remembrance. In the Haight, a single white rose was reportedly tied to a tree near the Dead's former Haight-Ashbury house, where a group of followers gathered to mourn.
On the morning of April 4, 1996, after a total lunar eclipse earlier that day, Weir and Deborah Koons accompanied by Sanjay Mishra, spread half of Garcia's ashes into the Ganges at the holy city of Rishikesh, India, a site sacred to Hindus. The remaining ashes were poured into the San Francisco Bay. Koons did not allow former wife Carolyn Garcia to attend the spreading of the ashes.
Musical equipment
Garcia played many guitars during his career, which ranged from student and budget models to custom-made instruments. During his thirty-five year career as a professional musician, Garcia used about 25 guitars.
In 1965, when Garcia was playing with the Warlocks, he used a Guild Starfire, which he also used on the début album of the Grateful Dead. Beginning in late 1967 and ending in 1968, Garcia played black or gold mid-1950s Gibson Les Paul guitars with P-90 pickups. In 1969, he picked up the Gibson SG and used it for most of that year and 1970, except for a small period in between where he used a sunburst Fender Stratocaster.
During Garcia's "pedal steel flirtation period" (as Bob Weir referred to it in Anthem to Beauty), from approximately 1969 to 1972, he initially played a Fender instrument before upgrading to the ZB Custom D-10, especially in his earlier public performances. Although this was a double neck guitar, Garcia used the "E9 neck and the three pedals to raise the tone and two levers to lower it." He employed an Emmons D-10 at the Grateful Dead's and New Riders of the Purple Sage's final appearances at the Fillmore East in April 1971.
In 1969, Garcia played pedal steel on three notable outside recordings: the track "The Farm" on the Jefferson Airplane album Volunteers, the track "Oh Mommy" by Brewer and Shipley and the hit single "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young from their album Déjà Vu, released in 1970. Garcia played on the latter album in exchange for harmony lessons for the Grateful Dead, who were at the time recording Workingman's Dead.
In 1971, Garcia began playing a sunburst Les Paul. In March and April 1971 – the time period during which the Grateful Dead recorded its second live album, Grateful Dead – Garcia played the "Peanut," a guitar he had received from Rick Turner, who had custom built the guitar's body and incorporated the neck, pickups, and hardware from an early '60s Les Paul.
In May, Garcia began using a 1957 natural finish Stratocaster that had been given to him by Graham Nash. Garcia added an alligator sticker to the pickguard in the fall of that year. "Alligator" would remain Garcia's principal electric guitar until August 1973.
In the summer of 1971, Garcia also played a double-cutaway Les Paul TV Junior.
While Alligator was in the shop in the summer of 1972, he briefly reverted to the sunburst Stratocaster; this can be seen in Sunshine Daydream.
In late 1972, Garcia purchased the first guitar ("Eagle") made by Alembic luthier Doug Irwin for $850 (). Enamored of Irwin's talents, he immediately commissioned his own custom instrument. This guitar, nicknamed "Wolf" for a memorable sticker Garcia added below the tailpiece, was delivered in May 1973 and replaced Alligator on stage in September. It cost $1,500 (), an extremely high price for the era.
Wolf was made with an ebony fingerboard and featured numerous embellishments like alternating grain designs in the headstock, ivory inlays, and fret marker dots made of sterling silver. The body was composed of western maple wood which had a core of purpleheart. Garcia later had Irwin (who ultimately left Alembic to start his own business) replace the electronics inside the guitar, at which point he added his own logo to the headstock alongside the Alembic logo. The system included two interchangeable plates for configuring pickups: one was made for strictly single coils, while the other accommodated humbuckers. Shortly after receiving the modified instrument, Garcia commissioned another custom guitar from Irwin with one caveat: "Don't hold back."
During the Grateful Dead's 1974 European tour, Wolf was dropped on several occasions, one of which caused a minor crack in the headstock. Following filming of The Grateful Dead Movie (in which the guitar is prominently visible) a month later, Garcia returned it to Irwin for repairs. Throughout its absence, Garcia predominantly played several Travis Bean guitars, including the TB1000A (1975) and the TB500 (1976-1977). On September 28, 1977, Irwin delivered the refurbished Wolf back to Garcia. The wolf sticker which gave the guitar its name had now been inlaid into the instrument; it also featured an effects loop between the pick-ups and controls (so inline effects would "see" the same signal at all times) which was bypassable. Irwin also put a new face on the headstock with only his logo (he later claimed to have built the guitar himself, though pictures through time clearly show the progression of logos, from Alembic, to Alembic & Irwin, to only Irwin).
Nearly seven years after he commissioned it, Garcia received his second custom guitar ("Tiger") from Irwin in the summer of 1979.
He first employed the instrument in concert at a Grateful Dead performance at the Oakland Auditorium Arena on August 4, 1979. Its name was derived from the inlay on the preamp cover.
The body of Tiger was of rich quality: the top layer was cocobolo, with the preceding layers being maple stripe, vermilion, and flame maple, in that order. The neck was made of western maple with an ebony fingerboard. The pickups consisted of a single coil DiMarzio SDS-1 and two humbucker DiMarzio Super IIs which were easily removable due to Garcia's preference for replacing his pickups every year or two. The electronics were composed of an effects bypass loop, which allowed Garcia to control the sound of his effects through the tone and volume controls on the guitar, and a preamplifier/buffer which rested behind a plate in the back of the guitar. Fully outfitted, Tiger weighed . This was Garcia's principal guitar for the next eleven years, and most played.
In the late 1980s Garcia, Weir and CSN (along with many others) endorsed Alvarez Yairi acoustic guitars. There are many photographs circulating (mostly promotional) of Garcia playing a DY99 Virtuoso Custom with a Modulus Graphite neck. He opted to play with the less decorated model but the promotional photo from the Alvarez Yairi catalog has him holding the "tree of life" model. This hand-built guitar was notable for the collaboration between Japanese luthier Kazuo Yairi and Modulus Graphite of San Rafael. As with most things Garcia, with his passing, the DY99 model is highly valued among collectors.
In 1990, Irwin completed "Rosebud", Garcia's fourth custom guitar. It was similar to his previous guitar Tiger in many respects, but featured different inlays and electronics, tone and volume controls, and weight. Rosebud, unlike Tiger, was configured with three humbuckers; the neck and bridge pickups shared a tone control, while the middle had its own. Atop the guitar was a Roland GK-2 pickup which fed the controller set inside the guitar. The GK2 was used in junction with the Roland GR-50 rack mount synthesizer. The GR-50 synthesizer in turn drove a Korg M1R synthesizer producing the MIDI effects heard during live performances of this period as heard on the Grateful Dead recording Without a Net. Sections of the guitar were hollowed out to bring the weight down to . The inlay, a dancing skeleton holding a rose, covers a plate just below the bridge. The final cost of the instrument was $11,000 ().
In 1993, carpenter-turned-luthier Stephen Cripe tried his hand at making an instrument for Garcia. After researching Tiger through pictures and films, Cripe set out on what would soon become known as "Lightning Bolt", again named for its inlay.
The guitar used Brazilian rosewood for the fingerboard and East Indian rosewood for the body, which, with admitted irony from Cripe, had been taken from a 19th-century bed used by opium smokers. Built purely from guesswork, Lightning Bolt was a hit with Garcia, who began using the guitar exclusively. Soon after, Garcia requested that Cripe build a backup of the guitar. Cripe, who had not measured or photographed the original, was told simply to "wing it."
Cripe later delivered the backup, which was known by the name "Top Hat". Garcia bought it from him for $6,500, making it the first guitar that Cripe had ever sold. However, infatuated with Lightning Bolt, Garcia rarely used the backup.
After Garcia's death, the ownership of Wolf and Tiger came into question. According to Garcia's will, his guitars were bequeathed to Doug Irwin, who had constructed them.
The remaining Grateful Dead members disagreed – they considered his guitars to be property of the band, leading to a lawsuit between the two parties. In 2001, Irwin won the case. However, nearly having been left destitute from a traffic accident in 1998, he decided to place the guitars up for auction in hopes of being able to start another guitar workshop.
On May 8, 2002, Wolf and Tiger, among other memorabilia, were placed for auction at Studio 54 in New York City. Tiger was sold for $957,500, and Wolf for $789,500. Together, the pair sold for $1.74 million, setting a new world record. Wolf went into in the private collection of Daniel Pritzker who kept it in a secure climate controlled room in a private residence at Utica, N.Y. Tiger went to the private collection of Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay.
In May 2017, Wolf was again auctioned, but this time for charity. Pritzker decided to sell the guitar and donate all proceeds to the Montgomery, Alabama based Southern Poverty Law Center.
Brian Halligan placed the winning bid totaling $1.9M.
For the majority of 2019 Wolf and Tiger were included in the Play it Loud exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. On June 23, 2019 John Mayer played Wolf with Dead & Co. at Citi Field.
Legacy
Garcia was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Grateful Dead in 1994. He declined to attend the ceremony; the band jokingly brought a cardboard cutout of Garcia out on stage in his absence.
In 1987, Vermont ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's introduced their Cherry Garcia flavor dedicated to him. It was the first ice cream flavor dedicated to a musician.
In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Jerry Garcia 13th in their list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time".
According to fellow Bay Area guitar player Henry Kaiser, Garcia is "the most recorded guitarist in history. With more than 2,200 Grateful Dead concerts, and 1,000 Jerry Garcia Band concerts captured on tape – as well as numerous studio sessions – there are about 15,000 hours of his guitar work preserved for the ages."
On July 30, 2004, Melvin Seals was the first Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) member to headline an outdoor music and camping festival called "The Grateful Garcia Gathering". Jerry Garcia Band drummer David Kemper joined Melvin Seals and JGB in 2007. Other musicians and friends of Garcia include Donna Jean Godchaux, Mookie Siegel, Pete Sears, G.E. Smith, Chuck Hammer, Barry Sless, Jackie Greene, Brian Lesh, Sanjay Mishra, and Mark Karan.
On July 21, 2005, the San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission passed a resolution to name the amphitheater in McLaren Park "The Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." The amphitheater is located in the Excelsior District, where Garcia grew up. The first show to happen at the Jerry Garcia Amphitheater was Jerry Day 2005 on August 7, 2005. Jerry's brother, Tiff Garcia, was the first person to welcome everybody to the "Jerry Garcia Amphitheater." Jerry Day is an annual celebration of Garcia in his childhood neighborhood. The dedication ceremony (Jerry Day 2) on October 29, 2005, was officiated by mayor Gavin Newsom.
On September 24, 2005, the Comes a Time: A Celebration of the Music & Spirit of Jerry Garcia tribute concert was held at the Hearst Greek Theatre in Berkeley, California. The concert featured Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart, Bruce Hornsby, Trey Anastasio, Warren Haynes, Jimmy Herring, Michael Kang, Jay Lane, Jeff Chimenti, Mark Karan, Robin Sylvester, Kenny Brooks, Melvin Seals, Merl Saunders, Marty Holland, Stu Allen, Gloria Jones, and Jackie LaBranch.
Georgia-based composer Lee Johnson released an orchestral tribute to the music of the Grateful Dead, recorded with the Russian National Orchestra, entitled "Dead Symphony: Lee Johnson Symphony No. 6." Johnson was interviewed on NPR on the July 26, 2008 broadcast of Weekend Edition, and gave much credit to the genius and craft of Garcia's songwriting. A live performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Johnson himself, was held Friday, August 1.
In 2010 the Santa Barbara Bowl in California opened Jerry Garcia Glen along the walk up to the venue. There is a statue of Garcia's right hand along the way.
Seattle rock band Soundgarden wrote and recorded the instrumental song "Jerry Garcia's Finger", dedicated to the singer, which was released as a b-side with their single "Pretty Noose".
Numerous music festivals across the United States and Uxbridge, Middlesex, UK hold annual events in memory of Jerry Garcia.
On May 14, 2015, an all-star lineup held a tribute concert for Garcia at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland. The event was called "Dear Jerry".
In 2015, Hunter and Garcia were inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. Hunter accepted the award along with Garcia's daughter, Trixie Garcia, who accepted on behalf of her father.
In 2015, Jerry Garcia's wife, Manasha Garcia and their daughter, Keelin Garcia launched The Jerry Garcia Foundation, a nonprofit charity that supports projects for artistic, environmental, and humanitarian causes. The Foundation's Board members are Bob Weir, Peter Shapiro, Glenn Fischer, Irwin Sternberg, Daniel Shiner, TRI Studios CEO, Christopher McCutcheon and Fender Music Foundation Executive Director,
Lynn Robison. Keelin Garcia said, "It is a tremendous honor to participate in nonprofit work that is in accordance with my father's values."
In 2018, Jerry Garcia family members, Keelin Garcia and Manasha Garcia launched the Jerry Garcia Music Arts independent music label.
On November 18, 2021, it was announced Jonah Hill would portray Garcia in a forthcoming Grateful Dead biopic written by Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski directed by Martin Scorsese for Apple TV+.
Discography
New Riders of the Purple Sage – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1971
Hooteroll? – Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia – 1971
Garcia – Jerry Garcia – 1972
Live at Keystone – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1973
Compliments – Jerry Garcia – 1974
Old & In the Way – Old & In the Way – 1975
Reflections – Jerry Garcia – 1976
Cats Under the Stars – Jerry Garcia Band – 1978
Run for the Roses – Jerry Garcia – 1982
Vintage NRPS – New Riders of the Purple Sage – 1986
Keystone Encores – Merl Saunders, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Vitt – 1988
Almost Acoustic – Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band – 1988
Jerry Garcia / David Grisman – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1991
Jerry Garcia Band – Jerry Garcia Band – 1991
Not for Kids Only – Jerry Garcia and David Grisman – 1993
Notes
References
Sources
External links
The official homepage of Jerry Garcia
Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jerry Garcia on Fretbase
The Jerry Site
Official Grateful Dead website
Jerry Garcia discography at deaddisc.com
Jerry Garcia autopsy
Jerry Day: A Civic and Cultural Celebration of Jerry Garcia held in San Francisco
FBI Records: The Vault - Jerry Garcia at vault.fbi.gov
Jerry Garcia's Army personnel file at the National Archives
TEAM
Garcia's Guitars & Gear Directory
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"Matthew 2:3 is the third verse of the second chapter of the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament. In the previous verse the magi had informed King Herod that they had seen portents showing the birth of the King of the Jews. In this verse he reacts to this news.\n\nContent\nIn the King James Version of the Bible the text reads:\nWhen Herod the king had heard these things, he \nwas troubled, and all Jerusalem with him.\n\nThe Novum Testamentum Graece text is:\nἀκούσας δὲ ὁ βασιλεὺς Ἡρῴδης\nἐταράχθη, καὶ πᾶσα Ἱεροσόλυμα μετ’ αὐτοῦ,\n\nAnalysis\nThat Herod should be troubled by the King of the Jews being born is not surprising. As an Edomite Herod was open to challenge from someone claiming to be the heir of King David, and the central theme of Matthew 1 is Jesus' Davidic status. Moreover, Herod was renowned for his paranoia, killing several of his own sons who threatened him.\n\nThat all Jerusalem is agitated also seems to conflict with later in the Gospel when the people are oblivious to Jesus. R. T. France suggests that the passage could perhaps be read as showing that the people of Jerusalem were troubled because of the possibility of Herod's wrath. Other scholars see this interpretation as being fairly implausible. Brown notes that this phrase originates in Exodus. There is a theory that this part of Matthew is heavily influenced by the story of Moses. In Exodus all Egypt is troubled by Moses, not just the Pharaoh. Thus in parallel all Jerusalem must also be troubled. This view was shared by St. Chrysostom.\n\nGundry sees this passage as influenced by the politics of the time it was written, a foreshadowing of the rejection of Jesus and his church by the leaders of Jerusalem. Paul L. Maier disagrees, \"If Matthew had concocted the account for such apologetic purposes, he failed quite miserably.\" R.T. France says \"The supposed parallel is far from exact.\"\n\nKeener argues that Matthew is contrasting the goodness of the pagan Magi against the residents of Jerusalem as part of his overall advocacy of Christian outreach beyond the Jewish community. Matthew challenges his reader's negative views of outsiders by contrasting these foreigners with the behaviour of those in Jerusalem. Levin believes the verse reflects Matthew's social critique against the wealthy and powerful city dwellers.\n\nGundry notes that this verse again makes sure to note Herod is a king. He sees this as an effort by the author of Matthew to create a deliberate contrast with Jesus, with Herod being the embodiment of all the things Jesus is not.\n\nCommentary from the Church Fathers\nAugustine: As the Magi seek a Redeemer, so Herod fears a successor.\n\nGlossa Ordinaria: The King, he is called, though in comparison with him whom they are seeking he is an alien and a foreigner.\n\nPseudo-Chrysostom: Herod was troubled when he heard that a King was born of Jewish lineage, lest, himself being an Idumæan, the kingdom should return again to native princes, and himself be expelled, and his seed after him. Great station is ever obnoxious to great fears, as the boughs of trees planted in high ground move when never so little wind blows, so high men are troubled with little rumours; while the lowly, like trees in the valley, remain at peace.\n\nAugustine: If His birth as an infant makes proud kings tremble, what will His tribunal as a Judge do? Let princes fear Him sitting at the right hand of His Father, whom this impious king feared while He hanged yet on His mother's breast.\n\nPope Leo I: Thou art troubled, Herod, without cause. Thy nature cannot contain Christ, nor is the Lord of the world content with the narrow bounds of thy dominion. He, whom thou wouldest not should reign in Judæa, reigns everywhere.\n\nGlossa Ordinaria: Perhaps he was troubled not on his own account, but for fear of the displeasure of the Romans. They would not allow the title of King or of God to any without their permission.\n\nGregory the Great: At the birth of a King of Heaven, a king of earth is troubled; surely, earthly greatness is confounded, when heavenly greatness shows itself.\n\nPope Leo I: Herod represents the Devil; who as he then instigated him, so now he unweariedly imitates him. For he is grieved by the calling of the Gentiles, and by the daily ruin of his power.\n\nPseudo-Chrysostom: Both have their own causes of jealousy, both fear a successor in their kingdom; Herod an earthly successor, the Devil a spiritual. Even Jerusalem is troubled, which should have rejoiced at that news, when a Jewish King was said to be risen up. But they were troubled, for the wicked cannot rejoice at the coming of the good. Or perhaps it was in fear that Herod should wreak his wrath against a Jewish King on his race.\n\nGlossa Ordinaria: Jerusalem was troubled with him, as willing to favour him whom it feared; the vulgar always pay undue honour to one who tyrannizes over it. Observe the diligence of his enquiry. If he should find him, he would do to him as he showed afterwards his disposition; if he should not, he would at least be excused to the Romans.\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\n02:03\nHerod the Great",
"\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer"
] |
[
"H. G. Wells",
"Personal life"
] | C_86cc13fd852e4219a6fc0d2d8dd4d80e_0 | Who did he marry | 1 | Who did H.G. Wells marry? | H. G. Wells | In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells. The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham. In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where in 1901 he constructed a large family home: Spade House. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip") in 1901 (died 1985) and Frank Richard in 1903 (died 1982). With his wife Jane's consent, Wells had affairs with a number of women, including the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger, adventurer and writer Odette Keun, Soviet spy Moura Budberg and novelist Elizabeth von Arnim. In 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society; and in 1914, a son, Anthony West (1914-1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells' "sordid intrigue" with the daughter of veteran Fabian Sidney Olivier, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011) - a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note) - gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others. Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989). CANNOTANSWER | 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells. | Herbert George Wells (21 September 186613 August 1946) was an English writer. Prolific in many genres, he wrote dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, history, satire, biography and autobiography. His work also included two books on recreational war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is sometimes called the "father of science fiction."
During his own lifetime, however, he was most prominent as a forward-looking, even prophetic social critic who devoted his literary talents to the development of a progressive vision on a global scale. A futurist, he wrote a number of utopian works and foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. His science fiction imagined time travel, alien invasion, invisibility, and biological engineering. Brian Aldiss referred to Wells as the "Shakespeare of science fiction", while American writer Charles Fort referred to him as a "wild talent".
Wells rendered his works convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work – dubbed “Wells's law” – leading Joseph Conrad to hail him in 1898 as "O Realist of the Fantastic!". His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), which was his first novel, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), The War of the Worlds (1898) and the military science fiction The War in the Air (1907). Wells was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature four times.
Wells's earliest specialised training was in biology, and his thinking on ethical matters took place in a specifically and fundamentally Darwinian context. He was also an outspoken socialist from a young age, often (but not always, as at the beginning of the First World War) sympathising with pacifist views. His later works became increasingly political and didactic, and he wrote little science fiction, while he sometimes indicated on official documents that his profession was that of journalist. Novels such as Kipps and The History of Mr Polly, which describe lower-middle-class life, led to the suggestion that he was a worthy successor to Charles Dickens, but Wells described a range of social strata and even attempted, in Tono-Bungay (1909), a diagnosis of English society as a whole. Wells was a diabetic and co-founded the charity The Diabetic Association (known today as Diabetes UK) in 1934.
Life
Early life
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on 21 September 1866. Called "Bertie" by his family, he was the fourth and last child of Joseph Wells, a former domestic gardener, and at the time a shopkeeper and professional cricketer and Sarah Neal, a former domestic servant. An inheritance had allowed the family to acquire a shop in which they sold china and sporting goods, although it failed to prosper: the stock was old and worn out, and the location was poor. Joseph Wells managed to earn a meagre income, but little of it came from the shop and he received an unsteady amount of money from playing professional cricket for the Kent county team.
A defining incident of young Wells's life was an accident in 1874 that left him bedridden with a broken leg. To pass the time he began to read books from the local library, brought to him by his father. He soon became devoted to the other worlds and lives to which books gave him access; they also stimulated his desire to write. Later that year he entered Thomas Morley's Commercial Academy, a private school founded in 1849, following the bankruptcy of Morley's earlier school. The teaching was erratic, the curriculum mostly focused, Wells later said, on producing copperplate handwriting and doing the sort of sums useful to tradesmen. Wells continued at Morley's Academy until 1880. In 1877, his father, Joseph Wells, suffered a fractured thigh. The accident effectively put an end to Joseph's career as a cricketer, and his subsequent earnings as a shopkeeper were not enough to compensate for the loss of the primary source of family income.
No longer able to support themselves financially, the family instead sought to place their sons as apprentices in various occupations. From 1880 to 1883, Wells had an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at Hyde's Drapery Emporium in Southsea. His experiences at Hyde's, where he worked a thirteen-hour day and slept in a dormitory with other apprentices, later inspired his novels The Wheels of Chance, The History of Mr Polly, and Kipps, which portray the life of a draper's apprentice as well as providing a critique of society's distribution of wealth.
Wells's parents had a turbulent marriage, owing primarily to his mother's being a Protestant and his father's being a freethinker. When his mother returned to work as a lady's maid (at Uppark, a country house in Sussex), one of the conditions of work was that she would not be permitted to have living space for her husband and children. Thereafter, she and Joseph lived separate lives, though they never divorced and remained faithful to each other. As a consequence, Herbert's personal troubles increased as he subsequently failed as a draper and also, later, as a chemist's assistant. However, Uppark had a magnificent library in which he immersed himself, reading many classic works, including Plato's Republic, Thomas More's Utopia, and the works of Daniel Defoe. This was the beginning of Wells's venture into literature.
Teacher
In October 1879, Wells's mother arranged through a distant relative, Arthur Williams, for him to join the National School at Wookey in Somerset as a pupil–teacher, a senior pupil who acted as a teacher of younger children. In December that year, however, Williams was dismissed for irregularities in his qualifications and Wells was returned to Uppark. After a short apprenticeship at a chemist in nearby Midhurst and an even shorter stay as a boarder at Midhurst Grammar School, he signed his apprenticeship papers at Hyde's. In 1883, Wells persuaded his parents to release him from the apprenticeship, taking an opportunity offered by Midhurst Grammar School again to become a pupil–teacher; his proficiency in Latin and science during his earlier short stay had been remembered.
The years he spent in Southsea had been the most miserable of his life to that point, but his good fortune at securing a position at Midhurst Grammar School meant that Wells could continue his self-education in earnest. The following year, Wells won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science (later the Royal College of Science in South Kensington, now part of Imperial College London) in London, studying biology under Thomas Henry Huxley. As an alumnus, he later helped to set up the Royal College of Science Association, of which he became the first president in 1909. Wells studied in his new school until 1887, with a weekly allowance of 21 shillings (a guinea) thanks to his scholarship. This ought to have been a comfortable sum of money (at the time many working class families had "round about a pound a week" as their entire household income), yet in his Experiment in Autobiography Wells speaks of constantly being hungry, and indeed photographs of him at the time show a youth who is very thin and malnourished.
He soon entered the Debating Society of the school. These years mark the beginning of his interest in a possible reformation of society. At first approaching the subject through Plato's Republic, he soon turned to contemporary ideas of socialism as expressed by the recently formed Fabian Society and free lectures delivered at Kelmscott House, the home of William Morris. He was also among the founders of The Science School Journal, a school magazine that allowed him to express his views on literature and society, as well as trying his hand at fiction; a precursor to his novel The Time Machine was published in the journal under the title The Chronic Argonauts. The school year 1886–87 was the last year of his studies.
During 1888, Wells stayed in Stoke-on-Trent, living in Basford. The unique environment of The Potteries was certainly an inspiration. He wrote in a letter to a friend from the area that "the district made an immense impression on me." The inspiration for some of his descriptions in The War of the Worlds is thought to have come from his short time spent here, seeing the iron foundry furnaces burn over the city, shooting huge red light into the skies. His stay in The Potteries also resulted in the macabre short story "The Cone" (1895, contemporaneous with his famous The Time Machine), set in the north of the city.
After teaching for some time, he was briefly on the staff of Holt Academy in Wales – Wells found it necessary to supplement his knowledge relating to educational principles and methodology and entered the College of Preceptors (College of Teachers). He later received his Licentiate and Fellowship FCP diplomas from the college. It was not until 1890 that Wells earned a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology from the University of London External Programme. In 1889–90, he managed to find a post as a teacher at Henley House School in London, where he taught A. A. Milne (whose father ran the school). His first published work was a Text-Book of Biology in two volumes (1893).
Upon leaving the Normal School of Science, Wells was left without a source of income. His aunt Mary—his father's sister-in-law—invited him to stay with her for a while, which solved his immediate problem of accommodation. During his stay at his aunt's residence, he grew increasingly interested in her daughter, Isabel, whom he later courted. To earn money, he began writing short humorous articles for journals such as The Pall Mall Gazette, later collecting these in volume form as Select Conversations with an Uncle (1895) and Certain Personal Matters (1897). So prolific did Wells become at this mode of journalism that many of his early pieces remain unidentified. According to David C. Smith, "Most of Wells's occasional pieces have not been collected, and many have not even been identified as his. Wells did not automatically receive the byline his reputation demanded until after 1896 or so ... As a result, many of his early pieces are unknown. It is obvious that many early Wells items have been lost." His success with these shorter pieces encouraged him to write book-length work, and he published his first novel, The Time Machine, in 1895.
Personal life
In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells (1865–1931; from 1902 Isabel Mary Smith). The couple agreed to separate in 1894, when he had fallen in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (1872–1927; later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey, in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton' (now No.141), Maybury Road, in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Doctor Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When the Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham.
In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames, for two years; this lasted until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where he constructed a large family home, Spade House, in 1901. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip"; 1901–1985) and Frank Richard (1903–1982) (grandfather of film director Simon Wells). Jane died on 6 October 1927, in Dunmow, at the age of 55.
Wells had affairs with a significant number of women. In December 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society. Amber had married the barrister G. R. Blanco White in July of that year, as co-arranged by Wells. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells's "sordid intrigue" with Amber, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. Between 1910 and 1913, novelist Elizabeth von Arnim was one of his mistresses. In 1914, he had a son, Anthony West (1914–1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. In 1920–21, and intermittently until his death, he had a love affair with the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger.
Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with the 22-year younger Dutch adventurer and writer Odette Keun, with whom he lived in Lou Pidou, a house they built together in Grasse, France. Wells dedicated his longest book to her (The World of William Clissold, 1926). When visiting Maxim Gorky in Russia 1920, he had slept with Gorky's mistress Moura Budberg, then still Countess Benckendorf and 27 years his junior. In 1933, when she left Gorky and emigrated to London, their relationship renewed and she cared for him through his final illness. Wells repeatedly asked her to marry him, but Budberg strongly rejected his proposals.
In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011)—a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note)—gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others.
Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989).
Artist
One of the ways that Wells expressed himself was through his drawings and sketches. One common location for these was the endpapers and title pages of his own diaries, and they covered a wide variety of topics, from political commentary to his feelings toward his literary contemporaries and his current romantic interests. During his marriage to Amy Catherine, whom he nicknamed Jane, he drew a considerable number of pictures, many of them being overt comments on their marriage. During this period, he called these pictures "picshuas". These picshuas have been the topic of study by Wells scholars for many years, and in 2006, a book was published on the subject.
Writer
Some of his early novels, called "scientific romances", invented several themes now classic in science fiction in such works as The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, When the Sleeper Wakes, and The First Men in the Moon. He also wrote realistic novels that received critical acclaim, including Kipps and a critique of English culture during the Edwardian period, Tono-Bungay. Wells also wrote dozens of short stories and novellas, including, "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid", which helped bring the full impact of Darwin's revolutionary botanical ideas to a wider public, and was followed by many later successes such as "The Country of the Blind" (1904).
According to James E. Gunn, one of Wells's major contributions to the science fiction genre was his approach, which he referred to as his "new system of ideas". In his opinion, the author should always strive to make the story as credible as possible, even if both the writer and the reader knew certain elements are impossible, allowing the reader to accept the ideas as something that could really happen, today referred to as "the plausible impossible" and "suspension of disbelief". While neither invisibility nor time travel was new in speculative fiction, Wells added a sense of realism to the concepts which the readers were not familiar with. He conceived the idea of using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposely and selectively forwards or backwards in time. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle. He explained that while writing The Time Machine, he realized that "the more impossible the story I had to tell, the more ordinary must be the setting, and the circumstances in which I now set the Time Traveller were all that I could imagine of solid upper-class comforts." In "Wells's Law", a science fiction story should contain only a single extraordinary assumption. Therefore, as justifications for the impossible, he employed scientific ideas and theories. Wells's best-known statement of the "law" appears in his introduction to a collection of his works published in 1934:
As soon as the magic trick has been done the whole business of the fantasy writer is to keep everything else human and real. Touches of prosaic detail are imperative and a rigorous adherence to the hypothesis. Any extra fantasy outside the cardinal assumption immediately gives a touch of irresponsible silliness to the invention.
Dr. Griffin / The Invisible Man is a brilliant research scientist who discovers a method of invisibility, but finds himself unable to reverse the process. An enthusiast of random and irresponsible violence, Griffin has become an iconic character in horror fiction. The Island of Doctor Moreau sees a shipwrecked man left on the island home of Doctor Moreau, a mad scientist who creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. The earliest depiction of uplift, the novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature. In The First Men in the Moon Wells used the idea of radio communication between astronomical objects, a plot point inspired by Nikola Tesla's claim that he had received radio signals from Mars. Though Tono-Bungay is not a science-fiction novel, radioactive decay plays a small but consequential role in it. Radioactive decay plays a much larger role in The World Set Free (1914). This book contains what is surely his biggest prophetic "hit", with the first description of a nuclear weapon. Scientists of the day were well aware that the natural decay of radium releases energy at a slow rate over thousands of years. The rate of release is too slow to have practical utility, but the total amount released is huge. Wells's novel revolves around an (unspecified) invention that accelerates the process of radioactive decay, producing bombs that explode with no more than the force of ordinary high explosives—but which "continue to explode" for days on end. "Nothing could have been more obvious to the people of the earlier twentieth century", he wrote, "than the rapidity with which war was becoming impossible ... [but] they did not see it until the atomic bombs burst in their fumbling hands". In 1932, the physicist and conceiver of nuclear chain reaction Leó Szilárd read The World Set Free (the same year Sir James Chadwick discovered the neutron), a book which he said made a great impression on him. In addition to writing early science fiction, he produced work dealing with mythological beings like an angel in the novel The Wonderful Visit (1895) and a mermaid in the novel The Sea Lady (1902).
Wells also wrote non-fiction. His first non-fiction bestseller was Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought (1901). When originally serialised in a magazine it was subtitled "An Experiment in Prophecy", and is considered his most explicitly futuristic work. It offered the immediate political message of the privileged sections of society continuing to bar capable men from other classes from advancement until war would force a need to employ those most able, rather than the traditional upper classes, as leaders. Anticipating what the world would be like in the year 2000, the book is interesting both for its hits (trains and cars resulting in the dispersion of populations from cities to suburbs; moral restrictions declining as men and women seek greater sexual freedom; the defeat of German militarism, and the existence of a European Union) and its misses (he did not expect successful aircraft before 1950, and averred that "my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocate its crew and founder at sea").
His bestselling two-volume work, The Outline of History (1920), began a new era of popularised world history. It received a mixed critical response from professional historians. However, it was very popular amongst the general population and made Wells a rich man. Many other authors followed with "Outlines" of their own in other subjects. He reprised his Outline in 1922 with a much shorter popular work, A Short History of the World, a history book praised by Albert Einstein, and two long efforts, The Science of Life (1930)—written with his son G. P. Wells and evolutionary biologist Julian Huxley, and The Work, Wealth and Happiness of Mankind (1931). The "Outlines" became sufficiently common for James Thurber to parody the trend in his humorous essay, "An Outline of Scientists"—indeed, Wells's Outline of History remains in print with a new 2005 edition, while A Short History of the World has been re-edited (2006).
From quite early in Wells's career, he sought a better way to organise society and wrote a number of Utopian novels. The first of these was A Modern Utopia (1905), which shows a worldwide utopia with "no imports but meteorites, and no exports at all"; two travellers from our world fall into its alternate history. The others usually begin with the world rushing to catastrophe, until people realise a better way of living: whether by mysterious gases from a comet causing people to behave rationally and abandoning a European war (In the Days of the Comet (1906)), or a world council of scientists taking over, as in The Shape of Things to Come (1933, which he later adapted for the 1936 Alexander Korda film, Things to Come). This depicted, all too accurately, the impending World War, with cities being destroyed by aerial bombs. He also portrayed the rise of fascist dictators in The Autocracy of Mr Parham (1930) and The Holy Terror (1939). Men Like Gods (1923) is also a utopian novel. Wells in this period was regarded as an enormously influential figure; the critic Malcolm Cowley stated: "by the time he was forty, his influence was wider than any other living English writer".
Wells contemplates the ideas of nature and nurture and questions humanity in books such as The First Men in the Moon, where nature is completely suppressed by nurture, and The Island of Doctor Moreau, where the strong presence of nature represents a threat to a civilized society. Not all his scientific romances ended in a Utopia, and Wells also wrote a dystopian novel, When the Sleeper Wakes (1899, rewritten as The Sleeper Awakes, 1910), which pictures a future society where the classes have become more and more separated, leading to a revolt of the masses against the rulers. The Island of Doctor Moreau is even darker. The narrator, having been trapped on an island of animals vivisected (unsuccessfully) into human beings, eventually returns to England; like Gulliver on his return from the Houyhnhnms, he finds himself unable to shake off the perceptions of his fellow humans as barely civilised beasts, slowly reverting to their animal natures.
Wells also wrote the preface for the first edition of W. N. P. Barbellion's diaries, The Journal of a Disappointed Man, published in 1919. Since "Barbellion" was the real author's pen name, many reviewers believed Wells to have been the true author of the Journal; Wells always denied this, despite being full of praise for the diaries.
In 1927, a Canadian teacher and writer Florence Deeks unsuccessfully sued Wells for infringement of copyright and breach of trust, claiming that much of The Outline of History had been plagiarised from her unpublished manuscript, The Web of the World's Romance, which had spent nearly nine months in the hands of Wells's Canadian publisher, Macmillan Canada. However, it was sworn on oath at the trial that the manuscript remained in Toronto in the safekeeping of Macmillan, and that Wells did not even know it existed, let alone had seen it. The court found no proof of copying, and decided the similarities were due to the fact that the books had similar nature and both writers had access to the same sources. In 2000, A. B. McKillop, a professor of history at Carleton University, produced a book on the case, The Spinster & The Prophet: Florence Deeks, H. G. Wells, and the Mystery of the Purloined Past. According to McKillop, the lawsuit was unsuccessful due to the prejudice against a woman suing a well-known and famous male author, and he paints a detailed story based on the circumstantial evidence of the case. In 2004, Denis N. Magnusson, Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Law, Queen's University, Ontario, published an article on Deeks v. Wells. This re-examines the case in relation to McKillop's book. While having some sympathy for Deeks, he argues that she had a weak case that was not well presented, and though she may have met with sexism from her lawyers, she received a fair trial, adding that the law applied is essentially the same law that would be applied to a similar case today (i.e., 2004).
In 1933, Wells predicted in The Shape of Things to Come that the world war he feared would begin in January 1940, a prediction which ultimately came true four months early, in September 1939, with the outbreak of World War II. In 1936, before the Royal Institution, Wells called for the compilation of a constantly growing and changing World Encyclopaedia, to be reviewed by outstanding authorities and made accessible to every human being. In 1938, he published a collection of essays on the future organisation of knowledge and education, World Brain, including the essay "The Idea of a Permanent World Encyclopaedia".
Prior to 1933, Wells's books were widely read in Germany and Austria, and most of his science fiction works had been translated shortly after publication. By 1933, he had attracted the attention of German officials because of his criticism of the political situation in Germany, and on 10 May 1933, Wells's books were burned by the Nazi youth in Berlin's Opernplatz, and his works were banned from libraries and book stores. Wells, as president of PEN International (Poets, Essayists, Novelists), angered the Nazis by overseeing the expulsion of the German PEN club from the international body in 1934 following the German PEN's refusal to admit non-Aryan writers to its membership. At a PEN conference in Ragusa, Wells refused to yield to Nazi sympathisers who demanded that the exiled author Ernst Toller be prevented from speaking. Near the end of World War II, Allied forces discovered that the SS had compiled lists of people slated for immediate arrest during the invasion of Britain in the abandoned Operation Sea Lion, with Wells included in the alphabetical list of "The Black Book".
Wartime works
Seeking a more structured way to play war games, Wells wrote Floor Games (1911) followed by Little Wars (1913), which set out rules for fighting battles with toy soldiers (miniatures). A pacifist prior to the First World War, Wells stated "how much better is this amiable miniature [war] than the real thing". According to Wells, the idea of the game developed from a visit by his friend Jerome K. Jerome. After dinner, Jerome began shooting down toy soldiers with a toy cannon and Wells joined in to compete.
During August 1914, immediately after the outbreak of the First World War, Wells published a number of articles in London newspapers that subsequently appeared as a book entitled The War That Will End War. He coined the expression with the idealistic belief that the result of the war would make a future conflict impossible. Wells blamed the Central Powers for the coming of the war and argued that only the defeat of German militarism could bring about an end to war. Wells used the shorter form of the phrase, "the war to end war", in In the Fourth Year (1918), in which he noted that the phrase "got into circulation" in the second half of 1914. In fact, it had become one of the most common catchphrases of the war.
In 1918 Wells worked for the British War Propaganda Bureau, also called Wellington House. Wells was also one of fifty-three leading British authors — a number that included Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — who signed their names to the “Authors' Declaration.” This manifesto declared that the German invasion of Belgium had been a brutal crime, and that Britain “could not without dishonour have refused to take part in the present war.”
Travels to Russia and the Soviet Union
Wells visited Russia three times: 1914, 1920 and 1934. During his second visit, he saw his old friend Maxim Gorky and with Gorky's help, met Vladimir Lenin. In his book Russia in the Shadows, Wells portrayed Russia as recovering from a total social collapse, "the completest that has ever happened to any modern social organisation." On 23 July 1934, after visiting U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Wells went to the Soviet Union and interviewed Joseph Stalin for three hours for the New Statesman magazine, which was extremely rare at that time. He told Stalin how he had seen 'the happy faces of healthy people' in contrast with his previous visit to Moscow in 1920. However, he also criticised the lawlessness, class discrimination, state violence, and absence of free expression. Stalin enjoyed the conversation and replied accordingly. As the chairman of the London-based PEN International, which protected the rights of authors to write without being intimidated, Wells hoped by his trip to USSR, he could win Stalin over by force of argument. Before he left, he realised that no reform was to happen in the near future.
Final years
Wells’s greatest literary output occurred before the First World War, which was lamented by younger authors whom he had influenced. In this connection, George Orwell described Wells as "too sane to understand the modern world", and "since 1920 he has squandered his talents in slaying paper dragons." G. K. Chesterton quipped: "Mr Wells is a born storyteller who has sold his birthright for a pot of message".
Wells had diabetes, and was a co-founder in 1934 of The Diabetic Association (now Diabetes UK, the leading charity for people with diabetes in the UK).
On 28 October 1940, on the radio station KTSA in San Antonio, Texas, Wells took part in a radio interview with Orson Welles, who two years previously had performed a famous radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds. During the interview, by Charles C Shaw, a KTSA radio host, Wells admitted his surprise at the sensation that resulted from the broadcast but acknowledged his debt to Welles for increasing sales of one of his "more obscure" titles.
Death
Wells died of unspecified causes on 13 August 1946, aged 79, at his home at 13 Hanover Terrace, overlooking Regent's Park, London. In his preface to the 1941 edition of The War in the Air, Wells had stated that his epitaph should be: "I told you so. You damned fools". Wells's body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on 16 August 1946; his ashes were subsequently scattered into the English Channel at Old Harry Rocks, the most eastern point of the Jurassic Coast and about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) from Swanage in Dorset.
A commemorative blue plaque in his honour was installed by the Greater London Council at his home in Regent's Park in 1966.
Futurist
A futurist and “visionary”, Wells foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. Asserting that "Wells' visions of the future remain unsurpassed", John Higgs, author of Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century, states that in the late 19th century Wells “saw the coming century clearer than anyone else. He anticipated wars in the air, the sexual revolution, motorised transport causing the growth of suburbs and a proto-Wikipedia he called the "world brain". In his novel The World Set Free, he imagined an “atomic bomb” of terrifying power that would be dropped from aeroplanes. This was an extraordinary insight for an author writing in 1913, and it made a deep impression on Winston Churchill."
In 2011, Wells was among a group of science fiction writers featured in the Prophets of Science Fiction series, a show produced and hosted by film director Sir Ridley Scott, which depicts how predictions influenced the development of scientific advancements by inspiring many readers to assist in transforming those futuristic visions into everyday reality. In a 2013 review of The Time Machine for the New Yorker magazine, Brad Leithauser writes, "At the base of Wells's great visionary exploit is this rational, ultimately scientific attempt to tease out the potential future consequences of present conditions—not as they might arise in a few years, or even decades, but millennia hence, epochs hence. He is world literature's Great Extrapolator. Like no other fiction writer before him, he embraced "deep time."
Political views
Wells was a socialist and a member of the Fabian Society. Winston Churchill was an avid reader of Wells's books, and after they first met in 1902 they kept in touch until Wells died in 1946. As a junior minister Churchill borrowed lines from Wells for one of his most famous early landmark speeches in 1906, and as Prime Minister the phrase "the gathering storm"—used by Churchill to describe the rise of Nazi Germany—had been written by Wells in The War of the Worlds, which depicts an attack on Britain by Martians. Wells's extensive writings on equality and human rights, most notably his most influential work, The Rights of Man (1940), laid the groundwork for the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations shortly after his death.
His efforts regarding the League of Nations, on which he collaborated on the project with Leonard Woolf with the booklets The Idea of a League of Nations, Prolegomena to the Study of World Organization, and The Way of the League of Nations, became a disappointment as the organization turned out to be a weak one unable to prevent the Second World War, which itself occurred towards the very end of his life and only increased the pessimistic side of his nature. In his last book Mind at the End of Its Tether (1945), he considered the idea that humanity being replaced by another species might not be a bad idea. He referred to the era between the two World Wars as "The Age of Frustration".
Religious views
Wells's views on God and religion changed over his lifetime. Early in his life he distanced himself from Christianity, and later from theism, and finally, late in life, he was essentially atheistic. Martin Gardner summarises this progression:[The younger Wells] ... did not object to using the word "God" provided it did not imply anything resembling human personality. In his middle years Wells went through a phase of defending the concept of a "finite God," similar to the god of such process theologians as Samuel Alexander, Edgar Brightman, and Charles Hartshorne. (He even wrote a book about it called God the Invisible King.) Later Wells decided he was really an atheist.
In God the Invisible King (1917), Wells wrote that his idea of God did not draw upon the traditional religions of the world: This book sets out as forcibly and exactly as possible the religious belief of the writer. [Which] is a profound belief in a personal and intimate God. ... Putting the leading idea of this book very roughly, these two antagonistic typical conceptions of God may be best contrasted by speaking of one of them as God-as-Nature or the Creator, and of the other as God-as-Christ or the Redeemer. One is the great Outward God; the other is the Inmost God. The first idea was perhaps developed most highly and completely in the God of Spinoza. It is a conception of God tending to pantheism, to an idea of a comprehensive God as ruling with justice rather than affection, to a conception of aloofness and awestriking worshipfulness. The second idea, which is contradictory to this idea of an absolute God, is the God of the human heart. The writer suggested that the great outline of the theological struggles of that phase of civilisation and world unity which produced Christianity, was a persistent but unsuccessful attempt to get these two different ideas of God into one focus. Later in the work, he aligns himself with a "renascent or modern religion ... neither atheist nor Buddhist nor Mohammedan nor Christian ... [that] he has found growing up in himself".
Of Christianity, he said: "it is not now true for me. ... Every believing Christian is, I am sure, my spiritual brother ... but if systemically I called myself a Christian I feel that to most men I should imply too much and so tell a lie". Of other world religions, he writes: "All these religions are true for me as Canterbury Cathedral is a true thing and as a Swiss chalet is a true thing. There they are, and they have served a purpose, they have worked. Only they are not true for me to live in them. ... They do not work for me". In The Fate of Homo Sapiens (1939), Wells criticised almost all world religions and philosophies, stating "there is no creed, no way of living left in the world at all, that really meets the needs of the time… When we come to look at them coolly and dispassionately, all the main religions, patriotic, moral and customary systems in which human beings are sheltering today, appear to be in a state of jostling and mutually destructive movement, like the houses and palaces and other buildings of some vast, sprawling city overtaken by a landslide.
Wells's opposition to organised religion reached a fever pitch in 1943 with publication of his book Crux Ansata, subtitled "An Indictment of the Roman Catholic Church".
Literary influence and legacy
The science fiction historian John Clute describes Wells as "the most important writer the genre has yet seen", and notes his work has been central to both British and American science fiction. Science fiction author and critic Algis Budrys said Wells "remains the outstanding expositor of both the hope, and the despair, which are embodied in the technology and which are the major facts of life in our world". He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921, 1932, 1935, and 1946. Wells so influenced real exploration of space that an impact crater on Mars (and the Moon) was named after him.
In the United Kingdom, Wells's work was a key model for the British "scientific romance", and other writers in that mode, such as Olaf Stapledon, J. D. Beresford, S. Fowler Wright, and Naomi Mitchison, all drew on Wells's example. Wells was also an important influence on British science fiction of the period after the Second World War, with Arthur C. Clarke and Brian Aldiss expressing strong admiration for Wells's work. Among contemporary British science fiction writers, Stephen Baxter, Christopher Priest and Adam Roberts have all acknowledged Wells's influence on their writing; all three are Vice-Presidents of the H. G. Wells Society. He also had a strong influence on British scientist J. B. S. Haldane, who wrote Daedalus; or, Science and the Future (1924), "The Last Judgement" and "On Being the Right Size" from the essay collection Possible Worlds (1927), and Biological Possibilities for the Human Species in the Next Ten Thousand Years (1963), which are speculations about the future of human evolution and life on other planets. Haldane gave several lectures about these topics which in turn influenced other science fiction writers.
In the United States, Hugo Gernsback reprinted most of Wells's work in the pulp magazine Amazing Stories, regarding Wells's work as "texts of central importance to the self-conscious new genre". Later American writers such as Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Carl Sagan, and Ursula K. Le Guin all recalled being influenced by Wells.
Sinclair Lewis's early novels were strongly influenced by Wells's realistic social novels, such as The History of Mr Polly; Lewis also named his first son Wells after the author. Lewis nominated H. G. Wells for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.
In an interview with The Paris Review, Vladimir Nabokov described Wells as his favourite writer when he was a boy and "a great artist." He went on to cite The Passionate Friends, Ann Veronica, The Time Machine, and The Country of the Blind as superior to anything else written by Wells's British contemporaries. Nabokov said: "His sociological cogitations can be safely ignored, of course, but his romances and fantasies are superb."
Jorge Luis Borges wrote many short pieces on Wells in which he demonstrates a deep familiarity with much of Wells's work. While Borges wrote several critical reviews, including a mostly negative review of Wells's film Things to Come, he regularly treated Wells as a canonical figure of fantastic literature. Late in his life, Borges included The Invisible Man and The Time Machine in his Prologue to a Personal Library, a curated list of 100 great works of literature that he undertook at the behest of the Argentine publishing house Emecé. Canadian author Margaret Atwood read Wells's books, and he also inspired writers of European speculative fiction such as Karel Čapek and Yevgeny Zamyatin.
Representations
Literary
The superhuman protagonist of J. D. Beresford's 1911 novel, The Hampdenshire Wonder, Victor Stott, was based on Wells.
In M. P. Shiel's short story "The Primate of the Rose" (1928), there is an unpleasant womaniser named E. P. Crooks, who was written as a parody of Wells. Wells had attacked Shiel's Prince Zaleski when it was published in 1895, and this was Shiel's response. Wells praised Shiel's The Purple Cloud (1901); in turn Shiel expressed admiration for Wells, referring to him at a speech to the Horsham Rotary Club in 1933 as "my friend Mr. Wells".
In C. S. Lewis's novel That Hideous Strength (1945), the character Jules is a caricature of Wells, and much of Lewis's science fiction was written both under the influence of Wells and as an antithesis to his work (or, as he put it, an "exorcism" of the influence it had on him).
In Brian Aldiss's novella The Saliva Tree (1966), Wells has a small off-screen guest role.
In Saul Bellow's novel Mr. Sammler's Planet (1970), Wells is one of several historical figures the protagonist met when he was a young man.
In The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock (1976) Wells has an important part.
In The Map of Time (2008) by Spanish author Félix J. Palma; Wells is one of several historical characters.
Wells is one of the two Georges in Paul Levinson's 2013 time-travel novelette, "Ian, George, and George," published in Analog magazine.
Dramatic
Rod Taylor portrays Wells in the 1960 science fiction film The Time Machine (based on the novel of the same name), in which Wells uses his time machine to try and find his Utopian society.
Malcolm McDowell portrays Wells in the 1979 science fiction film Time After Time, in which Wells uses a time machine to pursue Jack the Ripper to the present day. In the film, Wells meets "Amy" in the future who then returns to 1893 to become his second wife Amy Catherine Robbins.
Wells is portrayed in the 1985 story Timelash from the 22nd season of the BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who. In this story, Herbert, an enthusiastic temporary companion to the Doctor, is revealed to be a young H. G. Wells. The plot is loosely based upon the themes and characters of The Time Machine with references to The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man and The Island of Doctor Moreau. The story jokingly suggests that Wells's inspiration for his later novels came from his adventure with the Sixth Doctor.
In the BBC2 anthology series Encounters about imagined meetings between historical figures, Beautiful Lies, by Paul Pender (15 August 1992) centred on an acrimonious dinner party attended by Wells (Richard Todd), George Orwell (Jon Finch), and William Empson (Patrick Ryecart).
The character of Wells also appeared in several episodes of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993–1997), usually pitted against the time-travelling villain known as Tempus (Lane Davies). Wells's younger self was played by Terry Kiser, and the older Wells was played by Hamilton Camp.
In the British TV mini-series The Infinite Worlds of H. G. Wells (2001), several of Wells's short stories are dramatised but are adapted using Wells himself (Tom Ward) as the main protagonist in each story.
In the Disney Channel Original Series Phil of the Future, which centres on time-travel, the present-day high school that the main characters attend is named "H. G. Wells".
In the 2006 television docudrama H. G. Wells: War with the World, Wells is played by Michael Sheen.
Television episode "World's End" of Cold Case (2007) is about the discovery of human remains in the bottom of a well leads to the reinvestigation of the case of a housewife who went missing during Orson Welles' radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds".
On the science fiction television series Warehouse 13 (2009–2014), there is a female version Helena G. Wells. When she appeared she explained that her brother was her front for her writing because a female science fiction author would not be accepted.
Comedian Paul F. Tompkins portrays a fictional Wells as the host of The Dead Authors Podcast, wherein Wells uses his time machine to bring dead authors (played by other comedians) to the present and interview them.
H. G. Wells as a young boy appears in the Legends of Tomorrow episode "The Magnificent Eight". In this story, the boy Wells is dying of consumption but is cured by a time-travelling Martin Stein.
In the four part series The Nightmare Worlds of H. G. Wells (2016), Wells is played by Ray Winstone.
In the 2017 television series version of Time After Time, based on the 1979 film, H. G. Wells is portrayed by Freddie Stroma.
In the 2019 television adaptation of The War of the Worlds, the character of 'George', played by Rafe Spall, demonstrates a number of elements of Wells's own life, including his estrangement from his wife and unmarried co-habitation with the character of 'Amy'.
Literary papers
In 1954, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign purchased the H. G. Wells literary papers and correspondence collection. The University's Rare Book & Manuscript Library holds the largest collection of Wells manuscripts, correspondence, first editions and publications in the United States. Among these is unpublished material and the manuscripts of such works as The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine. The collection includes first editions, revisions and translations. The letters contain general family correspondence, communications from publishers, material regarding the Fabian Society, and letters from politicians and public figures, most notably George Bernard Shaw and Joseph Conrad.
Bibliography
See also
References
Further reading
Dickson, Lovat. H. G. Wells: His Turbulent Life & Times. 1969.
Foot, Michael. H. G.: History of Mr. Wells. Doubleday, 1985 (), Black Swan, New edition, Oct 1996 (paperback, )
Gilmour, David. The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002 (paperback, ); 2003 (paperback, ).
Gomme, A. W., Mr. Wells as Historian. Glasgow: MacLehose, Jackson, and Co., 1921.
Gosling, John. Waging the War of the Worlds. Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland, 2009 (paperback, ).
Jasanoff, Maya, "The Future Was His" (review of Sarah Cole, Inventing Tomorrow: H.G. Wells and the Twentieth Century, Columbia University Press, 374 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXVII, no. 12 (23 July 2020), pp. 50–51. Writes Jasanoff (p. 51): "Although [Wells] was prophetically right, and right-minded, about some things... [n]owhere was he more disturbingly wrong than in his loathsome affinity for eugenics..."
Lynn, Andrea The secret love life of H.G. Wells
Mackenzie, Norman and Jean, The Time Traveller: the Life of H G Wells, London: Weidenfeld, 1973,
Mauthner, Martin. German Writers in French Exile, 1933–1940, London: Vallentine and Mitchell, 2007, .
McLean, Steven. 'The Early Fiction of H. G. Wells: Fantasies of Science'. Palgrave, 2009, .
Partington, John S. Building Cosmopolis: The Political Thought of H. G. Wells. Ashgate, 2003, .
Roberts, Adam. H G Wells A Literary Life. Springer International Publishing, 2019, ISBN 9783030264215.
Shadurski, Maxim. The Nationality of Utopia: H. G. Wells, England, and the World State. London: Routledge, 2020, .
Sherborne, Michael. H. G. Wells: Another Kind of Life. London: Peter Owen, 2010, .
Smith, David C., H. G. Wells: Desperately Mortal: A Biography. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986,
West, Anthony. H. G. Wells: Aspects of a Life. London: Hutchinson, 1984.
External links
Future Tense – The Story of H. G. Wells at BBC One – 150th anniversary documentary (2016)
"In the footsteps of H G Wells" at New Statesman – "The great author called for a Human Rights Act; 60 years later, we have it" (2000)
Sources—collections
*
Free H. G. Wells downloads for iPhone, iPad, Nook, Android, and Kindle in PDF and all popular eBook reader formats (AZW3, EPUB, MOBI) at ebooktakeaway.com
H G Wells at the British Library
H. G. Wells papers at University of Illinois
Ebooks by H. G. Wells at Global Grey Ebooks
Sources—letters, essays and interviews
Archive of Wells's BBC broadcasts
Film interview with H. G. Wells
"Stephen Crane. From an English Standpoint", by Wells, 1900.
Rabindranath Tagore: In conversation with H. G. Wells. Rabindranath Tagore and Wells conversing in Geneva in 1930.
"Introduction", to W. N. P. Barbellion's The Journal of a Disappointed Man, by Wells, 1919.
"Woman and Primitive Culture", by Wells, 1895.
Letter, to M. P. Shiel, by Wells, 1937.
Biography
"H. G. Wells". In Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Critical essays
An introduction to The War of the Worlds by Iain Sinclair on the British Library's Discovering Literature website.
"An Appreciation of H. G. Wells", by Mary Austin, 1911.
"Socialism and the Family" (1906) by Belfort Bax, Part 1, Part 2.
"H. G. Wells warned us how it would feel to fight a War of the Worlds", by Niall Ferguson, in The Telegraph, 24 June 2005.
"H. G. Wells's Idea of a World Brain: A Critical Re-assessment", by W. Boyd Rayward, in Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50 (15 May 1999): 557–579
"Mr H. G. Wells and the Giants", by G. K. Chesterton, from his book Heretics (1908).
"The Internet: a world brain?", by Martin Gardner, in Skeptical Inquirer, Jan–Feb 1999.
"Science Fiction: The Shape of Things to Come", by Mark Bould, in The Socialist Review, May 2005.
"Who needs Utopia? A dialogue with my utopian self (with apologies, and thanks, to H. G. Wells)", by Gregory Claeys in Spaces of Utopia: An Electronic Journal, no 1, Spring 2006.
"When H. G. Wells Split the Atom: A 1914 Preview of 1945", by Freda Kirchwey, in The Nation, posted 4 September 2003 (original 18 August 1945 issue).
"Wells, Hitler and the World State", by George Orwell. First published: Horizon. GB, London. Aug 1941.
"War of the Worldviews", by John J. Miller, in The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal, 21 June 2005.
"Wells's Autobiography", by John Hart, from New International, Vol.2 No.2, Mar 1935, pp. 75–76.
"History in the Science Fiction of H. G. Wells", by Patrick Parrinder, Cycnos, 22.2 (2006).
"From the World Brain to the Worldwide Web", by Martin Campbell-Kelly, Gresham College Lecture, 9 November 2006.
"The Beginning of Wisdom: On Reading H. G. Wells", by Vivian Gornick, Boston Review, 31.1 (2007).
John Hammond, The Complete List of Short Stories of H. G. Wells
"H. G. Wells Predictions Ring True, 143 Years Later" at National Geographic
"H. G. Wells, the man I knew" Obituary of Wells by George Bernard Shaw, at the New Statesman
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"I Told You So is a 1970 Ghanaian movie. The movie portrays Ghanaians and their way of life in a satirical style. It also gives insight into the life of a young lady who did not take the advice of her father when about to marry a man, she did not know anything about the man she was going to marry, but rather took her mother's and uncle's advice because of the wealth and power the man has.\n\nThe young lady later finds out that the man she is supposed to marry was an armed robber. She was unhappy of the whole incident. When her dad ask what had happened, she replied that the man she was supposed to marry is an armed robber; her father ended by saying \"I told you so\".\n\nCast\nBobe Cole\nMargret Quainoo (Araba Stamp)\nKweku Crankson (Osuo Abrobor)\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n I TOLD YOU SO GHANAIAN MOVIE\n\n1970 films\nGhanaian films",
"Marianus III (died 1321) was the sole Giudice of Arborea from 1308 to his death. He co-ruled with his elder brother Andrew from the death of their father, John of Arborea, in 1304. Their mother was Vera Cappai. They were illegitimate.\n\nIn 1312, he was constrained by the Republic of Pisa to buy his own right of succession from the Emperor Henry VII and to marry Constance of Montalcino by proxy. In 1314, he requested aid from the Crown of Aragon against the Pisans.\n\nHe restored roads and bridges, complete the walls of Oristano and her defensive towers, and constructed a new archiepiscopal palace.\n\nHe never did marry Constance, but he did cohabitate with Padulesa de Serra, who gave him six children, among whom was his successor, Hugh II.\n\n1321 deaths\nJudges (judikes) of Arborea\nYear of birth unknown"
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"Who did he marry",
"1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells."
] | C_86cc13fd852e4219a6fc0d2d8dd4d80e_0 | What happened to the couple | 2 | What happened to H.G. Wells and Isabel Mary Wells? | H. G. Wells | In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells. The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham. In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where in 1901 he constructed a large family home: Spade House. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip") in 1901 (died 1985) and Frank Richard in 1903 (died 1982). With his wife Jane's consent, Wells had affairs with a number of women, including the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger, adventurer and writer Odette Keun, Soviet spy Moura Budberg and novelist Elizabeth von Arnim. In 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society; and in 1914, a son, Anthony West (1914-1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells' "sordid intrigue" with the daughter of veteran Fabian Sidney Olivier, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011) - a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note) - gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others. Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989). CANNOTANSWER | The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students, | Herbert George Wells (21 September 186613 August 1946) was an English writer. Prolific in many genres, he wrote dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, history, satire, biography and autobiography. His work also included two books on recreational war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is sometimes called the "father of science fiction."
During his own lifetime, however, he was most prominent as a forward-looking, even prophetic social critic who devoted his literary talents to the development of a progressive vision on a global scale. A futurist, he wrote a number of utopian works and foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. His science fiction imagined time travel, alien invasion, invisibility, and biological engineering. Brian Aldiss referred to Wells as the "Shakespeare of science fiction", while American writer Charles Fort referred to him as a "wild talent".
Wells rendered his works convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work – dubbed “Wells's law” – leading Joseph Conrad to hail him in 1898 as "O Realist of the Fantastic!". His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), which was his first novel, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), The War of the Worlds (1898) and the military science fiction The War in the Air (1907). Wells was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature four times.
Wells's earliest specialised training was in biology, and his thinking on ethical matters took place in a specifically and fundamentally Darwinian context. He was also an outspoken socialist from a young age, often (but not always, as at the beginning of the First World War) sympathising with pacifist views. His later works became increasingly political and didactic, and he wrote little science fiction, while he sometimes indicated on official documents that his profession was that of journalist. Novels such as Kipps and The History of Mr Polly, which describe lower-middle-class life, led to the suggestion that he was a worthy successor to Charles Dickens, but Wells described a range of social strata and even attempted, in Tono-Bungay (1909), a diagnosis of English society as a whole. Wells was a diabetic and co-founded the charity The Diabetic Association (known today as Diabetes UK) in 1934.
Life
Early life
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on 21 September 1866. Called "Bertie" by his family, he was the fourth and last child of Joseph Wells, a former domestic gardener, and at the time a shopkeeper and professional cricketer and Sarah Neal, a former domestic servant. An inheritance had allowed the family to acquire a shop in which they sold china and sporting goods, although it failed to prosper: the stock was old and worn out, and the location was poor. Joseph Wells managed to earn a meagre income, but little of it came from the shop and he received an unsteady amount of money from playing professional cricket for the Kent county team.
A defining incident of young Wells's life was an accident in 1874 that left him bedridden with a broken leg. To pass the time he began to read books from the local library, brought to him by his father. He soon became devoted to the other worlds and lives to which books gave him access; they also stimulated his desire to write. Later that year he entered Thomas Morley's Commercial Academy, a private school founded in 1849, following the bankruptcy of Morley's earlier school. The teaching was erratic, the curriculum mostly focused, Wells later said, on producing copperplate handwriting and doing the sort of sums useful to tradesmen. Wells continued at Morley's Academy until 1880. In 1877, his father, Joseph Wells, suffered a fractured thigh. The accident effectively put an end to Joseph's career as a cricketer, and his subsequent earnings as a shopkeeper were not enough to compensate for the loss of the primary source of family income.
No longer able to support themselves financially, the family instead sought to place their sons as apprentices in various occupations. From 1880 to 1883, Wells had an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at Hyde's Drapery Emporium in Southsea. His experiences at Hyde's, where he worked a thirteen-hour day and slept in a dormitory with other apprentices, later inspired his novels The Wheels of Chance, The History of Mr Polly, and Kipps, which portray the life of a draper's apprentice as well as providing a critique of society's distribution of wealth.
Wells's parents had a turbulent marriage, owing primarily to his mother's being a Protestant and his father's being a freethinker. When his mother returned to work as a lady's maid (at Uppark, a country house in Sussex), one of the conditions of work was that she would not be permitted to have living space for her husband and children. Thereafter, she and Joseph lived separate lives, though they never divorced and remained faithful to each other. As a consequence, Herbert's personal troubles increased as he subsequently failed as a draper and also, later, as a chemist's assistant. However, Uppark had a magnificent library in which he immersed himself, reading many classic works, including Plato's Republic, Thomas More's Utopia, and the works of Daniel Defoe. This was the beginning of Wells's venture into literature.
Teacher
In October 1879, Wells's mother arranged through a distant relative, Arthur Williams, for him to join the National School at Wookey in Somerset as a pupil–teacher, a senior pupil who acted as a teacher of younger children. In December that year, however, Williams was dismissed for irregularities in his qualifications and Wells was returned to Uppark. After a short apprenticeship at a chemist in nearby Midhurst and an even shorter stay as a boarder at Midhurst Grammar School, he signed his apprenticeship papers at Hyde's. In 1883, Wells persuaded his parents to release him from the apprenticeship, taking an opportunity offered by Midhurst Grammar School again to become a pupil–teacher; his proficiency in Latin and science during his earlier short stay had been remembered.
The years he spent in Southsea had been the most miserable of his life to that point, but his good fortune at securing a position at Midhurst Grammar School meant that Wells could continue his self-education in earnest. The following year, Wells won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science (later the Royal College of Science in South Kensington, now part of Imperial College London) in London, studying biology under Thomas Henry Huxley. As an alumnus, he later helped to set up the Royal College of Science Association, of which he became the first president in 1909. Wells studied in his new school until 1887, with a weekly allowance of 21 shillings (a guinea) thanks to his scholarship. This ought to have been a comfortable sum of money (at the time many working class families had "round about a pound a week" as their entire household income), yet in his Experiment in Autobiography Wells speaks of constantly being hungry, and indeed photographs of him at the time show a youth who is very thin and malnourished.
He soon entered the Debating Society of the school. These years mark the beginning of his interest in a possible reformation of society. At first approaching the subject through Plato's Republic, he soon turned to contemporary ideas of socialism as expressed by the recently formed Fabian Society and free lectures delivered at Kelmscott House, the home of William Morris. He was also among the founders of The Science School Journal, a school magazine that allowed him to express his views on literature and society, as well as trying his hand at fiction; a precursor to his novel The Time Machine was published in the journal under the title The Chronic Argonauts. The school year 1886–87 was the last year of his studies.
During 1888, Wells stayed in Stoke-on-Trent, living in Basford. The unique environment of The Potteries was certainly an inspiration. He wrote in a letter to a friend from the area that "the district made an immense impression on me." The inspiration for some of his descriptions in The War of the Worlds is thought to have come from his short time spent here, seeing the iron foundry furnaces burn over the city, shooting huge red light into the skies. His stay in The Potteries also resulted in the macabre short story "The Cone" (1895, contemporaneous with his famous The Time Machine), set in the north of the city.
After teaching for some time, he was briefly on the staff of Holt Academy in Wales – Wells found it necessary to supplement his knowledge relating to educational principles and methodology and entered the College of Preceptors (College of Teachers). He later received his Licentiate and Fellowship FCP diplomas from the college. It was not until 1890 that Wells earned a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology from the University of London External Programme. In 1889–90, he managed to find a post as a teacher at Henley House School in London, where he taught A. A. Milne (whose father ran the school). His first published work was a Text-Book of Biology in two volumes (1893).
Upon leaving the Normal School of Science, Wells was left without a source of income. His aunt Mary—his father's sister-in-law—invited him to stay with her for a while, which solved his immediate problem of accommodation. During his stay at his aunt's residence, he grew increasingly interested in her daughter, Isabel, whom he later courted. To earn money, he began writing short humorous articles for journals such as The Pall Mall Gazette, later collecting these in volume form as Select Conversations with an Uncle (1895) and Certain Personal Matters (1897). So prolific did Wells become at this mode of journalism that many of his early pieces remain unidentified. According to David C. Smith, "Most of Wells's occasional pieces have not been collected, and many have not even been identified as his. Wells did not automatically receive the byline his reputation demanded until after 1896 or so ... As a result, many of his early pieces are unknown. It is obvious that many early Wells items have been lost." His success with these shorter pieces encouraged him to write book-length work, and he published his first novel, The Time Machine, in 1895.
Personal life
In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells (1865–1931; from 1902 Isabel Mary Smith). The couple agreed to separate in 1894, when he had fallen in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (1872–1927; later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey, in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton' (now No.141), Maybury Road, in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Doctor Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When the Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham.
In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames, for two years; this lasted until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where he constructed a large family home, Spade House, in 1901. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip"; 1901–1985) and Frank Richard (1903–1982) (grandfather of film director Simon Wells). Jane died on 6 October 1927, in Dunmow, at the age of 55.
Wells had affairs with a significant number of women. In December 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society. Amber had married the barrister G. R. Blanco White in July of that year, as co-arranged by Wells. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells's "sordid intrigue" with Amber, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. Between 1910 and 1913, novelist Elizabeth von Arnim was one of his mistresses. In 1914, he had a son, Anthony West (1914–1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. In 1920–21, and intermittently until his death, he had a love affair with the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger.
Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with the 22-year younger Dutch adventurer and writer Odette Keun, with whom he lived in Lou Pidou, a house they built together in Grasse, France. Wells dedicated his longest book to her (The World of William Clissold, 1926). When visiting Maxim Gorky in Russia 1920, he had slept with Gorky's mistress Moura Budberg, then still Countess Benckendorf and 27 years his junior. In 1933, when she left Gorky and emigrated to London, their relationship renewed and she cared for him through his final illness. Wells repeatedly asked her to marry him, but Budberg strongly rejected his proposals.
In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011)—a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note)—gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others.
Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989).
Artist
One of the ways that Wells expressed himself was through his drawings and sketches. One common location for these was the endpapers and title pages of his own diaries, and they covered a wide variety of topics, from political commentary to his feelings toward his literary contemporaries and his current romantic interests. During his marriage to Amy Catherine, whom he nicknamed Jane, he drew a considerable number of pictures, many of them being overt comments on their marriage. During this period, he called these pictures "picshuas". These picshuas have been the topic of study by Wells scholars for many years, and in 2006, a book was published on the subject.
Writer
Some of his early novels, called "scientific romances", invented several themes now classic in science fiction in such works as The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, When the Sleeper Wakes, and The First Men in the Moon. He also wrote realistic novels that received critical acclaim, including Kipps and a critique of English culture during the Edwardian period, Tono-Bungay. Wells also wrote dozens of short stories and novellas, including, "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid", which helped bring the full impact of Darwin's revolutionary botanical ideas to a wider public, and was followed by many later successes such as "The Country of the Blind" (1904).
According to James E. Gunn, one of Wells's major contributions to the science fiction genre was his approach, which he referred to as his "new system of ideas". In his opinion, the author should always strive to make the story as credible as possible, even if both the writer and the reader knew certain elements are impossible, allowing the reader to accept the ideas as something that could really happen, today referred to as "the plausible impossible" and "suspension of disbelief". While neither invisibility nor time travel was new in speculative fiction, Wells added a sense of realism to the concepts which the readers were not familiar with. He conceived the idea of using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposely and selectively forwards or backwards in time. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle. He explained that while writing The Time Machine, he realized that "the more impossible the story I had to tell, the more ordinary must be the setting, and the circumstances in which I now set the Time Traveller were all that I could imagine of solid upper-class comforts." In "Wells's Law", a science fiction story should contain only a single extraordinary assumption. Therefore, as justifications for the impossible, he employed scientific ideas and theories. Wells's best-known statement of the "law" appears in his introduction to a collection of his works published in 1934:
As soon as the magic trick has been done the whole business of the fantasy writer is to keep everything else human and real. Touches of prosaic detail are imperative and a rigorous adherence to the hypothesis. Any extra fantasy outside the cardinal assumption immediately gives a touch of irresponsible silliness to the invention.
Dr. Griffin / The Invisible Man is a brilliant research scientist who discovers a method of invisibility, but finds himself unable to reverse the process. An enthusiast of random and irresponsible violence, Griffin has become an iconic character in horror fiction. The Island of Doctor Moreau sees a shipwrecked man left on the island home of Doctor Moreau, a mad scientist who creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. The earliest depiction of uplift, the novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature. In The First Men in the Moon Wells used the idea of radio communication between astronomical objects, a plot point inspired by Nikola Tesla's claim that he had received radio signals from Mars. Though Tono-Bungay is not a science-fiction novel, radioactive decay plays a small but consequential role in it. Radioactive decay plays a much larger role in The World Set Free (1914). This book contains what is surely his biggest prophetic "hit", with the first description of a nuclear weapon. Scientists of the day were well aware that the natural decay of radium releases energy at a slow rate over thousands of years. The rate of release is too slow to have practical utility, but the total amount released is huge. Wells's novel revolves around an (unspecified) invention that accelerates the process of radioactive decay, producing bombs that explode with no more than the force of ordinary high explosives—but which "continue to explode" for days on end. "Nothing could have been more obvious to the people of the earlier twentieth century", he wrote, "than the rapidity with which war was becoming impossible ... [but] they did not see it until the atomic bombs burst in their fumbling hands". In 1932, the physicist and conceiver of nuclear chain reaction Leó Szilárd read The World Set Free (the same year Sir James Chadwick discovered the neutron), a book which he said made a great impression on him. In addition to writing early science fiction, he produced work dealing with mythological beings like an angel in the novel The Wonderful Visit (1895) and a mermaid in the novel The Sea Lady (1902).
Wells also wrote non-fiction. His first non-fiction bestseller was Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought (1901). When originally serialised in a magazine it was subtitled "An Experiment in Prophecy", and is considered his most explicitly futuristic work. It offered the immediate political message of the privileged sections of society continuing to bar capable men from other classes from advancement until war would force a need to employ those most able, rather than the traditional upper classes, as leaders. Anticipating what the world would be like in the year 2000, the book is interesting both for its hits (trains and cars resulting in the dispersion of populations from cities to suburbs; moral restrictions declining as men and women seek greater sexual freedom; the defeat of German militarism, and the existence of a European Union) and its misses (he did not expect successful aircraft before 1950, and averred that "my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocate its crew and founder at sea").
His bestselling two-volume work, The Outline of History (1920), began a new era of popularised world history. It received a mixed critical response from professional historians. However, it was very popular amongst the general population and made Wells a rich man. Many other authors followed with "Outlines" of their own in other subjects. He reprised his Outline in 1922 with a much shorter popular work, A Short History of the World, a history book praised by Albert Einstein, and two long efforts, The Science of Life (1930)—written with his son G. P. Wells and evolutionary biologist Julian Huxley, and The Work, Wealth and Happiness of Mankind (1931). The "Outlines" became sufficiently common for James Thurber to parody the trend in his humorous essay, "An Outline of Scientists"—indeed, Wells's Outline of History remains in print with a new 2005 edition, while A Short History of the World has been re-edited (2006).
From quite early in Wells's career, he sought a better way to organise society and wrote a number of Utopian novels. The first of these was A Modern Utopia (1905), which shows a worldwide utopia with "no imports but meteorites, and no exports at all"; two travellers from our world fall into its alternate history. The others usually begin with the world rushing to catastrophe, until people realise a better way of living: whether by mysterious gases from a comet causing people to behave rationally and abandoning a European war (In the Days of the Comet (1906)), or a world council of scientists taking over, as in The Shape of Things to Come (1933, which he later adapted for the 1936 Alexander Korda film, Things to Come). This depicted, all too accurately, the impending World War, with cities being destroyed by aerial bombs. He also portrayed the rise of fascist dictators in The Autocracy of Mr Parham (1930) and The Holy Terror (1939). Men Like Gods (1923) is also a utopian novel. Wells in this period was regarded as an enormously influential figure; the critic Malcolm Cowley stated: "by the time he was forty, his influence was wider than any other living English writer".
Wells contemplates the ideas of nature and nurture and questions humanity in books such as The First Men in the Moon, where nature is completely suppressed by nurture, and The Island of Doctor Moreau, where the strong presence of nature represents a threat to a civilized society. Not all his scientific romances ended in a Utopia, and Wells also wrote a dystopian novel, When the Sleeper Wakes (1899, rewritten as The Sleeper Awakes, 1910), which pictures a future society where the classes have become more and more separated, leading to a revolt of the masses against the rulers. The Island of Doctor Moreau is even darker. The narrator, having been trapped on an island of animals vivisected (unsuccessfully) into human beings, eventually returns to England; like Gulliver on his return from the Houyhnhnms, he finds himself unable to shake off the perceptions of his fellow humans as barely civilised beasts, slowly reverting to their animal natures.
Wells also wrote the preface for the first edition of W. N. P. Barbellion's diaries, The Journal of a Disappointed Man, published in 1919. Since "Barbellion" was the real author's pen name, many reviewers believed Wells to have been the true author of the Journal; Wells always denied this, despite being full of praise for the diaries.
In 1927, a Canadian teacher and writer Florence Deeks unsuccessfully sued Wells for infringement of copyright and breach of trust, claiming that much of The Outline of History had been plagiarised from her unpublished manuscript, The Web of the World's Romance, which had spent nearly nine months in the hands of Wells's Canadian publisher, Macmillan Canada. However, it was sworn on oath at the trial that the manuscript remained in Toronto in the safekeeping of Macmillan, and that Wells did not even know it existed, let alone had seen it. The court found no proof of copying, and decided the similarities were due to the fact that the books had similar nature and both writers had access to the same sources. In 2000, A. B. McKillop, a professor of history at Carleton University, produced a book on the case, The Spinster & The Prophet: Florence Deeks, H. G. Wells, and the Mystery of the Purloined Past. According to McKillop, the lawsuit was unsuccessful due to the prejudice against a woman suing a well-known and famous male author, and he paints a detailed story based on the circumstantial evidence of the case. In 2004, Denis N. Magnusson, Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Law, Queen's University, Ontario, published an article on Deeks v. Wells. This re-examines the case in relation to McKillop's book. While having some sympathy for Deeks, he argues that she had a weak case that was not well presented, and though she may have met with sexism from her lawyers, she received a fair trial, adding that the law applied is essentially the same law that would be applied to a similar case today (i.e., 2004).
In 1933, Wells predicted in The Shape of Things to Come that the world war he feared would begin in January 1940, a prediction which ultimately came true four months early, in September 1939, with the outbreak of World War II. In 1936, before the Royal Institution, Wells called for the compilation of a constantly growing and changing World Encyclopaedia, to be reviewed by outstanding authorities and made accessible to every human being. In 1938, he published a collection of essays on the future organisation of knowledge and education, World Brain, including the essay "The Idea of a Permanent World Encyclopaedia".
Prior to 1933, Wells's books were widely read in Germany and Austria, and most of his science fiction works had been translated shortly after publication. By 1933, he had attracted the attention of German officials because of his criticism of the political situation in Germany, and on 10 May 1933, Wells's books were burned by the Nazi youth in Berlin's Opernplatz, and his works were banned from libraries and book stores. Wells, as president of PEN International (Poets, Essayists, Novelists), angered the Nazis by overseeing the expulsion of the German PEN club from the international body in 1934 following the German PEN's refusal to admit non-Aryan writers to its membership. At a PEN conference in Ragusa, Wells refused to yield to Nazi sympathisers who demanded that the exiled author Ernst Toller be prevented from speaking. Near the end of World War II, Allied forces discovered that the SS had compiled lists of people slated for immediate arrest during the invasion of Britain in the abandoned Operation Sea Lion, with Wells included in the alphabetical list of "The Black Book".
Wartime works
Seeking a more structured way to play war games, Wells wrote Floor Games (1911) followed by Little Wars (1913), which set out rules for fighting battles with toy soldiers (miniatures). A pacifist prior to the First World War, Wells stated "how much better is this amiable miniature [war] than the real thing". According to Wells, the idea of the game developed from a visit by his friend Jerome K. Jerome. After dinner, Jerome began shooting down toy soldiers with a toy cannon and Wells joined in to compete.
During August 1914, immediately after the outbreak of the First World War, Wells published a number of articles in London newspapers that subsequently appeared as a book entitled The War That Will End War. He coined the expression with the idealistic belief that the result of the war would make a future conflict impossible. Wells blamed the Central Powers for the coming of the war and argued that only the defeat of German militarism could bring about an end to war. Wells used the shorter form of the phrase, "the war to end war", in In the Fourth Year (1918), in which he noted that the phrase "got into circulation" in the second half of 1914. In fact, it had become one of the most common catchphrases of the war.
In 1918 Wells worked for the British War Propaganda Bureau, also called Wellington House. Wells was also one of fifty-three leading British authors — a number that included Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — who signed their names to the “Authors' Declaration.” This manifesto declared that the German invasion of Belgium had been a brutal crime, and that Britain “could not without dishonour have refused to take part in the present war.”
Travels to Russia and the Soviet Union
Wells visited Russia three times: 1914, 1920 and 1934. During his second visit, he saw his old friend Maxim Gorky and with Gorky's help, met Vladimir Lenin. In his book Russia in the Shadows, Wells portrayed Russia as recovering from a total social collapse, "the completest that has ever happened to any modern social organisation." On 23 July 1934, after visiting U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Wells went to the Soviet Union and interviewed Joseph Stalin for three hours for the New Statesman magazine, which was extremely rare at that time. He told Stalin how he had seen 'the happy faces of healthy people' in contrast with his previous visit to Moscow in 1920. However, he also criticised the lawlessness, class discrimination, state violence, and absence of free expression. Stalin enjoyed the conversation and replied accordingly. As the chairman of the London-based PEN International, which protected the rights of authors to write without being intimidated, Wells hoped by his trip to USSR, he could win Stalin over by force of argument. Before he left, he realised that no reform was to happen in the near future.
Final years
Wells’s greatest literary output occurred before the First World War, which was lamented by younger authors whom he had influenced. In this connection, George Orwell described Wells as "too sane to understand the modern world", and "since 1920 he has squandered his talents in slaying paper dragons." G. K. Chesterton quipped: "Mr Wells is a born storyteller who has sold his birthright for a pot of message".
Wells had diabetes, and was a co-founder in 1934 of The Diabetic Association (now Diabetes UK, the leading charity for people with diabetes in the UK).
On 28 October 1940, on the radio station KTSA in San Antonio, Texas, Wells took part in a radio interview with Orson Welles, who two years previously had performed a famous radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds. During the interview, by Charles C Shaw, a KTSA radio host, Wells admitted his surprise at the sensation that resulted from the broadcast but acknowledged his debt to Welles for increasing sales of one of his "more obscure" titles.
Death
Wells died of unspecified causes on 13 August 1946, aged 79, at his home at 13 Hanover Terrace, overlooking Regent's Park, London. In his preface to the 1941 edition of The War in the Air, Wells had stated that his epitaph should be: "I told you so. You damned fools". Wells's body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on 16 August 1946; his ashes were subsequently scattered into the English Channel at Old Harry Rocks, the most eastern point of the Jurassic Coast and about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) from Swanage in Dorset.
A commemorative blue plaque in his honour was installed by the Greater London Council at his home in Regent's Park in 1966.
Futurist
A futurist and “visionary”, Wells foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. Asserting that "Wells' visions of the future remain unsurpassed", John Higgs, author of Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century, states that in the late 19th century Wells “saw the coming century clearer than anyone else. He anticipated wars in the air, the sexual revolution, motorised transport causing the growth of suburbs and a proto-Wikipedia he called the "world brain". In his novel The World Set Free, he imagined an “atomic bomb” of terrifying power that would be dropped from aeroplanes. This was an extraordinary insight for an author writing in 1913, and it made a deep impression on Winston Churchill."
In 2011, Wells was among a group of science fiction writers featured in the Prophets of Science Fiction series, a show produced and hosted by film director Sir Ridley Scott, which depicts how predictions influenced the development of scientific advancements by inspiring many readers to assist in transforming those futuristic visions into everyday reality. In a 2013 review of The Time Machine for the New Yorker magazine, Brad Leithauser writes, "At the base of Wells's great visionary exploit is this rational, ultimately scientific attempt to tease out the potential future consequences of present conditions—not as they might arise in a few years, or even decades, but millennia hence, epochs hence. He is world literature's Great Extrapolator. Like no other fiction writer before him, he embraced "deep time."
Political views
Wells was a socialist and a member of the Fabian Society. Winston Churchill was an avid reader of Wells's books, and after they first met in 1902 they kept in touch until Wells died in 1946. As a junior minister Churchill borrowed lines from Wells for one of his most famous early landmark speeches in 1906, and as Prime Minister the phrase "the gathering storm"—used by Churchill to describe the rise of Nazi Germany—had been written by Wells in The War of the Worlds, which depicts an attack on Britain by Martians. Wells's extensive writings on equality and human rights, most notably his most influential work, The Rights of Man (1940), laid the groundwork for the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations shortly after his death.
His efforts regarding the League of Nations, on which he collaborated on the project with Leonard Woolf with the booklets The Idea of a League of Nations, Prolegomena to the Study of World Organization, and The Way of the League of Nations, became a disappointment as the organization turned out to be a weak one unable to prevent the Second World War, which itself occurred towards the very end of his life and only increased the pessimistic side of his nature. In his last book Mind at the End of Its Tether (1945), he considered the idea that humanity being replaced by another species might not be a bad idea. He referred to the era between the two World Wars as "The Age of Frustration".
Religious views
Wells's views on God and religion changed over his lifetime. Early in his life he distanced himself from Christianity, and later from theism, and finally, late in life, he was essentially atheistic. Martin Gardner summarises this progression:[The younger Wells] ... did not object to using the word "God" provided it did not imply anything resembling human personality. In his middle years Wells went through a phase of defending the concept of a "finite God," similar to the god of such process theologians as Samuel Alexander, Edgar Brightman, and Charles Hartshorne. (He even wrote a book about it called God the Invisible King.) Later Wells decided he was really an atheist.
In God the Invisible King (1917), Wells wrote that his idea of God did not draw upon the traditional religions of the world: This book sets out as forcibly and exactly as possible the religious belief of the writer. [Which] is a profound belief in a personal and intimate God. ... Putting the leading idea of this book very roughly, these two antagonistic typical conceptions of God may be best contrasted by speaking of one of them as God-as-Nature or the Creator, and of the other as God-as-Christ or the Redeemer. One is the great Outward God; the other is the Inmost God. The first idea was perhaps developed most highly and completely in the God of Spinoza. It is a conception of God tending to pantheism, to an idea of a comprehensive God as ruling with justice rather than affection, to a conception of aloofness and awestriking worshipfulness. The second idea, which is contradictory to this idea of an absolute God, is the God of the human heart. The writer suggested that the great outline of the theological struggles of that phase of civilisation and world unity which produced Christianity, was a persistent but unsuccessful attempt to get these two different ideas of God into one focus. Later in the work, he aligns himself with a "renascent or modern religion ... neither atheist nor Buddhist nor Mohammedan nor Christian ... [that] he has found growing up in himself".
Of Christianity, he said: "it is not now true for me. ... Every believing Christian is, I am sure, my spiritual brother ... but if systemically I called myself a Christian I feel that to most men I should imply too much and so tell a lie". Of other world religions, he writes: "All these religions are true for me as Canterbury Cathedral is a true thing and as a Swiss chalet is a true thing. There they are, and they have served a purpose, they have worked. Only they are not true for me to live in them. ... They do not work for me". In The Fate of Homo Sapiens (1939), Wells criticised almost all world religions and philosophies, stating "there is no creed, no way of living left in the world at all, that really meets the needs of the time… When we come to look at them coolly and dispassionately, all the main religions, patriotic, moral and customary systems in which human beings are sheltering today, appear to be in a state of jostling and mutually destructive movement, like the houses and palaces and other buildings of some vast, sprawling city overtaken by a landslide.
Wells's opposition to organised religion reached a fever pitch in 1943 with publication of his book Crux Ansata, subtitled "An Indictment of the Roman Catholic Church".
Literary influence and legacy
The science fiction historian John Clute describes Wells as "the most important writer the genre has yet seen", and notes his work has been central to both British and American science fiction. Science fiction author and critic Algis Budrys said Wells "remains the outstanding expositor of both the hope, and the despair, which are embodied in the technology and which are the major facts of life in our world". He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921, 1932, 1935, and 1946. Wells so influenced real exploration of space that an impact crater on Mars (and the Moon) was named after him.
In the United Kingdom, Wells's work was a key model for the British "scientific romance", and other writers in that mode, such as Olaf Stapledon, J. D. Beresford, S. Fowler Wright, and Naomi Mitchison, all drew on Wells's example. Wells was also an important influence on British science fiction of the period after the Second World War, with Arthur C. Clarke and Brian Aldiss expressing strong admiration for Wells's work. Among contemporary British science fiction writers, Stephen Baxter, Christopher Priest and Adam Roberts have all acknowledged Wells's influence on their writing; all three are Vice-Presidents of the H. G. Wells Society. He also had a strong influence on British scientist J. B. S. Haldane, who wrote Daedalus; or, Science and the Future (1924), "The Last Judgement" and "On Being the Right Size" from the essay collection Possible Worlds (1927), and Biological Possibilities for the Human Species in the Next Ten Thousand Years (1963), which are speculations about the future of human evolution and life on other planets. Haldane gave several lectures about these topics which in turn influenced other science fiction writers.
In the United States, Hugo Gernsback reprinted most of Wells's work in the pulp magazine Amazing Stories, regarding Wells's work as "texts of central importance to the self-conscious new genre". Later American writers such as Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Carl Sagan, and Ursula K. Le Guin all recalled being influenced by Wells.
Sinclair Lewis's early novels were strongly influenced by Wells's realistic social novels, such as The History of Mr Polly; Lewis also named his first son Wells after the author. Lewis nominated H. G. Wells for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.
In an interview with The Paris Review, Vladimir Nabokov described Wells as his favourite writer when he was a boy and "a great artist." He went on to cite The Passionate Friends, Ann Veronica, The Time Machine, and The Country of the Blind as superior to anything else written by Wells's British contemporaries. Nabokov said: "His sociological cogitations can be safely ignored, of course, but his romances and fantasies are superb."
Jorge Luis Borges wrote many short pieces on Wells in which he demonstrates a deep familiarity with much of Wells's work. While Borges wrote several critical reviews, including a mostly negative review of Wells's film Things to Come, he regularly treated Wells as a canonical figure of fantastic literature. Late in his life, Borges included The Invisible Man and The Time Machine in his Prologue to a Personal Library, a curated list of 100 great works of literature that he undertook at the behest of the Argentine publishing house Emecé. Canadian author Margaret Atwood read Wells's books, and he also inspired writers of European speculative fiction such as Karel Čapek and Yevgeny Zamyatin.
Representations
Literary
The superhuman protagonist of J. D. Beresford's 1911 novel, The Hampdenshire Wonder, Victor Stott, was based on Wells.
In M. P. Shiel's short story "The Primate of the Rose" (1928), there is an unpleasant womaniser named E. P. Crooks, who was written as a parody of Wells. Wells had attacked Shiel's Prince Zaleski when it was published in 1895, and this was Shiel's response. Wells praised Shiel's The Purple Cloud (1901); in turn Shiel expressed admiration for Wells, referring to him at a speech to the Horsham Rotary Club in 1933 as "my friend Mr. Wells".
In C. S. Lewis's novel That Hideous Strength (1945), the character Jules is a caricature of Wells, and much of Lewis's science fiction was written both under the influence of Wells and as an antithesis to his work (or, as he put it, an "exorcism" of the influence it had on him).
In Brian Aldiss's novella The Saliva Tree (1966), Wells has a small off-screen guest role.
In Saul Bellow's novel Mr. Sammler's Planet (1970), Wells is one of several historical figures the protagonist met when he was a young man.
In The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock (1976) Wells has an important part.
In The Map of Time (2008) by Spanish author Félix J. Palma; Wells is one of several historical characters.
Wells is one of the two Georges in Paul Levinson's 2013 time-travel novelette, "Ian, George, and George," published in Analog magazine.
Dramatic
Rod Taylor portrays Wells in the 1960 science fiction film The Time Machine (based on the novel of the same name), in which Wells uses his time machine to try and find his Utopian society.
Malcolm McDowell portrays Wells in the 1979 science fiction film Time After Time, in which Wells uses a time machine to pursue Jack the Ripper to the present day. In the film, Wells meets "Amy" in the future who then returns to 1893 to become his second wife Amy Catherine Robbins.
Wells is portrayed in the 1985 story Timelash from the 22nd season of the BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who. In this story, Herbert, an enthusiastic temporary companion to the Doctor, is revealed to be a young H. G. Wells. The plot is loosely based upon the themes and characters of The Time Machine with references to The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man and The Island of Doctor Moreau. The story jokingly suggests that Wells's inspiration for his later novels came from his adventure with the Sixth Doctor.
In the BBC2 anthology series Encounters about imagined meetings between historical figures, Beautiful Lies, by Paul Pender (15 August 1992) centred on an acrimonious dinner party attended by Wells (Richard Todd), George Orwell (Jon Finch), and William Empson (Patrick Ryecart).
The character of Wells also appeared in several episodes of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993–1997), usually pitted against the time-travelling villain known as Tempus (Lane Davies). Wells's younger self was played by Terry Kiser, and the older Wells was played by Hamilton Camp.
In the British TV mini-series The Infinite Worlds of H. G. Wells (2001), several of Wells's short stories are dramatised but are adapted using Wells himself (Tom Ward) as the main protagonist in each story.
In the Disney Channel Original Series Phil of the Future, which centres on time-travel, the present-day high school that the main characters attend is named "H. G. Wells".
In the 2006 television docudrama H. G. Wells: War with the World, Wells is played by Michael Sheen.
Television episode "World's End" of Cold Case (2007) is about the discovery of human remains in the bottom of a well leads to the reinvestigation of the case of a housewife who went missing during Orson Welles' radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds".
On the science fiction television series Warehouse 13 (2009–2014), there is a female version Helena G. Wells. When she appeared she explained that her brother was her front for her writing because a female science fiction author would not be accepted.
Comedian Paul F. Tompkins portrays a fictional Wells as the host of The Dead Authors Podcast, wherein Wells uses his time machine to bring dead authors (played by other comedians) to the present and interview them.
H. G. Wells as a young boy appears in the Legends of Tomorrow episode "The Magnificent Eight". In this story, the boy Wells is dying of consumption but is cured by a time-travelling Martin Stein.
In the four part series The Nightmare Worlds of H. G. Wells (2016), Wells is played by Ray Winstone.
In the 2017 television series version of Time After Time, based on the 1979 film, H. G. Wells is portrayed by Freddie Stroma.
In the 2019 television adaptation of The War of the Worlds, the character of 'George', played by Rafe Spall, demonstrates a number of elements of Wells's own life, including his estrangement from his wife and unmarried co-habitation with the character of 'Amy'.
Literary papers
In 1954, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign purchased the H. G. Wells literary papers and correspondence collection. The University's Rare Book & Manuscript Library holds the largest collection of Wells manuscripts, correspondence, first editions and publications in the United States. Among these is unpublished material and the manuscripts of such works as The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine. The collection includes first editions, revisions and translations. The letters contain general family correspondence, communications from publishers, material regarding the Fabian Society, and letters from politicians and public figures, most notably George Bernard Shaw and Joseph Conrad.
Bibliography
See also
References
Further reading
Dickson, Lovat. H. G. Wells: His Turbulent Life & Times. 1969.
Foot, Michael. H. G.: History of Mr. Wells. Doubleday, 1985 (), Black Swan, New edition, Oct 1996 (paperback, )
Gilmour, David. The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002 (paperback, ); 2003 (paperback, ).
Gomme, A. W., Mr. Wells as Historian. Glasgow: MacLehose, Jackson, and Co., 1921.
Gosling, John. Waging the War of the Worlds. Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland, 2009 (paperback, ).
Jasanoff, Maya, "The Future Was His" (review of Sarah Cole, Inventing Tomorrow: H.G. Wells and the Twentieth Century, Columbia University Press, 374 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXVII, no. 12 (23 July 2020), pp. 50–51. Writes Jasanoff (p. 51): "Although [Wells] was prophetically right, and right-minded, about some things... [n]owhere was he more disturbingly wrong than in his loathsome affinity for eugenics..."
Lynn, Andrea The secret love life of H.G. Wells
Mackenzie, Norman and Jean, The Time Traveller: the Life of H G Wells, London: Weidenfeld, 1973,
Mauthner, Martin. German Writers in French Exile, 1933–1940, London: Vallentine and Mitchell, 2007, .
McLean, Steven. 'The Early Fiction of H. G. Wells: Fantasies of Science'. Palgrave, 2009, .
Partington, John S. Building Cosmopolis: The Political Thought of H. G. Wells. Ashgate, 2003, .
Roberts, Adam. H G Wells A Literary Life. Springer International Publishing, 2019, ISBN 9783030264215.
Shadurski, Maxim. The Nationality of Utopia: H. G. Wells, England, and the World State. London: Routledge, 2020, .
Sherborne, Michael. H. G. Wells: Another Kind of Life. London: Peter Owen, 2010, .
Smith, David C., H. G. Wells: Desperately Mortal: A Biography. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986,
West, Anthony. H. G. Wells: Aspects of a Life. London: Hutchinson, 1984.
External links
Future Tense – The Story of H. G. Wells at BBC One – 150th anniversary documentary (2016)
"In the footsteps of H G Wells" at New Statesman – "The great author called for a Human Rights Act; 60 years later, we have it" (2000)
Sources—collections
*
Free H. G. Wells downloads for iPhone, iPad, Nook, Android, and Kindle in PDF and all popular eBook reader formats (AZW3, EPUB, MOBI) at ebooktakeaway.com
H G Wells at the British Library
H. G. Wells papers at University of Illinois
Ebooks by H. G. Wells at Global Grey Ebooks
Sources—letters, essays and interviews
Archive of Wells's BBC broadcasts
Film interview with H. G. Wells
"Stephen Crane. From an English Standpoint", by Wells, 1900.
Rabindranath Tagore: In conversation with H. G. Wells. Rabindranath Tagore and Wells conversing in Geneva in 1930.
"Introduction", to W. N. P. Barbellion's The Journal of a Disappointed Man, by Wells, 1919.
"Woman and Primitive Culture", by Wells, 1895.
Letter, to M. P. Shiel, by Wells, 1937.
Biography
"H. G. Wells". In Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Critical essays
An introduction to The War of the Worlds by Iain Sinclair on the British Library's Discovering Literature website.
"An Appreciation of H. G. Wells", by Mary Austin, 1911.
"Socialism and the Family" (1906) by Belfort Bax, Part 1, Part 2.
"H. G. Wells warned us how it would feel to fight a War of the Worlds", by Niall Ferguson, in The Telegraph, 24 June 2005.
"H. G. Wells's Idea of a World Brain: A Critical Re-assessment", by W. Boyd Rayward, in Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50 (15 May 1999): 557–579
"Mr H. G. Wells and the Giants", by G. K. Chesterton, from his book Heretics (1908).
"The Internet: a world brain?", by Martin Gardner, in Skeptical Inquirer, Jan–Feb 1999.
"Science Fiction: The Shape of Things to Come", by Mark Bould, in The Socialist Review, May 2005.
"Who needs Utopia? A dialogue with my utopian self (with apologies, and thanks, to H. G. Wells)", by Gregory Claeys in Spaces of Utopia: An Electronic Journal, no 1, Spring 2006.
"When H. G. Wells Split the Atom: A 1914 Preview of 1945", by Freda Kirchwey, in The Nation, posted 4 September 2003 (original 18 August 1945 issue).
"Wells, Hitler and the World State", by George Orwell. First published: Horizon. GB, London. Aug 1941.
"War of the Worldviews", by John J. Miller, in The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal, 21 June 2005.
"Wells's Autobiography", by John Hart, from New International, Vol.2 No.2, Mar 1935, pp. 75–76.
"History in the Science Fiction of H. G. Wells", by Patrick Parrinder, Cycnos, 22.2 (2006).
"From the World Brain to the Worldwide Web", by Martin Campbell-Kelly, Gresham College Lecture, 9 November 2006.
"The Beginning of Wisdom: On Reading H. G. Wells", by Vivian Gornick, Boston Review, 31.1 (2007).
John Hammond, The Complete List of Short Stories of H. G. Wells
"H. G. Wells Predictions Ring True, 143 Years Later" at National Geographic
"H. G. Wells, the man I knew" Obituary of Wells by George Bernard Shaw, at the New Statesman
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Writers with disabilities | false | [
"Don Juan Manuel's Tales of Count Lucanor, in Spanish Libro de los ejemplos del conde Lucanor y de Patronio (Book of the Examples of Count Lucanor and of Patronio), also commonly known as El Conde Lucanor, Libro de Patronio, or Libro de los ejemplos (original Old Castilian: Libro de los enxiemplos del Conde Lucanor et de Patronio), is one of the earliest works of prose in Castilian Spanish. It was first written in 1335.\n\nThe book is divided into four parts. The first and most well-known part is a series of 51 short stories (some no more than a page or two) drawn from various sources, such as Aesop and other classical writers, and Arabic folktales.\n\nTales of Count Lucanor was first printed in 1575 when it was published at Seville under the auspices of Argote de Molina. It was again printed at Madrid in 1642, after which it lay forgotten for nearly two centuries.\n\nPurpose and structure\n\nA didactic, moralistic purpose, which would color so much of the Spanish literature to follow (see Novela picaresca), is the mark of this book. Count Lucanor engages in conversation with his advisor Patronio, putting to him a problem (\"Some man has made me a proposition...\" or \"I fear that such and such person intends to...\") and asking for advice. Patronio responds always with the greatest humility, claiming not to wish to offer advice to so illustrious a person as the Count, but offering to tell him a story of which the Count's problem reminds him. (Thus, the stories are \"examples\" [ejemplos] of wise action.) At the end he advises the Count to do as the protagonist of his story did.\n\nEach chapter ends in more or less the same way, with slight variations on: \"And this pleased the Count greatly and he did just so, and found it well. And Don Johán (Juan) saw that this example was very good, and had it written in this book, and composed the following verses.\" A rhymed couplet closes, giving the moral of the story.\n\nOrigin of stories and influence on later literature\nMany of the stories written in the book are the first examples written in a modern European language of various stories, which many other writers would use in the proceeding centuries. Many of the stories he included were themselves derived from other stories, coming from western and Arab sources.\n\nShakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew has the basic elements of Tale 35, \"What Happened to a Young Man Who Married a Strong and Ill-tempered Woman\".\n\nTale 32, \"What Happened to the King and the Tricksters Who Made Cloth\" tells the story that Hans Christian Andersen made popular as The Emperor's New Clothes.\n\nStory 7, \"What Happened to a Woman Named Truhana\", a version of Aesop's The Milkmaid and Her Pail, was claimed by Max Müller to originate in the Hindu cycle Panchatantra.\n\nTale 2, \"What happened to a good Man and his Son, leading a beast to market,\" is the familiar fable The miller, his son and the donkey.\n\nIn 2016, Baroque Decay released a game under the name \"The Count Lucanor\". As well as some protagonists' names, certain events from the books inspired past events in the game.\n\nThe stories\n\nThe book opens with a prologue which introduces the characters of the Count and Patronio. The titles in the following list are those given in Keller and Keating's 1977 translation into English. James York's 1868 translation into English gives a significantly different ordering of the stories and omits the fifty-first.\n\n What Happened to a King and His Favorite \n What Happened to a Good Man and His Son \n How King Richard of England Leapt into the Sea against the Moors\n What a Genoese Said to His Soul When He Was about to Die \n What Happened to a Fox and a Crow Who Had a Piece of Cheese in His Beak\n How the Swallow Warned the Other Birds When She Saw Flax Being Sown \n What Happened to a Woman Named Truhana \n What Happened to a Man Whose Liver Had to Be Washed \n What Happened to Two Horses Which Were Thrown to the Lion \n What Happened to a Man Who on Account of Poverty and Lack of Other Food Was Eating Bitter Lentils \n What Happened to a Dean of Santiago de Compostela and Don Yllán, the Grand Master of Toledo\n What Happened to the Fox and the Rooster \n What Happened to a Man Who Was Hunting Partridges \n The Miracle of Saint Dominick When He Preached against the Usurer \n What Happened to Lorenzo Suárez at the Siege of Seville \n The Reply that count Fernán González Gave to His Relative Núño Laynes \n What Happened to a Very Hungry Man Who Was Half-heartedly Invited to Dinner \n What Happened to Pero Meléndez de Valdés When He Broke His Leg \n What Happened to the Crows and the Owls \n What Happened to a King for Whom a Man Promised to Perform Alchemy \n What Happened to a Young King and a Philosopher to Whom his Father Commended Him \n What Happened to the Lion and the Bull \n How the Ants Provide for Themselves \n What Happened to the King Who Wanted to Test His Three Sons \n What Happened to the Count of Provence and How He Was Freed from Prison by the Advice of Saladin\n What Happened to the Tree of Lies \n What Happened to an Emperor and to Don Alvarfáñez Minaya and Their Wives \n What Happened in Granada to Don Lorenzo Suárez Gallinato When He Beheaded the Renegade Chaplain \n What Happened to a Fox Who Lay down in the Street to Play Dead \n What Happened to King Abenabet of Seville and Ramayquía His Wife \n How a Cardinal Judged between the Canons of Paris and the Friars Minor \n What Happened to the King and the Tricksters Who Made Cloth \n What Happened to Don Juan Manuel's Saker Falcon and an Eagle and a Heron \n What Happened to a Blind Man Who Was Leading Another \n What Happened to a Young Man Who Married a Strong and Ill-tempered Woman\n What Happened to a Merchant When He Found His Son and His Wife Sleeping Together \n What Happened to Count Fernán González with His Men after He Had Won the Battle of Hacinas \n What Happened to a Man Who Was Loaded down with Precious Stones and Drowned in the River \n What Happened to a Man and a Swallow and a Sparrow \n Why the Seneschal of Carcassonne Lost His Soul \n What Happened to a King of Córdova Named Al-Haquem \n What Happened to a Woman of Sham Piety \n What Happened to Good and Evil and the Wise Man and the Madman \n What Happened to Don Pero Núñez the Loyal, to Don Ruy González de Zavallos, and to Don Gutier Roiz de Blaguiello with Don Rodrigo the Generous \n What Happened to a Man Who Became the Devil's Friend and Vassal \n What Happened to a Philosopher who by Accident Went down a Street Where Prostitutes Lived \n What Befell a Moor and His Sister Who Pretended That She Was Timid \n What Happened to a Man Who Tested His Friends \n What Happened to the Man Whom They Cast out Naked on an Island When They Took away from Him the Kingdom He Ruled \n What Happened to Saladin and a Lady, the Wife of a Knight Who Was His Vassal \n What Happened to a Christian King Who Was Very Powerful and Haughty\n\nReferences\n\nNotes\n\nBibliography\n\n Sturm, Harlan\n\n Wacks, David\n\nExternal links\n\nThe Internet Archive provides free access to the 1868 translation by James York.\nJSTOR has the to the 1977 translation by Keller and Keating.\nSelections in English and Spanish (pedagogical edition) with introduction, notes, and bibliography in Open Iberia/América (open access teaching anthology)\n\n14th-century books\nSpanish literature\n1335 books",
"What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? may refer to:\n\nWhat Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (novel), a 1960 suspense novel by Henry Farrell\n What Ever Happened to Baby Jane (film), a 1962 American psychological thriller, based on the novel.\n What Ever Happened to..., a 1991 ABC television film, based on the novel"
] |
[
"H. G. Wells",
"Personal life",
"Who did he marry",
"1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells.",
"What happened to the couple",
"The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students,"
] | C_86cc13fd852e4219a6fc0d2d8dd4d80e_0 | What was her name | 3 | What was the student's name that H.G. Wells fell in love with? | H. G. Wells | In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells. The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham. In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where in 1901 he constructed a large family home: Spade House. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip") in 1901 (died 1985) and Frank Richard in 1903 (died 1982). With his wife Jane's consent, Wells had affairs with a number of women, including the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger, adventurer and writer Odette Keun, Soviet spy Moura Budberg and novelist Elizabeth von Arnim. In 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society; and in 1914, a son, Anthony West (1914-1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells' "sordid intrigue" with the daughter of veteran Fabian Sidney Olivier, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011) - a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note) - gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others. Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989). CANNOTANSWER | Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895. | Herbert George Wells (21 September 186613 August 1946) was an English writer. Prolific in many genres, he wrote dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, history, satire, biography and autobiography. His work also included two books on recreational war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is sometimes called the "father of science fiction."
During his own lifetime, however, he was most prominent as a forward-looking, even prophetic social critic who devoted his literary talents to the development of a progressive vision on a global scale. A futurist, he wrote a number of utopian works and foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. His science fiction imagined time travel, alien invasion, invisibility, and biological engineering. Brian Aldiss referred to Wells as the "Shakespeare of science fiction", while American writer Charles Fort referred to him as a "wild talent".
Wells rendered his works convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work – dubbed “Wells's law” – leading Joseph Conrad to hail him in 1898 as "O Realist of the Fantastic!". His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), which was his first novel, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), The War of the Worlds (1898) and the military science fiction The War in the Air (1907). Wells was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature four times.
Wells's earliest specialised training was in biology, and his thinking on ethical matters took place in a specifically and fundamentally Darwinian context. He was also an outspoken socialist from a young age, often (but not always, as at the beginning of the First World War) sympathising with pacifist views. His later works became increasingly political and didactic, and he wrote little science fiction, while he sometimes indicated on official documents that his profession was that of journalist. Novels such as Kipps and The History of Mr Polly, which describe lower-middle-class life, led to the suggestion that he was a worthy successor to Charles Dickens, but Wells described a range of social strata and even attempted, in Tono-Bungay (1909), a diagnosis of English society as a whole. Wells was a diabetic and co-founded the charity The Diabetic Association (known today as Diabetes UK) in 1934.
Life
Early life
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on 21 September 1866. Called "Bertie" by his family, he was the fourth and last child of Joseph Wells, a former domestic gardener, and at the time a shopkeeper and professional cricketer and Sarah Neal, a former domestic servant. An inheritance had allowed the family to acquire a shop in which they sold china and sporting goods, although it failed to prosper: the stock was old and worn out, and the location was poor. Joseph Wells managed to earn a meagre income, but little of it came from the shop and he received an unsteady amount of money from playing professional cricket for the Kent county team.
A defining incident of young Wells's life was an accident in 1874 that left him bedridden with a broken leg. To pass the time he began to read books from the local library, brought to him by his father. He soon became devoted to the other worlds and lives to which books gave him access; they also stimulated his desire to write. Later that year he entered Thomas Morley's Commercial Academy, a private school founded in 1849, following the bankruptcy of Morley's earlier school. The teaching was erratic, the curriculum mostly focused, Wells later said, on producing copperplate handwriting and doing the sort of sums useful to tradesmen. Wells continued at Morley's Academy until 1880. In 1877, his father, Joseph Wells, suffered a fractured thigh. The accident effectively put an end to Joseph's career as a cricketer, and his subsequent earnings as a shopkeeper were not enough to compensate for the loss of the primary source of family income.
No longer able to support themselves financially, the family instead sought to place their sons as apprentices in various occupations. From 1880 to 1883, Wells had an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at Hyde's Drapery Emporium in Southsea. His experiences at Hyde's, where he worked a thirteen-hour day and slept in a dormitory with other apprentices, later inspired his novels The Wheels of Chance, The History of Mr Polly, and Kipps, which portray the life of a draper's apprentice as well as providing a critique of society's distribution of wealth.
Wells's parents had a turbulent marriage, owing primarily to his mother's being a Protestant and his father's being a freethinker. When his mother returned to work as a lady's maid (at Uppark, a country house in Sussex), one of the conditions of work was that she would not be permitted to have living space for her husband and children. Thereafter, she and Joseph lived separate lives, though they never divorced and remained faithful to each other. As a consequence, Herbert's personal troubles increased as he subsequently failed as a draper and also, later, as a chemist's assistant. However, Uppark had a magnificent library in which he immersed himself, reading many classic works, including Plato's Republic, Thomas More's Utopia, and the works of Daniel Defoe. This was the beginning of Wells's venture into literature.
Teacher
In October 1879, Wells's mother arranged through a distant relative, Arthur Williams, for him to join the National School at Wookey in Somerset as a pupil–teacher, a senior pupil who acted as a teacher of younger children. In December that year, however, Williams was dismissed for irregularities in his qualifications and Wells was returned to Uppark. After a short apprenticeship at a chemist in nearby Midhurst and an even shorter stay as a boarder at Midhurst Grammar School, he signed his apprenticeship papers at Hyde's. In 1883, Wells persuaded his parents to release him from the apprenticeship, taking an opportunity offered by Midhurst Grammar School again to become a pupil–teacher; his proficiency in Latin and science during his earlier short stay had been remembered.
The years he spent in Southsea had been the most miserable of his life to that point, but his good fortune at securing a position at Midhurst Grammar School meant that Wells could continue his self-education in earnest. The following year, Wells won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science (later the Royal College of Science in South Kensington, now part of Imperial College London) in London, studying biology under Thomas Henry Huxley. As an alumnus, he later helped to set up the Royal College of Science Association, of which he became the first president in 1909. Wells studied in his new school until 1887, with a weekly allowance of 21 shillings (a guinea) thanks to his scholarship. This ought to have been a comfortable sum of money (at the time many working class families had "round about a pound a week" as their entire household income), yet in his Experiment in Autobiography Wells speaks of constantly being hungry, and indeed photographs of him at the time show a youth who is very thin and malnourished.
He soon entered the Debating Society of the school. These years mark the beginning of his interest in a possible reformation of society. At first approaching the subject through Plato's Republic, he soon turned to contemporary ideas of socialism as expressed by the recently formed Fabian Society and free lectures delivered at Kelmscott House, the home of William Morris. He was also among the founders of The Science School Journal, a school magazine that allowed him to express his views on literature and society, as well as trying his hand at fiction; a precursor to his novel The Time Machine was published in the journal under the title The Chronic Argonauts. The school year 1886–87 was the last year of his studies.
During 1888, Wells stayed in Stoke-on-Trent, living in Basford. The unique environment of The Potteries was certainly an inspiration. He wrote in a letter to a friend from the area that "the district made an immense impression on me." The inspiration for some of his descriptions in The War of the Worlds is thought to have come from his short time spent here, seeing the iron foundry furnaces burn over the city, shooting huge red light into the skies. His stay in The Potteries also resulted in the macabre short story "The Cone" (1895, contemporaneous with his famous The Time Machine), set in the north of the city.
After teaching for some time, he was briefly on the staff of Holt Academy in Wales – Wells found it necessary to supplement his knowledge relating to educational principles and methodology and entered the College of Preceptors (College of Teachers). He later received his Licentiate and Fellowship FCP diplomas from the college. It was not until 1890 that Wells earned a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology from the University of London External Programme. In 1889–90, he managed to find a post as a teacher at Henley House School in London, where he taught A. A. Milne (whose father ran the school). His first published work was a Text-Book of Biology in two volumes (1893).
Upon leaving the Normal School of Science, Wells was left without a source of income. His aunt Mary—his father's sister-in-law—invited him to stay with her for a while, which solved his immediate problem of accommodation. During his stay at his aunt's residence, he grew increasingly interested in her daughter, Isabel, whom he later courted. To earn money, he began writing short humorous articles for journals such as The Pall Mall Gazette, later collecting these in volume form as Select Conversations with an Uncle (1895) and Certain Personal Matters (1897). So prolific did Wells become at this mode of journalism that many of his early pieces remain unidentified. According to David C. Smith, "Most of Wells's occasional pieces have not been collected, and many have not even been identified as his. Wells did not automatically receive the byline his reputation demanded until after 1896 or so ... As a result, many of his early pieces are unknown. It is obvious that many early Wells items have been lost." His success with these shorter pieces encouraged him to write book-length work, and he published his first novel, The Time Machine, in 1895.
Personal life
In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells (1865–1931; from 1902 Isabel Mary Smith). The couple agreed to separate in 1894, when he had fallen in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (1872–1927; later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey, in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton' (now No.141), Maybury Road, in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Doctor Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When the Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham.
In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames, for two years; this lasted until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where he constructed a large family home, Spade House, in 1901. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip"; 1901–1985) and Frank Richard (1903–1982) (grandfather of film director Simon Wells). Jane died on 6 October 1927, in Dunmow, at the age of 55.
Wells had affairs with a significant number of women. In December 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society. Amber had married the barrister G. R. Blanco White in July of that year, as co-arranged by Wells. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells's "sordid intrigue" with Amber, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. Between 1910 and 1913, novelist Elizabeth von Arnim was one of his mistresses. In 1914, he had a son, Anthony West (1914–1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. In 1920–21, and intermittently until his death, he had a love affair with the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger.
Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with the 22-year younger Dutch adventurer and writer Odette Keun, with whom he lived in Lou Pidou, a house they built together in Grasse, France. Wells dedicated his longest book to her (The World of William Clissold, 1926). When visiting Maxim Gorky in Russia 1920, he had slept with Gorky's mistress Moura Budberg, then still Countess Benckendorf and 27 years his junior. In 1933, when she left Gorky and emigrated to London, their relationship renewed and she cared for him through his final illness. Wells repeatedly asked her to marry him, but Budberg strongly rejected his proposals.
In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011)—a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note)—gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others.
Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989).
Artist
One of the ways that Wells expressed himself was through his drawings and sketches. One common location for these was the endpapers and title pages of his own diaries, and they covered a wide variety of topics, from political commentary to his feelings toward his literary contemporaries and his current romantic interests. During his marriage to Amy Catherine, whom he nicknamed Jane, he drew a considerable number of pictures, many of them being overt comments on their marriage. During this period, he called these pictures "picshuas". These picshuas have been the topic of study by Wells scholars for many years, and in 2006, a book was published on the subject.
Writer
Some of his early novels, called "scientific romances", invented several themes now classic in science fiction in such works as The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, When the Sleeper Wakes, and The First Men in the Moon. He also wrote realistic novels that received critical acclaim, including Kipps and a critique of English culture during the Edwardian period, Tono-Bungay. Wells also wrote dozens of short stories and novellas, including, "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid", which helped bring the full impact of Darwin's revolutionary botanical ideas to a wider public, and was followed by many later successes such as "The Country of the Blind" (1904).
According to James E. Gunn, one of Wells's major contributions to the science fiction genre was his approach, which he referred to as his "new system of ideas". In his opinion, the author should always strive to make the story as credible as possible, even if both the writer and the reader knew certain elements are impossible, allowing the reader to accept the ideas as something that could really happen, today referred to as "the plausible impossible" and "suspension of disbelief". While neither invisibility nor time travel was new in speculative fiction, Wells added a sense of realism to the concepts which the readers were not familiar with. He conceived the idea of using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposely and selectively forwards or backwards in time. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle. He explained that while writing The Time Machine, he realized that "the more impossible the story I had to tell, the more ordinary must be the setting, and the circumstances in which I now set the Time Traveller were all that I could imagine of solid upper-class comforts." In "Wells's Law", a science fiction story should contain only a single extraordinary assumption. Therefore, as justifications for the impossible, he employed scientific ideas and theories. Wells's best-known statement of the "law" appears in his introduction to a collection of his works published in 1934:
As soon as the magic trick has been done the whole business of the fantasy writer is to keep everything else human and real. Touches of prosaic detail are imperative and a rigorous adherence to the hypothesis. Any extra fantasy outside the cardinal assumption immediately gives a touch of irresponsible silliness to the invention.
Dr. Griffin / The Invisible Man is a brilliant research scientist who discovers a method of invisibility, but finds himself unable to reverse the process. An enthusiast of random and irresponsible violence, Griffin has become an iconic character in horror fiction. The Island of Doctor Moreau sees a shipwrecked man left on the island home of Doctor Moreau, a mad scientist who creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. The earliest depiction of uplift, the novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature. In The First Men in the Moon Wells used the idea of radio communication between astronomical objects, a plot point inspired by Nikola Tesla's claim that he had received radio signals from Mars. Though Tono-Bungay is not a science-fiction novel, radioactive decay plays a small but consequential role in it. Radioactive decay plays a much larger role in The World Set Free (1914). This book contains what is surely his biggest prophetic "hit", with the first description of a nuclear weapon. Scientists of the day were well aware that the natural decay of radium releases energy at a slow rate over thousands of years. The rate of release is too slow to have practical utility, but the total amount released is huge. Wells's novel revolves around an (unspecified) invention that accelerates the process of radioactive decay, producing bombs that explode with no more than the force of ordinary high explosives—but which "continue to explode" for days on end. "Nothing could have been more obvious to the people of the earlier twentieth century", he wrote, "than the rapidity with which war was becoming impossible ... [but] they did not see it until the atomic bombs burst in their fumbling hands". In 1932, the physicist and conceiver of nuclear chain reaction Leó Szilárd read The World Set Free (the same year Sir James Chadwick discovered the neutron), a book which he said made a great impression on him. In addition to writing early science fiction, he produced work dealing with mythological beings like an angel in the novel The Wonderful Visit (1895) and a mermaid in the novel The Sea Lady (1902).
Wells also wrote non-fiction. His first non-fiction bestseller was Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought (1901). When originally serialised in a magazine it was subtitled "An Experiment in Prophecy", and is considered his most explicitly futuristic work. It offered the immediate political message of the privileged sections of society continuing to bar capable men from other classes from advancement until war would force a need to employ those most able, rather than the traditional upper classes, as leaders. Anticipating what the world would be like in the year 2000, the book is interesting both for its hits (trains and cars resulting in the dispersion of populations from cities to suburbs; moral restrictions declining as men and women seek greater sexual freedom; the defeat of German militarism, and the existence of a European Union) and its misses (he did not expect successful aircraft before 1950, and averred that "my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocate its crew and founder at sea").
His bestselling two-volume work, The Outline of History (1920), began a new era of popularised world history. It received a mixed critical response from professional historians. However, it was very popular amongst the general population and made Wells a rich man. Many other authors followed with "Outlines" of their own in other subjects. He reprised his Outline in 1922 with a much shorter popular work, A Short History of the World, a history book praised by Albert Einstein, and two long efforts, The Science of Life (1930)—written with his son G. P. Wells and evolutionary biologist Julian Huxley, and The Work, Wealth and Happiness of Mankind (1931). The "Outlines" became sufficiently common for James Thurber to parody the trend in his humorous essay, "An Outline of Scientists"—indeed, Wells's Outline of History remains in print with a new 2005 edition, while A Short History of the World has been re-edited (2006).
From quite early in Wells's career, he sought a better way to organise society and wrote a number of Utopian novels. The first of these was A Modern Utopia (1905), which shows a worldwide utopia with "no imports but meteorites, and no exports at all"; two travellers from our world fall into its alternate history. The others usually begin with the world rushing to catastrophe, until people realise a better way of living: whether by mysterious gases from a comet causing people to behave rationally and abandoning a European war (In the Days of the Comet (1906)), or a world council of scientists taking over, as in The Shape of Things to Come (1933, which he later adapted for the 1936 Alexander Korda film, Things to Come). This depicted, all too accurately, the impending World War, with cities being destroyed by aerial bombs. He also portrayed the rise of fascist dictators in The Autocracy of Mr Parham (1930) and The Holy Terror (1939). Men Like Gods (1923) is also a utopian novel. Wells in this period was regarded as an enormously influential figure; the critic Malcolm Cowley stated: "by the time he was forty, his influence was wider than any other living English writer".
Wells contemplates the ideas of nature and nurture and questions humanity in books such as The First Men in the Moon, where nature is completely suppressed by nurture, and The Island of Doctor Moreau, where the strong presence of nature represents a threat to a civilized society. Not all his scientific romances ended in a Utopia, and Wells also wrote a dystopian novel, When the Sleeper Wakes (1899, rewritten as The Sleeper Awakes, 1910), which pictures a future society where the classes have become more and more separated, leading to a revolt of the masses against the rulers. The Island of Doctor Moreau is even darker. The narrator, having been trapped on an island of animals vivisected (unsuccessfully) into human beings, eventually returns to England; like Gulliver on his return from the Houyhnhnms, he finds himself unable to shake off the perceptions of his fellow humans as barely civilised beasts, slowly reverting to their animal natures.
Wells also wrote the preface for the first edition of W. N. P. Barbellion's diaries, The Journal of a Disappointed Man, published in 1919. Since "Barbellion" was the real author's pen name, many reviewers believed Wells to have been the true author of the Journal; Wells always denied this, despite being full of praise for the diaries.
In 1927, a Canadian teacher and writer Florence Deeks unsuccessfully sued Wells for infringement of copyright and breach of trust, claiming that much of The Outline of History had been plagiarised from her unpublished manuscript, The Web of the World's Romance, which had spent nearly nine months in the hands of Wells's Canadian publisher, Macmillan Canada. However, it was sworn on oath at the trial that the manuscript remained in Toronto in the safekeeping of Macmillan, and that Wells did not even know it existed, let alone had seen it. The court found no proof of copying, and decided the similarities were due to the fact that the books had similar nature and both writers had access to the same sources. In 2000, A. B. McKillop, a professor of history at Carleton University, produced a book on the case, The Spinster & The Prophet: Florence Deeks, H. G. Wells, and the Mystery of the Purloined Past. According to McKillop, the lawsuit was unsuccessful due to the prejudice against a woman suing a well-known and famous male author, and he paints a detailed story based on the circumstantial evidence of the case. In 2004, Denis N. Magnusson, Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Law, Queen's University, Ontario, published an article on Deeks v. Wells. This re-examines the case in relation to McKillop's book. While having some sympathy for Deeks, he argues that she had a weak case that was not well presented, and though she may have met with sexism from her lawyers, she received a fair trial, adding that the law applied is essentially the same law that would be applied to a similar case today (i.e., 2004).
In 1933, Wells predicted in The Shape of Things to Come that the world war he feared would begin in January 1940, a prediction which ultimately came true four months early, in September 1939, with the outbreak of World War II. In 1936, before the Royal Institution, Wells called for the compilation of a constantly growing and changing World Encyclopaedia, to be reviewed by outstanding authorities and made accessible to every human being. In 1938, he published a collection of essays on the future organisation of knowledge and education, World Brain, including the essay "The Idea of a Permanent World Encyclopaedia".
Prior to 1933, Wells's books were widely read in Germany and Austria, and most of his science fiction works had been translated shortly after publication. By 1933, he had attracted the attention of German officials because of his criticism of the political situation in Germany, and on 10 May 1933, Wells's books were burned by the Nazi youth in Berlin's Opernplatz, and his works were banned from libraries and book stores. Wells, as president of PEN International (Poets, Essayists, Novelists), angered the Nazis by overseeing the expulsion of the German PEN club from the international body in 1934 following the German PEN's refusal to admit non-Aryan writers to its membership. At a PEN conference in Ragusa, Wells refused to yield to Nazi sympathisers who demanded that the exiled author Ernst Toller be prevented from speaking. Near the end of World War II, Allied forces discovered that the SS had compiled lists of people slated for immediate arrest during the invasion of Britain in the abandoned Operation Sea Lion, with Wells included in the alphabetical list of "The Black Book".
Wartime works
Seeking a more structured way to play war games, Wells wrote Floor Games (1911) followed by Little Wars (1913), which set out rules for fighting battles with toy soldiers (miniatures). A pacifist prior to the First World War, Wells stated "how much better is this amiable miniature [war] than the real thing". According to Wells, the idea of the game developed from a visit by his friend Jerome K. Jerome. After dinner, Jerome began shooting down toy soldiers with a toy cannon and Wells joined in to compete.
During August 1914, immediately after the outbreak of the First World War, Wells published a number of articles in London newspapers that subsequently appeared as a book entitled The War That Will End War. He coined the expression with the idealistic belief that the result of the war would make a future conflict impossible. Wells blamed the Central Powers for the coming of the war and argued that only the defeat of German militarism could bring about an end to war. Wells used the shorter form of the phrase, "the war to end war", in In the Fourth Year (1918), in which he noted that the phrase "got into circulation" in the second half of 1914. In fact, it had become one of the most common catchphrases of the war.
In 1918 Wells worked for the British War Propaganda Bureau, also called Wellington House. Wells was also one of fifty-three leading British authors — a number that included Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — who signed their names to the “Authors' Declaration.” This manifesto declared that the German invasion of Belgium had been a brutal crime, and that Britain “could not without dishonour have refused to take part in the present war.”
Travels to Russia and the Soviet Union
Wells visited Russia three times: 1914, 1920 and 1934. During his second visit, he saw his old friend Maxim Gorky and with Gorky's help, met Vladimir Lenin. In his book Russia in the Shadows, Wells portrayed Russia as recovering from a total social collapse, "the completest that has ever happened to any modern social organisation." On 23 July 1934, after visiting U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Wells went to the Soviet Union and interviewed Joseph Stalin for three hours for the New Statesman magazine, which was extremely rare at that time. He told Stalin how he had seen 'the happy faces of healthy people' in contrast with his previous visit to Moscow in 1920. However, he also criticised the lawlessness, class discrimination, state violence, and absence of free expression. Stalin enjoyed the conversation and replied accordingly. As the chairman of the London-based PEN International, which protected the rights of authors to write without being intimidated, Wells hoped by his trip to USSR, he could win Stalin over by force of argument. Before he left, he realised that no reform was to happen in the near future.
Final years
Wells’s greatest literary output occurred before the First World War, which was lamented by younger authors whom he had influenced. In this connection, George Orwell described Wells as "too sane to understand the modern world", and "since 1920 he has squandered his talents in slaying paper dragons." G. K. Chesterton quipped: "Mr Wells is a born storyteller who has sold his birthright for a pot of message".
Wells had diabetes, and was a co-founder in 1934 of The Diabetic Association (now Diabetes UK, the leading charity for people with diabetes in the UK).
On 28 October 1940, on the radio station KTSA in San Antonio, Texas, Wells took part in a radio interview with Orson Welles, who two years previously had performed a famous radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds. During the interview, by Charles C Shaw, a KTSA radio host, Wells admitted his surprise at the sensation that resulted from the broadcast but acknowledged his debt to Welles for increasing sales of one of his "more obscure" titles.
Death
Wells died of unspecified causes on 13 August 1946, aged 79, at his home at 13 Hanover Terrace, overlooking Regent's Park, London. In his preface to the 1941 edition of The War in the Air, Wells had stated that his epitaph should be: "I told you so. You damned fools". Wells's body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on 16 August 1946; his ashes were subsequently scattered into the English Channel at Old Harry Rocks, the most eastern point of the Jurassic Coast and about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) from Swanage in Dorset.
A commemorative blue plaque in his honour was installed by the Greater London Council at his home in Regent's Park in 1966.
Futurist
A futurist and “visionary”, Wells foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. Asserting that "Wells' visions of the future remain unsurpassed", John Higgs, author of Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century, states that in the late 19th century Wells “saw the coming century clearer than anyone else. He anticipated wars in the air, the sexual revolution, motorised transport causing the growth of suburbs and a proto-Wikipedia he called the "world brain". In his novel The World Set Free, he imagined an “atomic bomb” of terrifying power that would be dropped from aeroplanes. This was an extraordinary insight for an author writing in 1913, and it made a deep impression on Winston Churchill."
In 2011, Wells was among a group of science fiction writers featured in the Prophets of Science Fiction series, a show produced and hosted by film director Sir Ridley Scott, which depicts how predictions influenced the development of scientific advancements by inspiring many readers to assist in transforming those futuristic visions into everyday reality. In a 2013 review of The Time Machine for the New Yorker magazine, Brad Leithauser writes, "At the base of Wells's great visionary exploit is this rational, ultimately scientific attempt to tease out the potential future consequences of present conditions—not as they might arise in a few years, or even decades, but millennia hence, epochs hence. He is world literature's Great Extrapolator. Like no other fiction writer before him, he embraced "deep time."
Political views
Wells was a socialist and a member of the Fabian Society. Winston Churchill was an avid reader of Wells's books, and after they first met in 1902 they kept in touch until Wells died in 1946. As a junior minister Churchill borrowed lines from Wells for one of his most famous early landmark speeches in 1906, and as Prime Minister the phrase "the gathering storm"—used by Churchill to describe the rise of Nazi Germany—had been written by Wells in The War of the Worlds, which depicts an attack on Britain by Martians. Wells's extensive writings on equality and human rights, most notably his most influential work, The Rights of Man (1940), laid the groundwork for the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations shortly after his death.
His efforts regarding the League of Nations, on which he collaborated on the project with Leonard Woolf with the booklets The Idea of a League of Nations, Prolegomena to the Study of World Organization, and The Way of the League of Nations, became a disappointment as the organization turned out to be a weak one unable to prevent the Second World War, which itself occurred towards the very end of his life and only increased the pessimistic side of his nature. In his last book Mind at the End of Its Tether (1945), he considered the idea that humanity being replaced by another species might not be a bad idea. He referred to the era between the two World Wars as "The Age of Frustration".
Religious views
Wells's views on God and religion changed over his lifetime. Early in his life he distanced himself from Christianity, and later from theism, and finally, late in life, he was essentially atheistic. Martin Gardner summarises this progression:[The younger Wells] ... did not object to using the word "God" provided it did not imply anything resembling human personality. In his middle years Wells went through a phase of defending the concept of a "finite God," similar to the god of such process theologians as Samuel Alexander, Edgar Brightman, and Charles Hartshorne. (He even wrote a book about it called God the Invisible King.) Later Wells decided he was really an atheist.
In God the Invisible King (1917), Wells wrote that his idea of God did not draw upon the traditional religions of the world: This book sets out as forcibly and exactly as possible the religious belief of the writer. [Which] is a profound belief in a personal and intimate God. ... Putting the leading idea of this book very roughly, these two antagonistic typical conceptions of God may be best contrasted by speaking of one of them as God-as-Nature or the Creator, and of the other as God-as-Christ or the Redeemer. One is the great Outward God; the other is the Inmost God. The first idea was perhaps developed most highly and completely in the God of Spinoza. It is a conception of God tending to pantheism, to an idea of a comprehensive God as ruling with justice rather than affection, to a conception of aloofness and awestriking worshipfulness. The second idea, which is contradictory to this idea of an absolute God, is the God of the human heart. The writer suggested that the great outline of the theological struggles of that phase of civilisation and world unity which produced Christianity, was a persistent but unsuccessful attempt to get these two different ideas of God into one focus. Later in the work, he aligns himself with a "renascent or modern religion ... neither atheist nor Buddhist nor Mohammedan nor Christian ... [that] he has found growing up in himself".
Of Christianity, he said: "it is not now true for me. ... Every believing Christian is, I am sure, my spiritual brother ... but if systemically I called myself a Christian I feel that to most men I should imply too much and so tell a lie". Of other world religions, he writes: "All these religions are true for me as Canterbury Cathedral is a true thing and as a Swiss chalet is a true thing. There they are, and they have served a purpose, they have worked. Only they are not true for me to live in them. ... They do not work for me". In The Fate of Homo Sapiens (1939), Wells criticised almost all world religions and philosophies, stating "there is no creed, no way of living left in the world at all, that really meets the needs of the time… When we come to look at them coolly and dispassionately, all the main religions, patriotic, moral and customary systems in which human beings are sheltering today, appear to be in a state of jostling and mutually destructive movement, like the houses and palaces and other buildings of some vast, sprawling city overtaken by a landslide.
Wells's opposition to organised religion reached a fever pitch in 1943 with publication of his book Crux Ansata, subtitled "An Indictment of the Roman Catholic Church".
Literary influence and legacy
The science fiction historian John Clute describes Wells as "the most important writer the genre has yet seen", and notes his work has been central to both British and American science fiction. Science fiction author and critic Algis Budrys said Wells "remains the outstanding expositor of both the hope, and the despair, which are embodied in the technology and which are the major facts of life in our world". He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921, 1932, 1935, and 1946. Wells so influenced real exploration of space that an impact crater on Mars (and the Moon) was named after him.
In the United Kingdom, Wells's work was a key model for the British "scientific romance", and other writers in that mode, such as Olaf Stapledon, J. D. Beresford, S. Fowler Wright, and Naomi Mitchison, all drew on Wells's example. Wells was also an important influence on British science fiction of the period after the Second World War, with Arthur C. Clarke and Brian Aldiss expressing strong admiration for Wells's work. Among contemporary British science fiction writers, Stephen Baxter, Christopher Priest and Adam Roberts have all acknowledged Wells's influence on their writing; all three are Vice-Presidents of the H. G. Wells Society. He also had a strong influence on British scientist J. B. S. Haldane, who wrote Daedalus; or, Science and the Future (1924), "The Last Judgement" and "On Being the Right Size" from the essay collection Possible Worlds (1927), and Biological Possibilities for the Human Species in the Next Ten Thousand Years (1963), which are speculations about the future of human evolution and life on other planets. Haldane gave several lectures about these topics which in turn influenced other science fiction writers.
In the United States, Hugo Gernsback reprinted most of Wells's work in the pulp magazine Amazing Stories, regarding Wells's work as "texts of central importance to the self-conscious new genre". Later American writers such as Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Carl Sagan, and Ursula K. Le Guin all recalled being influenced by Wells.
Sinclair Lewis's early novels were strongly influenced by Wells's realistic social novels, such as The History of Mr Polly; Lewis also named his first son Wells after the author. Lewis nominated H. G. Wells for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.
In an interview with The Paris Review, Vladimir Nabokov described Wells as his favourite writer when he was a boy and "a great artist." He went on to cite The Passionate Friends, Ann Veronica, The Time Machine, and The Country of the Blind as superior to anything else written by Wells's British contemporaries. Nabokov said: "His sociological cogitations can be safely ignored, of course, but his romances and fantasies are superb."
Jorge Luis Borges wrote many short pieces on Wells in which he demonstrates a deep familiarity with much of Wells's work. While Borges wrote several critical reviews, including a mostly negative review of Wells's film Things to Come, he regularly treated Wells as a canonical figure of fantastic literature. Late in his life, Borges included The Invisible Man and The Time Machine in his Prologue to a Personal Library, a curated list of 100 great works of literature that he undertook at the behest of the Argentine publishing house Emecé. Canadian author Margaret Atwood read Wells's books, and he also inspired writers of European speculative fiction such as Karel Čapek and Yevgeny Zamyatin.
Representations
Literary
The superhuman protagonist of J. D. Beresford's 1911 novel, The Hampdenshire Wonder, Victor Stott, was based on Wells.
In M. P. Shiel's short story "The Primate of the Rose" (1928), there is an unpleasant womaniser named E. P. Crooks, who was written as a parody of Wells. Wells had attacked Shiel's Prince Zaleski when it was published in 1895, and this was Shiel's response. Wells praised Shiel's The Purple Cloud (1901); in turn Shiel expressed admiration for Wells, referring to him at a speech to the Horsham Rotary Club in 1933 as "my friend Mr. Wells".
In C. S. Lewis's novel That Hideous Strength (1945), the character Jules is a caricature of Wells, and much of Lewis's science fiction was written both under the influence of Wells and as an antithesis to his work (or, as he put it, an "exorcism" of the influence it had on him).
In Brian Aldiss's novella The Saliva Tree (1966), Wells has a small off-screen guest role.
In Saul Bellow's novel Mr. Sammler's Planet (1970), Wells is one of several historical figures the protagonist met when he was a young man.
In The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock (1976) Wells has an important part.
In The Map of Time (2008) by Spanish author Félix J. Palma; Wells is one of several historical characters.
Wells is one of the two Georges in Paul Levinson's 2013 time-travel novelette, "Ian, George, and George," published in Analog magazine.
Dramatic
Rod Taylor portrays Wells in the 1960 science fiction film The Time Machine (based on the novel of the same name), in which Wells uses his time machine to try and find his Utopian society.
Malcolm McDowell portrays Wells in the 1979 science fiction film Time After Time, in which Wells uses a time machine to pursue Jack the Ripper to the present day. In the film, Wells meets "Amy" in the future who then returns to 1893 to become his second wife Amy Catherine Robbins.
Wells is portrayed in the 1985 story Timelash from the 22nd season of the BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who. In this story, Herbert, an enthusiastic temporary companion to the Doctor, is revealed to be a young H. G. Wells. The plot is loosely based upon the themes and characters of The Time Machine with references to The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man and The Island of Doctor Moreau. The story jokingly suggests that Wells's inspiration for his later novels came from his adventure with the Sixth Doctor.
In the BBC2 anthology series Encounters about imagined meetings between historical figures, Beautiful Lies, by Paul Pender (15 August 1992) centred on an acrimonious dinner party attended by Wells (Richard Todd), George Orwell (Jon Finch), and William Empson (Patrick Ryecart).
The character of Wells also appeared in several episodes of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993–1997), usually pitted against the time-travelling villain known as Tempus (Lane Davies). Wells's younger self was played by Terry Kiser, and the older Wells was played by Hamilton Camp.
In the British TV mini-series The Infinite Worlds of H. G. Wells (2001), several of Wells's short stories are dramatised but are adapted using Wells himself (Tom Ward) as the main protagonist in each story.
In the Disney Channel Original Series Phil of the Future, which centres on time-travel, the present-day high school that the main characters attend is named "H. G. Wells".
In the 2006 television docudrama H. G. Wells: War with the World, Wells is played by Michael Sheen.
Television episode "World's End" of Cold Case (2007) is about the discovery of human remains in the bottom of a well leads to the reinvestigation of the case of a housewife who went missing during Orson Welles' radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds".
On the science fiction television series Warehouse 13 (2009–2014), there is a female version Helena G. Wells. When she appeared she explained that her brother was her front for her writing because a female science fiction author would not be accepted.
Comedian Paul F. Tompkins portrays a fictional Wells as the host of The Dead Authors Podcast, wherein Wells uses his time machine to bring dead authors (played by other comedians) to the present and interview them.
H. G. Wells as a young boy appears in the Legends of Tomorrow episode "The Magnificent Eight". In this story, the boy Wells is dying of consumption but is cured by a time-travelling Martin Stein.
In the four part series The Nightmare Worlds of H. G. Wells (2016), Wells is played by Ray Winstone.
In the 2017 television series version of Time After Time, based on the 1979 film, H. G. Wells is portrayed by Freddie Stroma.
In the 2019 television adaptation of The War of the Worlds, the character of 'George', played by Rafe Spall, demonstrates a number of elements of Wells's own life, including his estrangement from his wife and unmarried co-habitation with the character of 'Amy'.
Literary papers
In 1954, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign purchased the H. G. Wells literary papers and correspondence collection. The University's Rare Book & Manuscript Library holds the largest collection of Wells manuscripts, correspondence, first editions and publications in the United States. Among these is unpublished material and the manuscripts of such works as The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine. The collection includes first editions, revisions and translations. The letters contain general family correspondence, communications from publishers, material regarding the Fabian Society, and letters from politicians and public figures, most notably George Bernard Shaw and Joseph Conrad.
Bibliography
See also
References
Further reading
Dickson, Lovat. H. G. Wells: His Turbulent Life & Times. 1969.
Foot, Michael. H. G.: History of Mr. Wells. Doubleday, 1985 (), Black Swan, New edition, Oct 1996 (paperback, )
Gilmour, David. The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002 (paperback, ); 2003 (paperback, ).
Gomme, A. W., Mr. Wells as Historian. Glasgow: MacLehose, Jackson, and Co., 1921.
Gosling, John. Waging the War of the Worlds. Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland, 2009 (paperback, ).
Jasanoff, Maya, "The Future Was His" (review of Sarah Cole, Inventing Tomorrow: H.G. Wells and the Twentieth Century, Columbia University Press, 374 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXVII, no. 12 (23 July 2020), pp. 50–51. Writes Jasanoff (p. 51): "Although [Wells] was prophetically right, and right-minded, about some things... [n]owhere was he more disturbingly wrong than in his loathsome affinity for eugenics..."
Lynn, Andrea The secret love life of H.G. Wells
Mackenzie, Norman and Jean, The Time Traveller: the Life of H G Wells, London: Weidenfeld, 1973,
Mauthner, Martin. German Writers in French Exile, 1933–1940, London: Vallentine and Mitchell, 2007, .
McLean, Steven. 'The Early Fiction of H. G. Wells: Fantasies of Science'. Palgrave, 2009, .
Partington, John S. Building Cosmopolis: The Political Thought of H. G. Wells. Ashgate, 2003, .
Roberts, Adam. H G Wells A Literary Life. Springer International Publishing, 2019, ISBN 9783030264215.
Shadurski, Maxim. The Nationality of Utopia: H. G. Wells, England, and the World State. London: Routledge, 2020, .
Sherborne, Michael. H. G. Wells: Another Kind of Life. London: Peter Owen, 2010, .
Smith, David C., H. G. Wells: Desperately Mortal: A Biography. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986,
West, Anthony. H. G. Wells: Aspects of a Life. London: Hutchinson, 1984.
External links
Future Tense – The Story of H. G. Wells at BBC One – 150th anniversary documentary (2016)
"In the footsteps of H G Wells" at New Statesman – "The great author called for a Human Rights Act; 60 years later, we have it" (2000)
Sources—collections
*
Free H. G. Wells downloads for iPhone, iPad, Nook, Android, and Kindle in PDF and all popular eBook reader formats (AZW3, EPUB, MOBI) at ebooktakeaway.com
H G Wells at the British Library
H. G. Wells papers at University of Illinois
Ebooks by H. G. Wells at Global Grey Ebooks
Sources—letters, essays and interviews
Archive of Wells's BBC broadcasts
Film interview with H. G. Wells
"Stephen Crane. From an English Standpoint", by Wells, 1900.
Rabindranath Tagore: In conversation with H. G. Wells. Rabindranath Tagore and Wells conversing in Geneva in 1930.
"Introduction", to W. N. P. Barbellion's The Journal of a Disappointed Man, by Wells, 1919.
"Woman and Primitive Culture", by Wells, 1895.
Letter, to M. P. Shiel, by Wells, 1937.
Biography
"H. G. Wells". In Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Critical essays
An introduction to The War of the Worlds by Iain Sinclair on the British Library's Discovering Literature website.
"An Appreciation of H. G. Wells", by Mary Austin, 1911.
"Socialism and the Family" (1906) by Belfort Bax, Part 1, Part 2.
"H. G. Wells warned us how it would feel to fight a War of the Worlds", by Niall Ferguson, in The Telegraph, 24 June 2005.
"H. G. Wells's Idea of a World Brain: A Critical Re-assessment", by W. Boyd Rayward, in Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50 (15 May 1999): 557–579
"Mr H. G. Wells and the Giants", by G. K. Chesterton, from his book Heretics (1908).
"The Internet: a world brain?", by Martin Gardner, in Skeptical Inquirer, Jan–Feb 1999.
"Science Fiction: The Shape of Things to Come", by Mark Bould, in The Socialist Review, May 2005.
"Who needs Utopia? A dialogue with my utopian self (with apologies, and thanks, to H. G. Wells)", by Gregory Claeys in Spaces of Utopia: An Electronic Journal, no 1, Spring 2006.
"When H. G. Wells Split the Atom: A 1914 Preview of 1945", by Freda Kirchwey, in The Nation, posted 4 September 2003 (original 18 August 1945 issue).
"Wells, Hitler and the World State", by George Orwell. First published: Horizon. GB, London. Aug 1941.
"War of the Worldviews", by John J. Miller, in The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal, 21 June 2005.
"Wells's Autobiography", by John Hart, from New International, Vol.2 No.2, Mar 1935, pp. 75–76.
"History in the Science Fiction of H. G. Wells", by Patrick Parrinder, Cycnos, 22.2 (2006).
"From the World Brain to the Worldwide Web", by Martin Campbell-Kelly, Gresham College Lecture, 9 November 2006.
"The Beginning of Wisdom: On Reading H. G. Wells", by Vivian Gornick, Boston Review, 31.1 (2007).
John Hammond, The Complete List of Short Stories of H. G. Wells
"H. G. Wells Predictions Ring True, 143 Years Later" at National Geographic
"H. G. Wells, the man I knew" Obituary of Wells by George Bernard Shaw, at the New Statesman
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"Seven ships of the Royal Navy have borne the name HMS Favourite, or HMS Favorite:\n\n may have been a 14-gun sloop launched in 1740.\n was a 14-gun sloop launched in 1757 and sold in 1784.\n was a 16-gun sloop launched in 1794. The French captured her in 1806 and renamed her Favorite, but the British recaptured her in 1807 and renamed her HMS Goree. She became a prison ship in 1814 and was broken up in 1817.\n was a survey cutter purchased in 1805 and sold c. 1813.\n was an 18-gun broken up in 1821.\n was an 18-gun sloop launched in 1829. She became a coal hulk in 1859 and was sold in 1905. She bore the name Favorite between 1836 and 1856, and was designated C3 and later C77 while in use as a coal hulk.\n was an ironclad screw corvette launched in 1864 and sold in 1886.\n\nOther\nOn 10 March 1806 the Principal Officers and Commissioners of His Majesty's Navy offered \"His Majesty's Schooner Favorite\", \"lying at Portsmouth\", for sale. It is not clear what vessel this was.\n\nCitations\n\nRoyal Navy ship names",
"Ann Jessop or Ann Wilde; Ann Turner or Ann Bardwell (c.1781 – 23 September 1864) was a British cabinet-maker based in Sheffield.\n\nLife\nJessop was born in Sheffield and baptised in 1782 in what is now Sheffield Cathedral. Her parents were Adam and Elizabeth Wilde. She appears to have had little formal education as she could not sign her own name when she married Charles Turner in Sheffield and later Edward Bardwell in Rotherham. Bardwell was a cabinet maker and when he died in 1821 she took over the business.\n\nShe started to make, and write, her name when she married her third husband. When he died she moved to the business to smaller premises but she was the registered owner of their cabinet-making business in 1833. It remained in her name until she married her fourth husband.\n\nIn 1841 she was again the registered owner of the business. It is clear that the business was well regarded as they were asked to bid to supply hundreds of mahogany chairs and matching tables.\n\nIn 1852 her business was still operating in Fargate in Sheffield.\n\nJessop died in her own home in 1864 in Sheffield.\n\nReferences\n\n1780 births\n1864 deaths\nBusinesspeople from Sheffield\nCabinetmakers\n19th-century British businesspeople"
] |
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"H. G. Wells",
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"Who did he marry",
"1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells.",
"What happened to the couple",
"The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students,",
"What was her name",
"Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895."
] | C_86cc13fd852e4219a6fc0d2d8dd4d80e_0 | Where was their house atthis time | 4 | Where was H.G. Wells living prior to moving to Woking, Surrey with Amy Robbins? | H. G. Wells | In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells. The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham. In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where in 1901 he constructed a large family home: Spade House. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip") in 1901 (died 1985) and Frank Richard in 1903 (died 1982). With his wife Jane's consent, Wells had affairs with a number of women, including the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger, adventurer and writer Odette Keun, Soviet spy Moura Budberg and novelist Elizabeth von Arnim. In 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society; and in 1914, a son, Anthony West (1914-1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells' "sordid intrigue" with the daughter of veteran Fabian Sidney Olivier, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011) - a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note) - gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others. Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989). CANNOTANSWER | They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months | Herbert George Wells (21 September 186613 August 1946) was an English writer. Prolific in many genres, he wrote dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, history, satire, biography and autobiography. His work also included two books on recreational war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is sometimes called the "father of science fiction."
During his own lifetime, however, he was most prominent as a forward-looking, even prophetic social critic who devoted his literary talents to the development of a progressive vision on a global scale. A futurist, he wrote a number of utopian works and foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. His science fiction imagined time travel, alien invasion, invisibility, and biological engineering. Brian Aldiss referred to Wells as the "Shakespeare of science fiction", while American writer Charles Fort referred to him as a "wild talent".
Wells rendered his works convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work – dubbed “Wells's law” – leading Joseph Conrad to hail him in 1898 as "O Realist of the Fantastic!". His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), which was his first novel, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), The War of the Worlds (1898) and the military science fiction The War in the Air (1907). Wells was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature four times.
Wells's earliest specialised training was in biology, and his thinking on ethical matters took place in a specifically and fundamentally Darwinian context. He was also an outspoken socialist from a young age, often (but not always, as at the beginning of the First World War) sympathising with pacifist views. His later works became increasingly political and didactic, and he wrote little science fiction, while he sometimes indicated on official documents that his profession was that of journalist. Novels such as Kipps and The History of Mr Polly, which describe lower-middle-class life, led to the suggestion that he was a worthy successor to Charles Dickens, but Wells described a range of social strata and even attempted, in Tono-Bungay (1909), a diagnosis of English society as a whole. Wells was a diabetic and co-founded the charity The Diabetic Association (known today as Diabetes UK) in 1934.
Life
Early life
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on 21 September 1866. Called "Bertie" by his family, he was the fourth and last child of Joseph Wells, a former domestic gardener, and at the time a shopkeeper and professional cricketer and Sarah Neal, a former domestic servant. An inheritance had allowed the family to acquire a shop in which they sold china and sporting goods, although it failed to prosper: the stock was old and worn out, and the location was poor. Joseph Wells managed to earn a meagre income, but little of it came from the shop and he received an unsteady amount of money from playing professional cricket for the Kent county team.
A defining incident of young Wells's life was an accident in 1874 that left him bedridden with a broken leg. To pass the time he began to read books from the local library, brought to him by his father. He soon became devoted to the other worlds and lives to which books gave him access; they also stimulated his desire to write. Later that year he entered Thomas Morley's Commercial Academy, a private school founded in 1849, following the bankruptcy of Morley's earlier school. The teaching was erratic, the curriculum mostly focused, Wells later said, on producing copperplate handwriting and doing the sort of sums useful to tradesmen. Wells continued at Morley's Academy until 1880. In 1877, his father, Joseph Wells, suffered a fractured thigh. The accident effectively put an end to Joseph's career as a cricketer, and his subsequent earnings as a shopkeeper were not enough to compensate for the loss of the primary source of family income.
No longer able to support themselves financially, the family instead sought to place their sons as apprentices in various occupations. From 1880 to 1883, Wells had an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at Hyde's Drapery Emporium in Southsea. His experiences at Hyde's, where he worked a thirteen-hour day and slept in a dormitory with other apprentices, later inspired his novels The Wheels of Chance, The History of Mr Polly, and Kipps, which portray the life of a draper's apprentice as well as providing a critique of society's distribution of wealth.
Wells's parents had a turbulent marriage, owing primarily to his mother's being a Protestant and his father's being a freethinker. When his mother returned to work as a lady's maid (at Uppark, a country house in Sussex), one of the conditions of work was that she would not be permitted to have living space for her husband and children. Thereafter, she and Joseph lived separate lives, though they never divorced and remained faithful to each other. As a consequence, Herbert's personal troubles increased as he subsequently failed as a draper and also, later, as a chemist's assistant. However, Uppark had a magnificent library in which he immersed himself, reading many classic works, including Plato's Republic, Thomas More's Utopia, and the works of Daniel Defoe. This was the beginning of Wells's venture into literature.
Teacher
In October 1879, Wells's mother arranged through a distant relative, Arthur Williams, for him to join the National School at Wookey in Somerset as a pupil–teacher, a senior pupil who acted as a teacher of younger children. In December that year, however, Williams was dismissed for irregularities in his qualifications and Wells was returned to Uppark. After a short apprenticeship at a chemist in nearby Midhurst and an even shorter stay as a boarder at Midhurst Grammar School, he signed his apprenticeship papers at Hyde's. In 1883, Wells persuaded his parents to release him from the apprenticeship, taking an opportunity offered by Midhurst Grammar School again to become a pupil–teacher; his proficiency in Latin and science during his earlier short stay had been remembered.
The years he spent in Southsea had been the most miserable of his life to that point, but his good fortune at securing a position at Midhurst Grammar School meant that Wells could continue his self-education in earnest. The following year, Wells won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science (later the Royal College of Science in South Kensington, now part of Imperial College London) in London, studying biology under Thomas Henry Huxley. As an alumnus, he later helped to set up the Royal College of Science Association, of which he became the first president in 1909. Wells studied in his new school until 1887, with a weekly allowance of 21 shillings (a guinea) thanks to his scholarship. This ought to have been a comfortable sum of money (at the time many working class families had "round about a pound a week" as their entire household income), yet in his Experiment in Autobiography Wells speaks of constantly being hungry, and indeed photographs of him at the time show a youth who is very thin and malnourished.
He soon entered the Debating Society of the school. These years mark the beginning of his interest in a possible reformation of society. At first approaching the subject through Plato's Republic, he soon turned to contemporary ideas of socialism as expressed by the recently formed Fabian Society and free lectures delivered at Kelmscott House, the home of William Morris. He was also among the founders of The Science School Journal, a school magazine that allowed him to express his views on literature and society, as well as trying his hand at fiction; a precursor to his novel The Time Machine was published in the journal under the title The Chronic Argonauts. The school year 1886–87 was the last year of his studies.
During 1888, Wells stayed in Stoke-on-Trent, living in Basford. The unique environment of The Potteries was certainly an inspiration. He wrote in a letter to a friend from the area that "the district made an immense impression on me." The inspiration for some of his descriptions in The War of the Worlds is thought to have come from his short time spent here, seeing the iron foundry furnaces burn over the city, shooting huge red light into the skies. His stay in The Potteries also resulted in the macabre short story "The Cone" (1895, contemporaneous with his famous The Time Machine), set in the north of the city.
After teaching for some time, he was briefly on the staff of Holt Academy in Wales – Wells found it necessary to supplement his knowledge relating to educational principles and methodology and entered the College of Preceptors (College of Teachers). He later received his Licentiate and Fellowship FCP diplomas from the college. It was not until 1890 that Wells earned a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology from the University of London External Programme. In 1889–90, he managed to find a post as a teacher at Henley House School in London, where he taught A. A. Milne (whose father ran the school). His first published work was a Text-Book of Biology in two volumes (1893).
Upon leaving the Normal School of Science, Wells was left without a source of income. His aunt Mary—his father's sister-in-law—invited him to stay with her for a while, which solved his immediate problem of accommodation. During his stay at his aunt's residence, he grew increasingly interested in her daughter, Isabel, whom he later courted. To earn money, he began writing short humorous articles for journals such as The Pall Mall Gazette, later collecting these in volume form as Select Conversations with an Uncle (1895) and Certain Personal Matters (1897). So prolific did Wells become at this mode of journalism that many of his early pieces remain unidentified. According to David C. Smith, "Most of Wells's occasional pieces have not been collected, and many have not even been identified as his. Wells did not automatically receive the byline his reputation demanded until after 1896 or so ... As a result, many of his early pieces are unknown. It is obvious that many early Wells items have been lost." His success with these shorter pieces encouraged him to write book-length work, and he published his first novel, The Time Machine, in 1895.
Personal life
In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells (1865–1931; from 1902 Isabel Mary Smith). The couple agreed to separate in 1894, when he had fallen in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (1872–1927; later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey, in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton' (now No.141), Maybury Road, in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Doctor Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When the Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham.
In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames, for two years; this lasted until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where he constructed a large family home, Spade House, in 1901. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip"; 1901–1985) and Frank Richard (1903–1982) (grandfather of film director Simon Wells). Jane died on 6 October 1927, in Dunmow, at the age of 55.
Wells had affairs with a significant number of women. In December 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society. Amber had married the barrister G. R. Blanco White in July of that year, as co-arranged by Wells. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells's "sordid intrigue" with Amber, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. Between 1910 and 1913, novelist Elizabeth von Arnim was one of his mistresses. In 1914, he had a son, Anthony West (1914–1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. In 1920–21, and intermittently until his death, he had a love affair with the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger.
Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with the 22-year younger Dutch adventurer and writer Odette Keun, with whom he lived in Lou Pidou, a house they built together in Grasse, France. Wells dedicated his longest book to her (The World of William Clissold, 1926). When visiting Maxim Gorky in Russia 1920, he had slept with Gorky's mistress Moura Budberg, then still Countess Benckendorf and 27 years his junior. In 1933, when she left Gorky and emigrated to London, their relationship renewed and she cared for him through his final illness. Wells repeatedly asked her to marry him, but Budberg strongly rejected his proposals.
In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011)—a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note)—gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others.
Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989).
Artist
One of the ways that Wells expressed himself was through his drawings and sketches. One common location for these was the endpapers and title pages of his own diaries, and they covered a wide variety of topics, from political commentary to his feelings toward his literary contemporaries and his current romantic interests. During his marriage to Amy Catherine, whom he nicknamed Jane, he drew a considerable number of pictures, many of them being overt comments on their marriage. During this period, he called these pictures "picshuas". These picshuas have been the topic of study by Wells scholars for many years, and in 2006, a book was published on the subject.
Writer
Some of his early novels, called "scientific romances", invented several themes now classic in science fiction in such works as The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, When the Sleeper Wakes, and The First Men in the Moon. He also wrote realistic novels that received critical acclaim, including Kipps and a critique of English culture during the Edwardian period, Tono-Bungay. Wells also wrote dozens of short stories and novellas, including, "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid", which helped bring the full impact of Darwin's revolutionary botanical ideas to a wider public, and was followed by many later successes such as "The Country of the Blind" (1904).
According to James E. Gunn, one of Wells's major contributions to the science fiction genre was his approach, which he referred to as his "new system of ideas". In his opinion, the author should always strive to make the story as credible as possible, even if both the writer and the reader knew certain elements are impossible, allowing the reader to accept the ideas as something that could really happen, today referred to as "the plausible impossible" and "suspension of disbelief". While neither invisibility nor time travel was new in speculative fiction, Wells added a sense of realism to the concepts which the readers were not familiar with. He conceived the idea of using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposely and selectively forwards or backwards in time. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle. He explained that while writing The Time Machine, he realized that "the more impossible the story I had to tell, the more ordinary must be the setting, and the circumstances in which I now set the Time Traveller were all that I could imagine of solid upper-class comforts." In "Wells's Law", a science fiction story should contain only a single extraordinary assumption. Therefore, as justifications for the impossible, he employed scientific ideas and theories. Wells's best-known statement of the "law" appears in his introduction to a collection of his works published in 1934:
As soon as the magic trick has been done the whole business of the fantasy writer is to keep everything else human and real. Touches of prosaic detail are imperative and a rigorous adherence to the hypothesis. Any extra fantasy outside the cardinal assumption immediately gives a touch of irresponsible silliness to the invention.
Dr. Griffin / The Invisible Man is a brilliant research scientist who discovers a method of invisibility, but finds himself unable to reverse the process. An enthusiast of random and irresponsible violence, Griffin has become an iconic character in horror fiction. The Island of Doctor Moreau sees a shipwrecked man left on the island home of Doctor Moreau, a mad scientist who creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. The earliest depiction of uplift, the novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature. In The First Men in the Moon Wells used the idea of radio communication between astronomical objects, a plot point inspired by Nikola Tesla's claim that he had received radio signals from Mars. Though Tono-Bungay is not a science-fiction novel, radioactive decay plays a small but consequential role in it. Radioactive decay plays a much larger role in The World Set Free (1914). This book contains what is surely his biggest prophetic "hit", with the first description of a nuclear weapon. Scientists of the day were well aware that the natural decay of radium releases energy at a slow rate over thousands of years. The rate of release is too slow to have practical utility, but the total amount released is huge. Wells's novel revolves around an (unspecified) invention that accelerates the process of radioactive decay, producing bombs that explode with no more than the force of ordinary high explosives—but which "continue to explode" for days on end. "Nothing could have been more obvious to the people of the earlier twentieth century", he wrote, "than the rapidity with which war was becoming impossible ... [but] they did not see it until the atomic bombs burst in their fumbling hands". In 1932, the physicist and conceiver of nuclear chain reaction Leó Szilárd read The World Set Free (the same year Sir James Chadwick discovered the neutron), a book which he said made a great impression on him. In addition to writing early science fiction, he produced work dealing with mythological beings like an angel in the novel The Wonderful Visit (1895) and a mermaid in the novel The Sea Lady (1902).
Wells also wrote non-fiction. His first non-fiction bestseller was Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought (1901). When originally serialised in a magazine it was subtitled "An Experiment in Prophecy", and is considered his most explicitly futuristic work. It offered the immediate political message of the privileged sections of society continuing to bar capable men from other classes from advancement until war would force a need to employ those most able, rather than the traditional upper classes, as leaders. Anticipating what the world would be like in the year 2000, the book is interesting both for its hits (trains and cars resulting in the dispersion of populations from cities to suburbs; moral restrictions declining as men and women seek greater sexual freedom; the defeat of German militarism, and the existence of a European Union) and its misses (he did not expect successful aircraft before 1950, and averred that "my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocate its crew and founder at sea").
His bestselling two-volume work, The Outline of History (1920), began a new era of popularised world history. It received a mixed critical response from professional historians. However, it was very popular amongst the general population and made Wells a rich man. Many other authors followed with "Outlines" of their own in other subjects. He reprised his Outline in 1922 with a much shorter popular work, A Short History of the World, a history book praised by Albert Einstein, and two long efforts, The Science of Life (1930)—written with his son G. P. Wells and evolutionary biologist Julian Huxley, and The Work, Wealth and Happiness of Mankind (1931). The "Outlines" became sufficiently common for James Thurber to parody the trend in his humorous essay, "An Outline of Scientists"—indeed, Wells's Outline of History remains in print with a new 2005 edition, while A Short History of the World has been re-edited (2006).
From quite early in Wells's career, he sought a better way to organise society and wrote a number of Utopian novels. The first of these was A Modern Utopia (1905), which shows a worldwide utopia with "no imports but meteorites, and no exports at all"; two travellers from our world fall into its alternate history. The others usually begin with the world rushing to catastrophe, until people realise a better way of living: whether by mysterious gases from a comet causing people to behave rationally and abandoning a European war (In the Days of the Comet (1906)), or a world council of scientists taking over, as in The Shape of Things to Come (1933, which he later adapted for the 1936 Alexander Korda film, Things to Come). This depicted, all too accurately, the impending World War, with cities being destroyed by aerial bombs. He also portrayed the rise of fascist dictators in The Autocracy of Mr Parham (1930) and The Holy Terror (1939). Men Like Gods (1923) is also a utopian novel. Wells in this period was regarded as an enormously influential figure; the critic Malcolm Cowley stated: "by the time he was forty, his influence was wider than any other living English writer".
Wells contemplates the ideas of nature and nurture and questions humanity in books such as The First Men in the Moon, where nature is completely suppressed by nurture, and The Island of Doctor Moreau, where the strong presence of nature represents a threat to a civilized society. Not all his scientific romances ended in a Utopia, and Wells also wrote a dystopian novel, When the Sleeper Wakes (1899, rewritten as The Sleeper Awakes, 1910), which pictures a future society where the classes have become more and more separated, leading to a revolt of the masses against the rulers. The Island of Doctor Moreau is even darker. The narrator, having been trapped on an island of animals vivisected (unsuccessfully) into human beings, eventually returns to England; like Gulliver on his return from the Houyhnhnms, he finds himself unable to shake off the perceptions of his fellow humans as barely civilised beasts, slowly reverting to their animal natures.
Wells also wrote the preface for the first edition of W. N. P. Barbellion's diaries, The Journal of a Disappointed Man, published in 1919. Since "Barbellion" was the real author's pen name, many reviewers believed Wells to have been the true author of the Journal; Wells always denied this, despite being full of praise for the diaries.
In 1927, a Canadian teacher and writer Florence Deeks unsuccessfully sued Wells for infringement of copyright and breach of trust, claiming that much of The Outline of History had been plagiarised from her unpublished manuscript, The Web of the World's Romance, which had spent nearly nine months in the hands of Wells's Canadian publisher, Macmillan Canada. However, it was sworn on oath at the trial that the manuscript remained in Toronto in the safekeeping of Macmillan, and that Wells did not even know it existed, let alone had seen it. The court found no proof of copying, and decided the similarities were due to the fact that the books had similar nature and both writers had access to the same sources. In 2000, A. B. McKillop, a professor of history at Carleton University, produced a book on the case, The Spinster & The Prophet: Florence Deeks, H. G. Wells, and the Mystery of the Purloined Past. According to McKillop, the lawsuit was unsuccessful due to the prejudice against a woman suing a well-known and famous male author, and he paints a detailed story based on the circumstantial evidence of the case. In 2004, Denis N. Magnusson, Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Law, Queen's University, Ontario, published an article on Deeks v. Wells. This re-examines the case in relation to McKillop's book. While having some sympathy for Deeks, he argues that she had a weak case that was not well presented, and though she may have met with sexism from her lawyers, she received a fair trial, adding that the law applied is essentially the same law that would be applied to a similar case today (i.e., 2004).
In 1933, Wells predicted in The Shape of Things to Come that the world war he feared would begin in January 1940, a prediction which ultimately came true four months early, in September 1939, with the outbreak of World War II. In 1936, before the Royal Institution, Wells called for the compilation of a constantly growing and changing World Encyclopaedia, to be reviewed by outstanding authorities and made accessible to every human being. In 1938, he published a collection of essays on the future organisation of knowledge and education, World Brain, including the essay "The Idea of a Permanent World Encyclopaedia".
Prior to 1933, Wells's books were widely read in Germany and Austria, and most of his science fiction works had been translated shortly after publication. By 1933, he had attracted the attention of German officials because of his criticism of the political situation in Germany, and on 10 May 1933, Wells's books were burned by the Nazi youth in Berlin's Opernplatz, and his works were banned from libraries and book stores. Wells, as president of PEN International (Poets, Essayists, Novelists), angered the Nazis by overseeing the expulsion of the German PEN club from the international body in 1934 following the German PEN's refusal to admit non-Aryan writers to its membership. At a PEN conference in Ragusa, Wells refused to yield to Nazi sympathisers who demanded that the exiled author Ernst Toller be prevented from speaking. Near the end of World War II, Allied forces discovered that the SS had compiled lists of people slated for immediate arrest during the invasion of Britain in the abandoned Operation Sea Lion, with Wells included in the alphabetical list of "The Black Book".
Wartime works
Seeking a more structured way to play war games, Wells wrote Floor Games (1911) followed by Little Wars (1913), which set out rules for fighting battles with toy soldiers (miniatures). A pacifist prior to the First World War, Wells stated "how much better is this amiable miniature [war] than the real thing". According to Wells, the idea of the game developed from a visit by his friend Jerome K. Jerome. After dinner, Jerome began shooting down toy soldiers with a toy cannon and Wells joined in to compete.
During August 1914, immediately after the outbreak of the First World War, Wells published a number of articles in London newspapers that subsequently appeared as a book entitled The War That Will End War. He coined the expression with the idealistic belief that the result of the war would make a future conflict impossible. Wells blamed the Central Powers for the coming of the war and argued that only the defeat of German militarism could bring about an end to war. Wells used the shorter form of the phrase, "the war to end war", in In the Fourth Year (1918), in which he noted that the phrase "got into circulation" in the second half of 1914. In fact, it had become one of the most common catchphrases of the war.
In 1918 Wells worked for the British War Propaganda Bureau, also called Wellington House. Wells was also one of fifty-three leading British authors — a number that included Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — who signed their names to the “Authors' Declaration.” This manifesto declared that the German invasion of Belgium had been a brutal crime, and that Britain “could not without dishonour have refused to take part in the present war.”
Travels to Russia and the Soviet Union
Wells visited Russia three times: 1914, 1920 and 1934. During his second visit, he saw his old friend Maxim Gorky and with Gorky's help, met Vladimir Lenin. In his book Russia in the Shadows, Wells portrayed Russia as recovering from a total social collapse, "the completest that has ever happened to any modern social organisation." On 23 July 1934, after visiting U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Wells went to the Soviet Union and interviewed Joseph Stalin for three hours for the New Statesman magazine, which was extremely rare at that time. He told Stalin how he had seen 'the happy faces of healthy people' in contrast with his previous visit to Moscow in 1920. However, he also criticised the lawlessness, class discrimination, state violence, and absence of free expression. Stalin enjoyed the conversation and replied accordingly. As the chairman of the London-based PEN International, which protected the rights of authors to write without being intimidated, Wells hoped by his trip to USSR, he could win Stalin over by force of argument. Before he left, he realised that no reform was to happen in the near future.
Final years
Wells’s greatest literary output occurred before the First World War, which was lamented by younger authors whom he had influenced. In this connection, George Orwell described Wells as "too sane to understand the modern world", and "since 1920 he has squandered his talents in slaying paper dragons." G. K. Chesterton quipped: "Mr Wells is a born storyteller who has sold his birthright for a pot of message".
Wells had diabetes, and was a co-founder in 1934 of The Diabetic Association (now Diabetes UK, the leading charity for people with diabetes in the UK).
On 28 October 1940, on the radio station KTSA in San Antonio, Texas, Wells took part in a radio interview with Orson Welles, who two years previously had performed a famous radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds. During the interview, by Charles C Shaw, a KTSA radio host, Wells admitted his surprise at the sensation that resulted from the broadcast but acknowledged his debt to Welles for increasing sales of one of his "more obscure" titles.
Death
Wells died of unspecified causes on 13 August 1946, aged 79, at his home at 13 Hanover Terrace, overlooking Regent's Park, London. In his preface to the 1941 edition of The War in the Air, Wells had stated that his epitaph should be: "I told you so. You damned fools". Wells's body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on 16 August 1946; his ashes were subsequently scattered into the English Channel at Old Harry Rocks, the most eastern point of the Jurassic Coast and about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) from Swanage in Dorset.
A commemorative blue plaque in his honour was installed by the Greater London Council at his home in Regent's Park in 1966.
Futurist
A futurist and “visionary”, Wells foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. Asserting that "Wells' visions of the future remain unsurpassed", John Higgs, author of Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century, states that in the late 19th century Wells “saw the coming century clearer than anyone else. He anticipated wars in the air, the sexual revolution, motorised transport causing the growth of suburbs and a proto-Wikipedia he called the "world brain". In his novel The World Set Free, he imagined an “atomic bomb” of terrifying power that would be dropped from aeroplanes. This was an extraordinary insight for an author writing in 1913, and it made a deep impression on Winston Churchill."
In 2011, Wells was among a group of science fiction writers featured in the Prophets of Science Fiction series, a show produced and hosted by film director Sir Ridley Scott, which depicts how predictions influenced the development of scientific advancements by inspiring many readers to assist in transforming those futuristic visions into everyday reality. In a 2013 review of The Time Machine for the New Yorker magazine, Brad Leithauser writes, "At the base of Wells's great visionary exploit is this rational, ultimately scientific attempt to tease out the potential future consequences of present conditions—not as they might arise in a few years, or even decades, but millennia hence, epochs hence. He is world literature's Great Extrapolator. Like no other fiction writer before him, he embraced "deep time."
Political views
Wells was a socialist and a member of the Fabian Society. Winston Churchill was an avid reader of Wells's books, and after they first met in 1902 they kept in touch until Wells died in 1946. As a junior minister Churchill borrowed lines from Wells for one of his most famous early landmark speeches in 1906, and as Prime Minister the phrase "the gathering storm"—used by Churchill to describe the rise of Nazi Germany—had been written by Wells in The War of the Worlds, which depicts an attack on Britain by Martians. Wells's extensive writings on equality and human rights, most notably his most influential work, The Rights of Man (1940), laid the groundwork for the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations shortly after his death.
His efforts regarding the League of Nations, on which he collaborated on the project with Leonard Woolf with the booklets The Idea of a League of Nations, Prolegomena to the Study of World Organization, and The Way of the League of Nations, became a disappointment as the organization turned out to be a weak one unable to prevent the Second World War, which itself occurred towards the very end of his life and only increased the pessimistic side of his nature. In his last book Mind at the End of Its Tether (1945), he considered the idea that humanity being replaced by another species might not be a bad idea. He referred to the era between the two World Wars as "The Age of Frustration".
Religious views
Wells's views on God and religion changed over his lifetime. Early in his life he distanced himself from Christianity, and later from theism, and finally, late in life, he was essentially atheistic. Martin Gardner summarises this progression:[The younger Wells] ... did not object to using the word "God" provided it did not imply anything resembling human personality. In his middle years Wells went through a phase of defending the concept of a "finite God," similar to the god of such process theologians as Samuel Alexander, Edgar Brightman, and Charles Hartshorne. (He even wrote a book about it called God the Invisible King.) Later Wells decided he was really an atheist.
In God the Invisible King (1917), Wells wrote that his idea of God did not draw upon the traditional religions of the world: This book sets out as forcibly and exactly as possible the religious belief of the writer. [Which] is a profound belief in a personal and intimate God. ... Putting the leading idea of this book very roughly, these two antagonistic typical conceptions of God may be best contrasted by speaking of one of them as God-as-Nature or the Creator, and of the other as God-as-Christ or the Redeemer. One is the great Outward God; the other is the Inmost God. The first idea was perhaps developed most highly and completely in the God of Spinoza. It is a conception of God tending to pantheism, to an idea of a comprehensive God as ruling with justice rather than affection, to a conception of aloofness and awestriking worshipfulness. The second idea, which is contradictory to this idea of an absolute God, is the God of the human heart. The writer suggested that the great outline of the theological struggles of that phase of civilisation and world unity which produced Christianity, was a persistent but unsuccessful attempt to get these two different ideas of God into one focus. Later in the work, he aligns himself with a "renascent or modern religion ... neither atheist nor Buddhist nor Mohammedan nor Christian ... [that] he has found growing up in himself".
Of Christianity, he said: "it is not now true for me. ... Every believing Christian is, I am sure, my spiritual brother ... but if systemically I called myself a Christian I feel that to most men I should imply too much and so tell a lie". Of other world religions, he writes: "All these religions are true for me as Canterbury Cathedral is a true thing and as a Swiss chalet is a true thing. There they are, and they have served a purpose, they have worked. Only they are not true for me to live in them. ... They do not work for me". In The Fate of Homo Sapiens (1939), Wells criticised almost all world religions and philosophies, stating "there is no creed, no way of living left in the world at all, that really meets the needs of the time… When we come to look at them coolly and dispassionately, all the main religions, patriotic, moral and customary systems in which human beings are sheltering today, appear to be in a state of jostling and mutually destructive movement, like the houses and palaces and other buildings of some vast, sprawling city overtaken by a landslide.
Wells's opposition to organised religion reached a fever pitch in 1943 with publication of his book Crux Ansata, subtitled "An Indictment of the Roman Catholic Church".
Literary influence and legacy
The science fiction historian John Clute describes Wells as "the most important writer the genre has yet seen", and notes his work has been central to both British and American science fiction. Science fiction author and critic Algis Budrys said Wells "remains the outstanding expositor of both the hope, and the despair, which are embodied in the technology and which are the major facts of life in our world". He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921, 1932, 1935, and 1946. Wells so influenced real exploration of space that an impact crater on Mars (and the Moon) was named after him.
In the United Kingdom, Wells's work was a key model for the British "scientific romance", and other writers in that mode, such as Olaf Stapledon, J. D. Beresford, S. Fowler Wright, and Naomi Mitchison, all drew on Wells's example. Wells was also an important influence on British science fiction of the period after the Second World War, with Arthur C. Clarke and Brian Aldiss expressing strong admiration for Wells's work. Among contemporary British science fiction writers, Stephen Baxter, Christopher Priest and Adam Roberts have all acknowledged Wells's influence on their writing; all three are Vice-Presidents of the H. G. Wells Society. He also had a strong influence on British scientist J. B. S. Haldane, who wrote Daedalus; or, Science and the Future (1924), "The Last Judgement" and "On Being the Right Size" from the essay collection Possible Worlds (1927), and Biological Possibilities for the Human Species in the Next Ten Thousand Years (1963), which are speculations about the future of human evolution and life on other planets. Haldane gave several lectures about these topics which in turn influenced other science fiction writers.
In the United States, Hugo Gernsback reprinted most of Wells's work in the pulp magazine Amazing Stories, regarding Wells's work as "texts of central importance to the self-conscious new genre". Later American writers such as Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Carl Sagan, and Ursula K. Le Guin all recalled being influenced by Wells.
Sinclair Lewis's early novels were strongly influenced by Wells's realistic social novels, such as The History of Mr Polly; Lewis also named his first son Wells after the author. Lewis nominated H. G. Wells for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.
In an interview with The Paris Review, Vladimir Nabokov described Wells as his favourite writer when he was a boy and "a great artist." He went on to cite The Passionate Friends, Ann Veronica, The Time Machine, and The Country of the Blind as superior to anything else written by Wells's British contemporaries. Nabokov said: "His sociological cogitations can be safely ignored, of course, but his romances and fantasies are superb."
Jorge Luis Borges wrote many short pieces on Wells in which he demonstrates a deep familiarity with much of Wells's work. While Borges wrote several critical reviews, including a mostly negative review of Wells's film Things to Come, he regularly treated Wells as a canonical figure of fantastic literature. Late in his life, Borges included The Invisible Man and The Time Machine in his Prologue to a Personal Library, a curated list of 100 great works of literature that he undertook at the behest of the Argentine publishing house Emecé. Canadian author Margaret Atwood read Wells's books, and he also inspired writers of European speculative fiction such as Karel Čapek and Yevgeny Zamyatin.
Representations
Literary
The superhuman protagonist of J. D. Beresford's 1911 novel, The Hampdenshire Wonder, Victor Stott, was based on Wells.
In M. P. Shiel's short story "The Primate of the Rose" (1928), there is an unpleasant womaniser named E. P. Crooks, who was written as a parody of Wells. Wells had attacked Shiel's Prince Zaleski when it was published in 1895, and this was Shiel's response. Wells praised Shiel's The Purple Cloud (1901); in turn Shiel expressed admiration for Wells, referring to him at a speech to the Horsham Rotary Club in 1933 as "my friend Mr. Wells".
In C. S. Lewis's novel That Hideous Strength (1945), the character Jules is a caricature of Wells, and much of Lewis's science fiction was written both under the influence of Wells and as an antithesis to his work (or, as he put it, an "exorcism" of the influence it had on him).
In Brian Aldiss's novella The Saliva Tree (1966), Wells has a small off-screen guest role.
In Saul Bellow's novel Mr. Sammler's Planet (1970), Wells is one of several historical figures the protagonist met when he was a young man.
In The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock (1976) Wells has an important part.
In The Map of Time (2008) by Spanish author Félix J. Palma; Wells is one of several historical characters.
Wells is one of the two Georges in Paul Levinson's 2013 time-travel novelette, "Ian, George, and George," published in Analog magazine.
Dramatic
Rod Taylor portrays Wells in the 1960 science fiction film The Time Machine (based on the novel of the same name), in which Wells uses his time machine to try and find his Utopian society.
Malcolm McDowell portrays Wells in the 1979 science fiction film Time After Time, in which Wells uses a time machine to pursue Jack the Ripper to the present day. In the film, Wells meets "Amy" in the future who then returns to 1893 to become his second wife Amy Catherine Robbins.
Wells is portrayed in the 1985 story Timelash from the 22nd season of the BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who. In this story, Herbert, an enthusiastic temporary companion to the Doctor, is revealed to be a young H. G. Wells. The plot is loosely based upon the themes and characters of The Time Machine with references to The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man and The Island of Doctor Moreau. The story jokingly suggests that Wells's inspiration for his later novels came from his adventure with the Sixth Doctor.
In the BBC2 anthology series Encounters about imagined meetings between historical figures, Beautiful Lies, by Paul Pender (15 August 1992) centred on an acrimonious dinner party attended by Wells (Richard Todd), George Orwell (Jon Finch), and William Empson (Patrick Ryecart).
The character of Wells also appeared in several episodes of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993–1997), usually pitted against the time-travelling villain known as Tempus (Lane Davies). Wells's younger self was played by Terry Kiser, and the older Wells was played by Hamilton Camp.
In the British TV mini-series The Infinite Worlds of H. G. Wells (2001), several of Wells's short stories are dramatised but are adapted using Wells himself (Tom Ward) as the main protagonist in each story.
In the Disney Channel Original Series Phil of the Future, which centres on time-travel, the present-day high school that the main characters attend is named "H. G. Wells".
In the 2006 television docudrama H. G. Wells: War with the World, Wells is played by Michael Sheen.
Television episode "World's End" of Cold Case (2007) is about the discovery of human remains in the bottom of a well leads to the reinvestigation of the case of a housewife who went missing during Orson Welles' radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds".
On the science fiction television series Warehouse 13 (2009–2014), there is a female version Helena G. Wells. When she appeared she explained that her brother was her front for her writing because a female science fiction author would not be accepted.
Comedian Paul F. Tompkins portrays a fictional Wells as the host of The Dead Authors Podcast, wherein Wells uses his time machine to bring dead authors (played by other comedians) to the present and interview them.
H. G. Wells as a young boy appears in the Legends of Tomorrow episode "The Magnificent Eight". In this story, the boy Wells is dying of consumption but is cured by a time-travelling Martin Stein.
In the four part series The Nightmare Worlds of H. G. Wells (2016), Wells is played by Ray Winstone.
In the 2017 television series version of Time After Time, based on the 1979 film, H. G. Wells is portrayed by Freddie Stroma.
In the 2019 television adaptation of The War of the Worlds, the character of 'George', played by Rafe Spall, demonstrates a number of elements of Wells's own life, including his estrangement from his wife and unmarried co-habitation with the character of 'Amy'.
Literary papers
In 1954, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign purchased the H. G. Wells literary papers and correspondence collection. The University's Rare Book & Manuscript Library holds the largest collection of Wells manuscripts, correspondence, first editions and publications in the United States. Among these is unpublished material and the manuscripts of such works as The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine. The collection includes first editions, revisions and translations. The letters contain general family correspondence, communications from publishers, material regarding the Fabian Society, and letters from politicians and public figures, most notably George Bernard Shaw and Joseph Conrad.
Bibliography
See also
References
Further reading
Dickson, Lovat. H. G. Wells: His Turbulent Life & Times. 1969.
Foot, Michael. H. G.: History of Mr. Wells. Doubleday, 1985 (), Black Swan, New edition, Oct 1996 (paperback, )
Gilmour, David. The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002 (paperback, ); 2003 (paperback, ).
Gomme, A. W., Mr. Wells as Historian. Glasgow: MacLehose, Jackson, and Co., 1921.
Gosling, John. Waging the War of the Worlds. Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland, 2009 (paperback, ).
Jasanoff, Maya, "The Future Was His" (review of Sarah Cole, Inventing Tomorrow: H.G. Wells and the Twentieth Century, Columbia University Press, 374 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXVII, no. 12 (23 July 2020), pp. 50–51. Writes Jasanoff (p. 51): "Although [Wells] was prophetically right, and right-minded, about some things... [n]owhere was he more disturbingly wrong than in his loathsome affinity for eugenics..."
Lynn, Andrea The secret love life of H.G. Wells
Mackenzie, Norman and Jean, The Time Traveller: the Life of H G Wells, London: Weidenfeld, 1973,
Mauthner, Martin. German Writers in French Exile, 1933–1940, London: Vallentine and Mitchell, 2007, .
McLean, Steven. 'The Early Fiction of H. G. Wells: Fantasies of Science'. Palgrave, 2009, .
Partington, John S. Building Cosmopolis: The Political Thought of H. G. Wells. Ashgate, 2003, .
Roberts, Adam. H G Wells A Literary Life. Springer International Publishing, 2019, ISBN 9783030264215.
Shadurski, Maxim. The Nationality of Utopia: H. G. Wells, England, and the World State. London: Routledge, 2020, .
Sherborne, Michael. H. G. Wells: Another Kind of Life. London: Peter Owen, 2010, .
Smith, David C., H. G. Wells: Desperately Mortal: A Biography. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986,
West, Anthony. H. G. Wells: Aspects of a Life. London: Hutchinson, 1984.
External links
Future Tense – The Story of H. G. Wells at BBC One – 150th anniversary documentary (2016)
"In the footsteps of H G Wells" at New Statesman – "The great author called for a Human Rights Act; 60 years later, we have it" (2000)
Sources—collections
*
Free H. G. Wells downloads for iPhone, iPad, Nook, Android, and Kindle in PDF and all popular eBook reader formats (AZW3, EPUB, MOBI) at ebooktakeaway.com
H G Wells at the British Library
H. G. Wells papers at University of Illinois
Ebooks by H. G. Wells at Global Grey Ebooks
Sources—letters, essays and interviews
Archive of Wells's BBC broadcasts
Film interview with H. G. Wells
"Stephen Crane. From an English Standpoint", by Wells, 1900.
Rabindranath Tagore: In conversation with H. G. Wells. Rabindranath Tagore and Wells conversing in Geneva in 1930.
"Introduction", to W. N. P. Barbellion's The Journal of a Disappointed Man, by Wells, 1919.
"Woman and Primitive Culture", by Wells, 1895.
Letter, to M. P. Shiel, by Wells, 1937.
Biography
"H. G. Wells". In Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Critical essays
An introduction to The War of the Worlds by Iain Sinclair on the British Library's Discovering Literature website.
"An Appreciation of H. G. Wells", by Mary Austin, 1911.
"Socialism and the Family" (1906) by Belfort Bax, Part 1, Part 2.
"H. G. Wells warned us how it would feel to fight a War of the Worlds", by Niall Ferguson, in The Telegraph, 24 June 2005.
"H. G. Wells's Idea of a World Brain: A Critical Re-assessment", by W. Boyd Rayward, in Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50 (15 May 1999): 557–579
"Mr H. G. Wells and the Giants", by G. K. Chesterton, from his book Heretics (1908).
"The Internet: a world brain?", by Martin Gardner, in Skeptical Inquirer, Jan–Feb 1999.
"Science Fiction: The Shape of Things to Come", by Mark Bould, in The Socialist Review, May 2005.
"Who needs Utopia? A dialogue with my utopian self (with apologies, and thanks, to H. G. Wells)", by Gregory Claeys in Spaces of Utopia: An Electronic Journal, no 1, Spring 2006.
"When H. G. Wells Split the Atom: A 1914 Preview of 1945", by Freda Kirchwey, in The Nation, posted 4 September 2003 (original 18 August 1945 issue).
"Wells, Hitler and the World State", by George Orwell. First published: Horizon. GB, London. Aug 1941.
"War of the Worldviews", by John J. Miller, in The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal, 21 June 2005.
"Wells's Autobiography", by John Hart, from New International, Vol.2 No.2, Mar 1935, pp. 75–76.
"History in the Science Fiction of H. G. Wells", by Patrick Parrinder, Cycnos, 22.2 (2006).
"From the World Brain to the Worldwide Web", by Martin Campbell-Kelly, Gresham College Lecture, 9 November 2006.
"The Beginning of Wisdom: On Reading H. G. Wells", by Vivian Gornick, Boston Review, 31.1 (2007).
John Hammond, The Complete List of Short Stories of H. G. Wells
"H. G. Wells Predictions Ring True, 143 Years Later" at National Geographic
"H. G. Wells, the man I knew" Obituary of Wells by George Bernard Shaw, at the New Statesman
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"Atthis can be:\n\nAtthis (mythology), in Greek myth, the daughter of Cranaus\nAtthis (plural: Atthides), the traditional title for ancient historical works on Athenian history, written by an atthidographer\nA woman mentioned in love poetry by Sappho\nAtthis (genus) in the hummingbird family\nAtthis (Obernewtyn character) in the Obernewtyn Chronicles, by Isobelle Carmody \n8975 Atthis, an asteroid"
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"What happened to the couple",
"The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students,",
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"Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895.",
"Where was their house atthis time",
"They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months"
] | C_86cc13fd852e4219a6fc0d2d8dd4d80e_0 | When and where were the two married | 5 | When and where were H.G. Wells and Amy Robbins married? | H. G. Wells | In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells. The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham. In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where in 1901 he constructed a large family home: Spade House. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip") in 1901 (died 1985) and Frank Richard in 1903 (died 1982). With his wife Jane's consent, Wells had affairs with a number of women, including the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger, adventurer and writer Odette Keun, Soviet spy Moura Budberg and novelist Elizabeth von Arnim. In 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society; and in 1914, a son, Anthony West (1914-1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells' "sordid intrigue" with the daughter of veteran Fabian Sidney Olivier, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011) - a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note) - gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others. Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989). CANNOTANSWER | married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. | Herbert George Wells (21 September 186613 August 1946) was an English writer. Prolific in many genres, he wrote dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, history, satire, biography and autobiography. His work also included two books on recreational war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is sometimes called the "father of science fiction."
During his own lifetime, however, he was most prominent as a forward-looking, even prophetic social critic who devoted his literary talents to the development of a progressive vision on a global scale. A futurist, he wrote a number of utopian works and foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. His science fiction imagined time travel, alien invasion, invisibility, and biological engineering. Brian Aldiss referred to Wells as the "Shakespeare of science fiction", while American writer Charles Fort referred to him as a "wild talent".
Wells rendered his works convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work – dubbed “Wells's law” – leading Joseph Conrad to hail him in 1898 as "O Realist of the Fantastic!". His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), which was his first novel, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), The War of the Worlds (1898) and the military science fiction The War in the Air (1907). Wells was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature four times.
Wells's earliest specialised training was in biology, and his thinking on ethical matters took place in a specifically and fundamentally Darwinian context. He was also an outspoken socialist from a young age, often (but not always, as at the beginning of the First World War) sympathising with pacifist views. His later works became increasingly political and didactic, and he wrote little science fiction, while he sometimes indicated on official documents that his profession was that of journalist. Novels such as Kipps and The History of Mr Polly, which describe lower-middle-class life, led to the suggestion that he was a worthy successor to Charles Dickens, but Wells described a range of social strata and even attempted, in Tono-Bungay (1909), a diagnosis of English society as a whole. Wells was a diabetic and co-founded the charity The Diabetic Association (known today as Diabetes UK) in 1934.
Life
Early life
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on 21 September 1866. Called "Bertie" by his family, he was the fourth and last child of Joseph Wells, a former domestic gardener, and at the time a shopkeeper and professional cricketer and Sarah Neal, a former domestic servant. An inheritance had allowed the family to acquire a shop in which they sold china and sporting goods, although it failed to prosper: the stock was old and worn out, and the location was poor. Joseph Wells managed to earn a meagre income, but little of it came from the shop and he received an unsteady amount of money from playing professional cricket for the Kent county team.
A defining incident of young Wells's life was an accident in 1874 that left him bedridden with a broken leg. To pass the time he began to read books from the local library, brought to him by his father. He soon became devoted to the other worlds and lives to which books gave him access; they also stimulated his desire to write. Later that year he entered Thomas Morley's Commercial Academy, a private school founded in 1849, following the bankruptcy of Morley's earlier school. The teaching was erratic, the curriculum mostly focused, Wells later said, on producing copperplate handwriting and doing the sort of sums useful to tradesmen. Wells continued at Morley's Academy until 1880. In 1877, his father, Joseph Wells, suffered a fractured thigh. The accident effectively put an end to Joseph's career as a cricketer, and his subsequent earnings as a shopkeeper were not enough to compensate for the loss of the primary source of family income.
No longer able to support themselves financially, the family instead sought to place their sons as apprentices in various occupations. From 1880 to 1883, Wells had an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at Hyde's Drapery Emporium in Southsea. His experiences at Hyde's, where he worked a thirteen-hour day and slept in a dormitory with other apprentices, later inspired his novels The Wheels of Chance, The History of Mr Polly, and Kipps, which portray the life of a draper's apprentice as well as providing a critique of society's distribution of wealth.
Wells's parents had a turbulent marriage, owing primarily to his mother's being a Protestant and his father's being a freethinker. When his mother returned to work as a lady's maid (at Uppark, a country house in Sussex), one of the conditions of work was that she would not be permitted to have living space for her husband and children. Thereafter, she and Joseph lived separate lives, though they never divorced and remained faithful to each other. As a consequence, Herbert's personal troubles increased as he subsequently failed as a draper and also, later, as a chemist's assistant. However, Uppark had a magnificent library in which he immersed himself, reading many classic works, including Plato's Republic, Thomas More's Utopia, and the works of Daniel Defoe. This was the beginning of Wells's venture into literature.
Teacher
In October 1879, Wells's mother arranged through a distant relative, Arthur Williams, for him to join the National School at Wookey in Somerset as a pupil–teacher, a senior pupil who acted as a teacher of younger children. In December that year, however, Williams was dismissed for irregularities in his qualifications and Wells was returned to Uppark. After a short apprenticeship at a chemist in nearby Midhurst and an even shorter stay as a boarder at Midhurst Grammar School, he signed his apprenticeship papers at Hyde's. In 1883, Wells persuaded his parents to release him from the apprenticeship, taking an opportunity offered by Midhurst Grammar School again to become a pupil–teacher; his proficiency in Latin and science during his earlier short stay had been remembered.
The years he spent in Southsea had been the most miserable of his life to that point, but his good fortune at securing a position at Midhurst Grammar School meant that Wells could continue his self-education in earnest. The following year, Wells won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science (later the Royal College of Science in South Kensington, now part of Imperial College London) in London, studying biology under Thomas Henry Huxley. As an alumnus, he later helped to set up the Royal College of Science Association, of which he became the first president in 1909. Wells studied in his new school until 1887, with a weekly allowance of 21 shillings (a guinea) thanks to his scholarship. This ought to have been a comfortable sum of money (at the time many working class families had "round about a pound a week" as their entire household income), yet in his Experiment in Autobiography Wells speaks of constantly being hungry, and indeed photographs of him at the time show a youth who is very thin and malnourished.
He soon entered the Debating Society of the school. These years mark the beginning of his interest in a possible reformation of society. At first approaching the subject through Plato's Republic, he soon turned to contemporary ideas of socialism as expressed by the recently formed Fabian Society and free lectures delivered at Kelmscott House, the home of William Morris. He was also among the founders of The Science School Journal, a school magazine that allowed him to express his views on literature and society, as well as trying his hand at fiction; a precursor to his novel The Time Machine was published in the journal under the title The Chronic Argonauts. The school year 1886–87 was the last year of his studies.
During 1888, Wells stayed in Stoke-on-Trent, living in Basford. The unique environment of The Potteries was certainly an inspiration. He wrote in a letter to a friend from the area that "the district made an immense impression on me." The inspiration for some of his descriptions in The War of the Worlds is thought to have come from his short time spent here, seeing the iron foundry furnaces burn over the city, shooting huge red light into the skies. His stay in The Potteries also resulted in the macabre short story "The Cone" (1895, contemporaneous with his famous The Time Machine), set in the north of the city.
After teaching for some time, he was briefly on the staff of Holt Academy in Wales – Wells found it necessary to supplement his knowledge relating to educational principles and methodology and entered the College of Preceptors (College of Teachers). He later received his Licentiate and Fellowship FCP diplomas from the college. It was not until 1890 that Wells earned a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology from the University of London External Programme. In 1889–90, he managed to find a post as a teacher at Henley House School in London, where he taught A. A. Milne (whose father ran the school). His first published work was a Text-Book of Biology in two volumes (1893).
Upon leaving the Normal School of Science, Wells was left without a source of income. His aunt Mary—his father's sister-in-law—invited him to stay with her for a while, which solved his immediate problem of accommodation. During his stay at his aunt's residence, he grew increasingly interested in her daughter, Isabel, whom he later courted. To earn money, he began writing short humorous articles for journals such as The Pall Mall Gazette, later collecting these in volume form as Select Conversations with an Uncle (1895) and Certain Personal Matters (1897). So prolific did Wells become at this mode of journalism that many of his early pieces remain unidentified. According to David C. Smith, "Most of Wells's occasional pieces have not been collected, and many have not even been identified as his. Wells did not automatically receive the byline his reputation demanded until after 1896 or so ... As a result, many of his early pieces are unknown. It is obvious that many early Wells items have been lost." His success with these shorter pieces encouraged him to write book-length work, and he published his first novel, The Time Machine, in 1895.
Personal life
In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells (1865–1931; from 1902 Isabel Mary Smith). The couple agreed to separate in 1894, when he had fallen in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (1872–1927; later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey, in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton' (now No.141), Maybury Road, in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Doctor Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When the Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham.
In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames, for two years; this lasted until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where he constructed a large family home, Spade House, in 1901. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip"; 1901–1985) and Frank Richard (1903–1982) (grandfather of film director Simon Wells). Jane died on 6 October 1927, in Dunmow, at the age of 55.
Wells had affairs with a significant number of women. In December 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society. Amber had married the barrister G. R. Blanco White in July of that year, as co-arranged by Wells. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells's "sordid intrigue" with Amber, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. Between 1910 and 1913, novelist Elizabeth von Arnim was one of his mistresses. In 1914, he had a son, Anthony West (1914–1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. In 1920–21, and intermittently until his death, he had a love affair with the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger.
Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with the 22-year younger Dutch adventurer and writer Odette Keun, with whom he lived in Lou Pidou, a house they built together in Grasse, France. Wells dedicated his longest book to her (The World of William Clissold, 1926). When visiting Maxim Gorky in Russia 1920, he had slept with Gorky's mistress Moura Budberg, then still Countess Benckendorf and 27 years his junior. In 1933, when she left Gorky and emigrated to London, their relationship renewed and she cared for him through his final illness. Wells repeatedly asked her to marry him, but Budberg strongly rejected his proposals.
In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011)—a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note)—gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others.
Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989).
Artist
One of the ways that Wells expressed himself was through his drawings and sketches. One common location for these was the endpapers and title pages of his own diaries, and they covered a wide variety of topics, from political commentary to his feelings toward his literary contemporaries and his current romantic interests. During his marriage to Amy Catherine, whom he nicknamed Jane, he drew a considerable number of pictures, many of them being overt comments on their marriage. During this period, he called these pictures "picshuas". These picshuas have been the topic of study by Wells scholars for many years, and in 2006, a book was published on the subject.
Writer
Some of his early novels, called "scientific romances", invented several themes now classic in science fiction in such works as The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, When the Sleeper Wakes, and The First Men in the Moon. He also wrote realistic novels that received critical acclaim, including Kipps and a critique of English culture during the Edwardian period, Tono-Bungay. Wells also wrote dozens of short stories and novellas, including, "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid", which helped bring the full impact of Darwin's revolutionary botanical ideas to a wider public, and was followed by many later successes such as "The Country of the Blind" (1904).
According to James E. Gunn, one of Wells's major contributions to the science fiction genre was his approach, which he referred to as his "new system of ideas". In his opinion, the author should always strive to make the story as credible as possible, even if both the writer and the reader knew certain elements are impossible, allowing the reader to accept the ideas as something that could really happen, today referred to as "the plausible impossible" and "suspension of disbelief". While neither invisibility nor time travel was new in speculative fiction, Wells added a sense of realism to the concepts which the readers were not familiar with. He conceived the idea of using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposely and selectively forwards or backwards in time. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle. He explained that while writing The Time Machine, he realized that "the more impossible the story I had to tell, the more ordinary must be the setting, and the circumstances in which I now set the Time Traveller were all that I could imagine of solid upper-class comforts." In "Wells's Law", a science fiction story should contain only a single extraordinary assumption. Therefore, as justifications for the impossible, he employed scientific ideas and theories. Wells's best-known statement of the "law" appears in his introduction to a collection of his works published in 1934:
As soon as the magic trick has been done the whole business of the fantasy writer is to keep everything else human and real. Touches of prosaic detail are imperative and a rigorous adherence to the hypothesis. Any extra fantasy outside the cardinal assumption immediately gives a touch of irresponsible silliness to the invention.
Dr. Griffin / The Invisible Man is a brilliant research scientist who discovers a method of invisibility, but finds himself unable to reverse the process. An enthusiast of random and irresponsible violence, Griffin has become an iconic character in horror fiction. The Island of Doctor Moreau sees a shipwrecked man left on the island home of Doctor Moreau, a mad scientist who creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. The earliest depiction of uplift, the novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature. In The First Men in the Moon Wells used the idea of radio communication between astronomical objects, a plot point inspired by Nikola Tesla's claim that he had received radio signals from Mars. Though Tono-Bungay is not a science-fiction novel, radioactive decay plays a small but consequential role in it. Radioactive decay plays a much larger role in The World Set Free (1914). This book contains what is surely his biggest prophetic "hit", with the first description of a nuclear weapon. Scientists of the day were well aware that the natural decay of radium releases energy at a slow rate over thousands of years. The rate of release is too slow to have practical utility, but the total amount released is huge. Wells's novel revolves around an (unspecified) invention that accelerates the process of radioactive decay, producing bombs that explode with no more than the force of ordinary high explosives—but which "continue to explode" for days on end. "Nothing could have been more obvious to the people of the earlier twentieth century", he wrote, "than the rapidity with which war was becoming impossible ... [but] they did not see it until the atomic bombs burst in their fumbling hands". In 1932, the physicist and conceiver of nuclear chain reaction Leó Szilárd read The World Set Free (the same year Sir James Chadwick discovered the neutron), a book which he said made a great impression on him. In addition to writing early science fiction, he produced work dealing with mythological beings like an angel in the novel The Wonderful Visit (1895) and a mermaid in the novel The Sea Lady (1902).
Wells also wrote non-fiction. His first non-fiction bestseller was Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought (1901). When originally serialised in a magazine it was subtitled "An Experiment in Prophecy", and is considered his most explicitly futuristic work. It offered the immediate political message of the privileged sections of society continuing to bar capable men from other classes from advancement until war would force a need to employ those most able, rather than the traditional upper classes, as leaders. Anticipating what the world would be like in the year 2000, the book is interesting both for its hits (trains and cars resulting in the dispersion of populations from cities to suburbs; moral restrictions declining as men and women seek greater sexual freedom; the defeat of German militarism, and the existence of a European Union) and its misses (he did not expect successful aircraft before 1950, and averred that "my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocate its crew and founder at sea").
His bestselling two-volume work, The Outline of History (1920), began a new era of popularised world history. It received a mixed critical response from professional historians. However, it was very popular amongst the general population and made Wells a rich man. Many other authors followed with "Outlines" of their own in other subjects. He reprised his Outline in 1922 with a much shorter popular work, A Short History of the World, a history book praised by Albert Einstein, and two long efforts, The Science of Life (1930)—written with his son G. P. Wells and evolutionary biologist Julian Huxley, and The Work, Wealth and Happiness of Mankind (1931). The "Outlines" became sufficiently common for James Thurber to parody the trend in his humorous essay, "An Outline of Scientists"—indeed, Wells's Outline of History remains in print with a new 2005 edition, while A Short History of the World has been re-edited (2006).
From quite early in Wells's career, he sought a better way to organise society and wrote a number of Utopian novels. The first of these was A Modern Utopia (1905), which shows a worldwide utopia with "no imports but meteorites, and no exports at all"; two travellers from our world fall into its alternate history. The others usually begin with the world rushing to catastrophe, until people realise a better way of living: whether by mysterious gases from a comet causing people to behave rationally and abandoning a European war (In the Days of the Comet (1906)), or a world council of scientists taking over, as in The Shape of Things to Come (1933, which he later adapted for the 1936 Alexander Korda film, Things to Come). This depicted, all too accurately, the impending World War, with cities being destroyed by aerial bombs. He also portrayed the rise of fascist dictators in The Autocracy of Mr Parham (1930) and The Holy Terror (1939). Men Like Gods (1923) is also a utopian novel. Wells in this period was regarded as an enormously influential figure; the critic Malcolm Cowley stated: "by the time he was forty, his influence was wider than any other living English writer".
Wells contemplates the ideas of nature and nurture and questions humanity in books such as The First Men in the Moon, where nature is completely suppressed by nurture, and The Island of Doctor Moreau, where the strong presence of nature represents a threat to a civilized society. Not all his scientific romances ended in a Utopia, and Wells also wrote a dystopian novel, When the Sleeper Wakes (1899, rewritten as The Sleeper Awakes, 1910), which pictures a future society where the classes have become more and more separated, leading to a revolt of the masses against the rulers. The Island of Doctor Moreau is even darker. The narrator, having been trapped on an island of animals vivisected (unsuccessfully) into human beings, eventually returns to England; like Gulliver on his return from the Houyhnhnms, he finds himself unable to shake off the perceptions of his fellow humans as barely civilised beasts, slowly reverting to their animal natures.
Wells also wrote the preface for the first edition of W. N. P. Barbellion's diaries, The Journal of a Disappointed Man, published in 1919. Since "Barbellion" was the real author's pen name, many reviewers believed Wells to have been the true author of the Journal; Wells always denied this, despite being full of praise for the diaries.
In 1927, a Canadian teacher and writer Florence Deeks unsuccessfully sued Wells for infringement of copyright and breach of trust, claiming that much of The Outline of History had been plagiarised from her unpublished manuscript, The Web of the World's Romance, which had spent nearly nine months in the hands of Wells's Canadian publisher, Macmillan Canada. However, it was sworn on oath at the trial that the manuscript remained in Toronto in the safekeeping of Macmillan, and that Wells did not even know it existed, let alone had seen it. The court found no proof of copying, and decided the similarities were due to the fact that the books had similar nature and both writers had access to the same sources. In 2000, A. B. McKillop, a professor of history at Carleton University, produced a book on the case, The Spinster & The Prophet: Florence Deeks, H. G. Wells, and the Mystery of the Purloined Past. According to McKillop, the lawsuit was unsuccessful due to the prejudice against a woman suing a well-known and famous male author, and he paints a detailed story based on the circumstantial evidence of the case. In 2004, Denis N. Magnusson, Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Law, Queen's University, Ontario, published an article on Deeks v. Wells. This re-examines the case in relation to McKillop's book. While having some sympathy for Deeks, he argues that she had a weak case that was not well presented, and though she may have met with sexism from her lawyers, she received a fair trial, adding that the law applied is essentially the same law that would be applied to a similar case today (i.e., 2004).
In 1933, Wells predicted in The Shape of Things to Come that the world war he feared would begin in January 1940, a prediction which ultimately came true four months early, in September 1939, with the outbreak of World War II. In 1936, before the Royal Institution, Wells called for the compilation of a constantly growing and changing World Encyclopaedia, to be reviewed by outstanding authorities and made accessible to every human being. In 1938, he published a collection of essays on the future organisation of knowledge and education, World Brain, including the essay "The Idea of a Permanent World Encyclopaedia".
Prior to 1933, Wells's books were widely read in Germany and Austria, and most of his science fiction works had been translated shortly after publication. By 1933, he had attracted the attention of German officials because of his criticism of the political situation in Germany, and on 10 May 1933, Wells's books were burned by the Nazi youth in Berlin's Opernplatz, and his works were banned from libraries and book stores. Wells, as president of PEN International (Poets, Essayists, Novelists), angered the Nazis by overseeing the expulsion of the German PEN club from the international body in 1934 following the German PEN's refusal to admit non-Aryan writers to its membership. At a PEN conference in Ragusa, Wells refused to yield to Nazi sympathisers who demanded that the exiled author Ernst Toller be prevented from speaking. Near the end of World War II, Allied forces discovered that the SS had compiled lists of people slated for immediate arrest during the invasion of Britain in the abandoned Operation Sea Lion, with Wells included in the alphabetical list of "The Black Book".
Wartime works
Seeking a more structured way to play war games, Wells wrote Floor Games (1911) followed by Little Wars (1913), which set out rules for fighting battles with toy soldiers (miniatures). A pacifist prior to the First World War, Wells stated "how much better is this amiable miniature [war] than the real thing". According to Wells, the idea of the game developed from a visit by his friend Jerome K. Jerome. After dinner, Jerome began shooting down toy soldiers with a toy cannon and Wells joined in to compete.
During August 1914, immediately after the outbreak of the First World War, Wells published a number of articles in London newspapers that subsequently appeared as a book entitled The War That Will End War. He coined the expression with the idealistic belief that the result of the war would make a future conflict impossible. Wells blamed the Central Powers for the coming of the war and argued that only the defeat of German militarism could bring about an end to war. Wells used the shorter form of the phrase, "the war to end war", in In the Fourth Year (1918), in which he noted that the phrase "got into circulation" in the second half of 1914. In fact, it had become one of the most common catchphrases of the war.
In 1918 Wells worked for the British War Propaganda Bureau, also called Wellington House. Wells was also one of fifty-three leading British authors — a number that included Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — who signed their names to the “Authors' Declaration.” This manifesto declared that the German invasion of Belgium had been a brutal crime, and that Britain “could not without dishonour have refused to take part in the present war.”
Travels to Russia and the Soviet Union
Wells visited Russia three times: 1914, 1920 and 1934. During his second visit, he saw his old friend Maxim Gorky and with Gorky's help, met Vladimir Lenin. In his book Russia in the Shadows, Wells portrayed Russia as recovering from a total social collapse, "the completest that has ever happened to any modern social organisation." On 23 July 1934, after visiting U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Wells went to the Soviet Union and interviewed Joseph Stalin for three hours for the New Statesman magazine, which was extremely rare at that time. He told Stalin how he had seen 'the happy faces of healthy people' in contrast with his previous visit to Moscow in 1920. However, he also criticised the lawlessness, class discrimination, state violence, and absence of free expression. Stalin enjoyed the conversation and replied accordingly. As the chairman of the London-based PEN International, which protected the rights of authors to write without being intimidated, Wells hoped by his trip to USSR, he could win Stalin over by force of argument. Before he left, he realised that no reform was to happen in the near future.
Final years
Wells’s greatest literary output occurred before the First World War, which was lamented by younger authors whom he had influenced. In this connection, George Orwell described Wells as "too sane to understand the modern world", and "since 1920 he has squandered his talents in slaying paper dragons." G. K. Chesterton quipped: "Mr Wells is a born storyteller who has sold his birthright for a pot of message".
Wells had diabetes, and was a co-founder in 1934 of The Diabetic Association (now Diabetes UK, the leading charity for people with diabetes in the UK).
On 28 October 1940, on the radio station KTSA in San Antonio, Texas, Wells took part in a radio interview with Orson Welles, who two years previously had performed a famous radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds. During the interview, by Charles C Shaw, a KTSA radio host, Wells admitted his surprise at the sensation that resulted from the broadcast but acknowledged his debt to Welles for increasing sales of one of his "more obscure" titles.
Death
Wells died of unspecified causes on 13 August 1946, aged 79, at his home at 13 Hanover Terrace, overlooking Regent's Park, London. In his preface to the 1941 edition of The War in the Air, Wells had stated that his epitaph should be: "I told you so. You damned fools". Wells's body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on 16 August 1946; his ashes were subsequently scattered into the English Channel at Old Harry Rocks, the most eastern point of the Jurassic Coast and about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) from Swanage in Dorset.
A commemorative blue plaque in his honour was installed by the Greater London Council at his home in Regent's Park in 1966.
Futurist
A futurist and “visionary”, Wells foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. Asserting that "Wells' visions of the future remain unsurpassed", John Higgs, author of Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century, states that in the late 19th century Wells “saw the coming century clearer than anyone else. He anticipated wars in the air, the sexual revolution, motorised transport causing the growth of suburbs and a proto-Wikipedia he called the "world brain". In his novel The World Set Free, he imagined an “atomic bomb” of terrifying power that would be dropped from aeroplanes. This was an extraordinary insight for an author writing in 1913, and it made a deep impression on Winston Churchill."
In 2011, Wells was among a group of science fiction writers featured in the Prophets of Science Fiction series, a show produced and hosted by film director Sir Ridley Scott, which depicts how predictions influenced the development of scientific advancements by inspiring many readers to assist in transforming those futuristic visions into everyday reality. In a 2013 review of The Time Machine for the New Yorker magazine, Brad Leithauser writes, "At the base of Wells's great visionary exploit is this rational, ultimately scientific attempt to tease out the potential future consequences of present conditions—not as they might arise in a few years, or even decades, but millennia hence, epochs hence. He is world literature's Great Extrapolator. Like no other fiction writer before him, he embraced "deep time."
Political views
Wells was a socialist and a member of the Fabian Society. Winston Churchill was an avid reader of Wells's books, and after they first met in 1902 they kept in touch until Wells died in 1946. As a junior minister Churchill borrowed lines from Wells for one of his most famous early landmark speeches in 1906, and as Prime Minister the phrase "the gathering storm"—used by Churchill to describe the rise of Nazi Germany—had been written by Wells in The War of the Worlds, which depicts an attack on Britain by Martians. Wells's extensive writings on equality and human rights, most notably his most influential work, The Rights of Man (1940), laid the groundwork for the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations shortly after his death.
His efforts regarding the League of Nations, on which he collaborated on the project with Leonard Woolf with the booklets The Idea of a League of Nations, Prolegomena to the Study of World Organization, and The Way of the League of Nations, became a disappointment as the organization turned out to be a weak one unable to prevent the Second World War, which itself occurred towards the very end of his life and only increased the pessimistic side of his nature. In his last book Mind at the End of Its Tether (1945), he considered the idea that humanity being replaced by another species might not be a bad idea. He referred to the era between the two World Wars as "The Age of Frustration".
Religious views
Wells's views on God and religion changed over his lifetime. Early in his life he distanced himself from Christianity, and later from theism, and finally, late in life, he was essentially atheistic. Martin Gardner summarises this progression:[The younger Wells] ... did not object to using the word "God" provided it did not imply anything resembling human personality. In his middle years Wells went through a phase of defending the concept of a "finite God," similar to the god of such process theologians as Samuel Alexander, Edgar Brightman, and Charles Hartshorne. (He even wrote a book about it called God the Invisible King.) Later Wells decided he was really an atheist.
In God the Invisible King (1917), Wells wrote that his idea of God did not draw upon the traditional religions of the world: This book sets out as forcibly and exactly as possible the religious belief of the writer. [Which] is a profound belief in a personal and intimate God. ... Putting the leading idea of this book very roughly, these two antagonistic typical conceptions of God may be best contrasted by speaking of one of them as God-as-Nature or the Creator, and of the other as God-as-Christ or the Redeemer. One is the great Outward God; the other is the Inmost God. The first idea was perhaps developed most highly and completely in the God of Spinoza. It is a conception of God tending to pantheism, to an idea of a comprehensive God as ruling with justice rather than affection, to a conception of aloofness and awestriking worshipfulness. The second idea, which is contradictory to this idea of an absolute God, is the God of the human heart. The writer suggested that the great outline of the theological struggles of that phase of civilisation and world unity which produced Christianity, was a persistent but unsuccessful attempt to get these two different ideas of God into one focus. Later in the work, he aligns himself with a "renascent or modern religion ... neither atheist nor Buddhist nor Mohammedan nor Christian ... [that] he has found growing up in himself".
Of Christianity, he said: "it is not now true for me. ... Every believing Christian is, I am sure, my spiritual brother ... but if systemically I called myself a Christian I feel that to most men I should imply too much and so tell a lie". Of other world religions, he writes: "All these religions are true for me as Canterbury Cathedral is a true thing and as a Swiss chalet is a true thing. There they are, and they have served a purpose, they have worked. Only they are not true for me to live in them. ... They do not work for me". In The Fate of Homo Sapiens (1939), Wells criticised almost all world religions and philosophies, stating "there is no creed, no way of living left in the world at all, that really meets the needs of the time… When we come to look at them coolly and dispassionately, all the main religions, patriotic, moral and customary systems in which human beings are sheltering today, appear to be in a state of jostling and mutually destructive movement, like the houses and palaces and other buildings of some vast, sprawling city overtaken by a landslide.
Wells's opposition to organised religion reached a fever pitch in 1943 with publication of his book Crux Ansata, subtitled "An Indictment of the Roman Catholic Church".
Literary influence and legacy
The science fiction historian John Clute describes Wells as "the most important writer the genre has yet seen", and notes his work has been central to both British and American science fiction. Science fiction author and critic Algis Budrys said Wells "remains the outstanding expositor of both the hope, and the despair, which are embodied in the technology and which are the major facts of life in our world". He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921, 1932, 1935, and 1946. Wells so influenced real exploration of space that an impact crater on Mars (and the Moon) was named after him.
In the United Kingdom, Wells's work was a key model for the British "scientific romance", and other writers in that mode, such as Olaf Stapledon, J. D. Beresford, S. Fowler Wright, and Naomi Mitchison, all drew on Wells's example. Wells was also an important influence on British science fiction of the period after the Second World War, with Arthur C. Clarke and Brian Aldiss expressing strong admiration for Wells's work. Among contemporary British science fiction writers, Stephen Baxter, Christopher Priest and Adam Roberts have all acknowledged Wells's influence on their writing; all three are Vice-Presidents of the H. G. Wells Society. He also had a strong influence on British scientist J. B. S. Haldane, who wrote Daedalus; or, Science and the Future (1924), "The Last Judgement" and "On Being the Right Size" from the essay collection Possible Worlds (1927), and Biological Possibilities for the Human Species in the Next Ten Thousand Years (1963), which are speculations about the future of human evolution and life on other planets. Haldane gave several lectures about these topics which in turn influenced other science fiction writers.
In the United States, Hugo Gernsback reprinted most of Wells's work in the pulp magazine Amazing Stories, regarding Wells's work as "texts of central importance to the self-conscious new genre". Later American writers such as Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Carl Sagan, and Ursula K. Le Guin all recalled being influenced by Wells.
Sinclair Lewis's early novels were strongly influenced by Wells's realistic social novels, such as The History of Mr Polly; Lewis also named his first son Wells after the author. Lewis nominated H. G. Wells for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.
In an interview with The Paris Review, Vladimir Nabokov described Wells as his favourite writer when he was a boy and "a great artist." He went on to cite The Passionate Friends, Ann Veronica, The Time Machine, and The Country of the Blind as superior to anything else written by Wells's British contemporaries. Nabokov said: "His sociological cogitations can be safely ignored, of course, but his romances and fantasies are superb."
Jorge Luis Borges wrote many short pieces on Wells in which he demonstrates a deep familiarity with much of Wells's work. While Borges wrote several critical reviews, including a mostly negative review of Wells's film Things to Come, he regularly treated Wells as a canonical figure of fantastic literature. Late in his life, Borges included The Invisible Man and The Time Machine in his Prologue to a Personal Library, a curated list of 100 great works of literature that he undertook at the behest of the Argentine publishing house Emecé. Canadian author Margaret Atwood read Wells's books, and he also inspired writers of European speculative fiction such as Karel Čapek and Yevgeny Zamyatin.
Representations
Literary
The superhuman protagonist of J. D. Beresford's 1911 novel, The Hampdenshire Wonder, Victor Stott, was based on Wells.
In M. P. Shiel's short story "The Primate of the Rose" (1928), there is an unpleasant womaniser named E. P. Crooks, who was written as a parody of Wells. Wells had attacked Shiel's Prince Zaleski when it was published in 1895, and this was Shiel's response. Wells praised Shiel's The Purple Cloud (1901); in turn Shiel expressed admiration for Wells, referring to him at a speech to the Horsham Rotary Club in 1933 as "my friend Mr. Wells".
In C. S. Lewis's novel That Hideous Strength (1945), the character Jules is a caricature of Wells, and much of Lewis's science fiction was written both under the influence of Wells and as an antithesis to his work (or, as he put it, an "exorcism" of the influence it had on him).
In Brian Aldiss's novella The Saliva Tree (1966), Wells has a small off-screen guest role.
In Saul Bellow's novel Mr. Sammler's Planet (1970), Wells is one of several historical figures the protagonist met when he was a young man.
In The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock (1976) Wells has an important part.
In The Map of Time (2008) by Spanish author Félix J. Palma; Wells is one of several historical characters.
Wells is one of the two Georges in Paul Levinson's 2013 time-travel novelette, "Ian, George, and George," published in Analog magazine.
Dramatic
Rod Taylor portrays Wells in the 1960 science fiction film The Time Machine (based on the novel of the same name), in which Wells uses his time machine to try and find his Utopian society.
Malcolm McDowell portrays Wells in the 1979 science fiction film Time After Time, in which Wells uses a time machine to pursue Jack the Ripper to the present day. In the film, Wells meets "Amy" in the future who then returns to 1893 to become his second wife Amy Catherine Robbins.
Wells is portrayed in the 1985 story Timelash from the 22nd season of the BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who. In this story, Herbert, an enthusiastic temporary companion to the Doctor, is revealed to be a young H. G. Wells. The plot is loosely based upon the themes and characters of The Time Machine with references to The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man and The Island of Doctor Moreau. The story jokingly suggests that Wells's inspiration for his later novels came from his adventure with the Sixth Doctor.
In the BBC2 anthology series Encounters about imagined meetings between historical figures, Beautiful Lies, by Paul Pender (15 August 1992) centred on an acrimonious dinner party attended by Wells (Richard Todd), George Orwell (Jon Finch), and William Empson (Patrick Ryecart).
The character of Wells also appeared in several episodes of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993–1997), usually pitted against the time-travelling villain known as Tempus (Lane Davies). Wells's younger self was played by Terry Kiser, and the older Wells was played by Hamilton Camp.
In the British TV mini-series The Infinite Worlds of H. G. Wells (2001), several of Wells's short stories are dramatised but are adapted using Wells himself (Tom Ward) as the main protagonist in each story.
In the Disney Channel Original Series Phil of the Future, which centres on time-travel, the present-day high school that the main characters attend is named "H. G. Wells".
In the 2006 television docudrama H. G. Wells: War with the World, Wells is played by Michael Sheen.
Television episode "World's End" of Cold Case (2007) is about the discovery of human remains in the bottom of a well leads to the reinvestigation of the case of a housewife who went missing during Orson Welles' radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds".
On the science fiction television series Warehouse 13 (2009–2014), there is a female version Helena G. Wells. When she appeared she explained that her brother was her front for her writing because a female science fiction author would not be accepted.
Comedian Paul F. Tompkins portrays a fictional Wells as the host of The Dead Authors Podcast, wherein Wells uses his time machine to bring dead authors (played by other comedians) to the present and interview them.
H. G. Wells as a young boy appears in the Legends of Tomorrow episode "The Magnificent Eight". In this story, the boy Wells is dying of consumption but is cured by a time-travelling Martin Stein.
In the four part series The Nightmare Worlds of H. G. Wells (2016), Wells is played by Ray Winstone.
In the 2017 television series version of Time After Time, based on the 1979 film, H. G. Wells is portrayed by Freddie Stroma.
In the 2019 television adaptation of The War of the Worlds, the character of 'George', played by Rafe Spall, demonstrates a number of elements of Wells's own life, including his estrangement from his wife and unmarried co-habitation with the character of 'Amy'.
Literary papers
In 1954, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign purchased the H. G. Wells literary papers and correspondence collection. The University's Rare Book & Manuscript Library holds the largest collection of Wells manuscripts, correspondence, first editions and publications in the United States. Among these is unpublished material and the manuscripts of such works as The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine. The collection includes first editions, revisions and translations. The letters contain general family correspondence, communications from publishers, material regarding the Fabian Society, and letters from politicians and public figures, most notably George Bernard Shaw and Joseph Conrad.
Bibliography
See also
References
Further reading
Dickson, Lovat. H. G. Wells: His Turbulent Life & Times. 1969.
Foot, Michael. H. G.: History of Mr. Wells. Doubleday, 1985 (), Black Swan, New edition, Oct 1996 (paperback, )
Gilmour, David. The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002 (paperback, ); 2003 (paperback, ).
Gomme, A. W., Mr. Wells as Historian. Glasgow: MacLehose, Jackson, and Co., 1921.
Gosling, John. Waging the War of the Worlds. Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland, 2009 (paperback, ).
Jasanoff, Maya, "The Future Was His" (review of Sarah Cole, Inventing Tomorrow: H.G. Wells and the Twentieth Century, Columbia University Press, 374 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXVII, no. 12 (23 July 2020), pp. 50–51. Writes Jasanoff (p. 51): "Although [Wells] was prophetically right, and right-minded, about some things... [n]owhere was he more disturbingly wrong than in his loathsome affinity for eugenics..."
Lynn, Andrea The secret love life of H.G. Wells
Mackenzie, Norman and Jean, The Time Traveller: the Life of H G Wells, London: Weidenfeld, 1973,
Mauthner, Martin. German Writers in French Exile, 1933–1940, London: Vallentine and Mitchell, 2007, .
McLean, Steven. 'The Early Fiction of H. G. Wells: Fantasies of Science'. Palgrave, 2009, .
Partington, John S. Building Cosmopolis: The Political Thought of H. G. Wells. Ashgate, 2003, .
Roberts, Adam. H G Wells A Literary Life. Springer International Publishing, 2019, ISBN 9783030264215.
Shadurski, Maxim. The Nationality of Utopia: H. G. Wells, England, and the World State. London: Routledge, 2020, .
Sherborne, Michael. H. G. Wells: Another Kind of Life. London: Peter Owen, 2010, .
Smith, David C., H. G. Wells: Desperately Mortal: A Biography. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986,
West, Anthony. H. G. Wells: Aspects of a Life. London: Hutchinson, 1984.
External links
Future Tense – The Story of H. G. Wells at BBC One – 150th anniversary documentary (2016)
"In the footsteps of H G Wells" at New Statesman – "The great author called for a Human Rights Act; 60 years later, we have it" (2000)
Sources—collections
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Free H. G. Wells downloads for iPhone, iPad, Nook, Android, and Kindle in PDF and all popular eBook reader formats (AZW3, EPUB, MOBI) at ebooktakeaway.com
H G Wells at the British Library
H. G. Wells papers at University of Illinois
Ebooks by H. G. Wells at Global Grey Ebooks
Sources—letters, essays and interviews
Archive of Wells's BBC broadcasts
Film interview with H. G. Wells
"Stephen Crane. From an English Standpoint", by Wells, 1900.
Rabindranath Tagore: In conversation with H. G. Wells. Rabindranath Tagore and Wells conversing in Geneva in 1930.
"Introduction", to W. N. P. Barbellion's The Journal of a Disappointed Man, by Wells, 1919.
"Woman and Primitive Culture", by Wells, 1895.
Letter, to M. P. Shiel, by Wells, 1937.
Biography
"H. G. Wells". In Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Critical essays
An introduction to The War of the Worlds by Iain Sinclair on the British Library's Discovering Literature website.
"An Appreciation of H. G. Wells", by Mary Austin, 1911.
"Socialism and the Family" (1906) by Belfort Bax, Part 1, Part 2.
"H. G. Wells warned us how it would feel to fight a War of the Worlds", by Niall Ferguson, in The Telegraph, 24 June 2005.
"H. G. Wells's Idea of a World Brain: A Critical Re-assessment", by W. Boyd Rayward, in Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50 (15 May 1999): 557–579
"Mr H. G. Wells and the Giants", by G. K. Chesterton, from his book Heretics (1908).
"The Internet: a world brain?", by Martin Gardner, in Skeptical Inquirer, Jan–Feb 1999.
"Science Fiction: The Shape of Things to Come", by Mark Bould, in The Socialist Review, May 2005.
"Who needs Utopia? A dialogue with my utopian self (with apologies, and thanks, to H. G. Wells)", by Gregory Claeys in Spaces of Utopia: An Electronic Journal, no 1, Spring 2006.
"When H. G. Wells Split the Atom: A 1914 Preview of 1945", by Freda Kirchwey, in The Nation, posted 4 September 2003 (original 18 August 1945 issue).
"Wells, Hitler and the World State", by George Orwell. First published: Horizon. GB, London. Aug 1941.
"War of the Worldviews", by John J. Miller, in The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal, 21 June 2005.
"Wells's Autobiography", by John Hart, from New International, Vol.2 No.2, Mar 1935, pp. 75–76.
"History in the Science Fiction of H. G. Wells", by Patrick Parrinder, Cycnos, 22.2 (2006).
"From the World Brain to the Worldwide Web", by Martin Campbell-Kelly, Gresham College Lecture, 9 November 2006.
"The Beginning of Wisdom: On Reading H. G. Wells", by Vivian Gornick, Boston Review, 31.1 (2007).
John Hammond, The Complete List of Short Stories of H. G. Wells
"H. G. Wells Predictions Ring True, 143 Years Later" at National Geographic
"H. G. Wells, the man I knew" Obituary of Wells by George Bernard Shaw, at the New Statesman
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Writers with disabilities | true | [
"Two Strangers and a Wedding is a controversial radio competition created and first hosted in Australia.\n\nIn order to win the competition, two contestants who have not met or made contact with each other must be chosen by the station's listeners. They then have to get married legitimately to win prizes.\n\nAustralian competitions \nThe first promotions were held in Adelaide and Sydney, Australia on 2Day FM and SAFM and then on several other Australian stations in 1998. \n The couple involved in the 1998 SAFM Adelaide competition were Thomas Balacco and Helen Boyer. The couple involved in the two-day FM promotion were Glenn Emerton and Lief Bunyan. Glenn Emerton later met Naomi Kennedy and married in March 2006.\n\nUK competitions \nBirmingham radio station BRMB has married two sets of couples, and both of these contests have sparked a national interest. In 1999, the first couple were matched by a panel of relationship counsellors and astrologers, including astrologer Russell Grant. The groom was 28-year-old Greg Cordell, a sales manager, and his chosen bride was Carla Germaine, a 23-year-old former model. Also to make it to the last four girls was her long-term schoolfriend Joanna Scragg who later married successful banker Rob Cook.\n\nThe couple married, on air nationally and online; however, they split soon after the wedding. Carla later met and married Jeremy Kyle, who at the time was one of the radio station's DJs. They have 2 daughters and a son together. It was announced in September 2015 that they have since separated.\n\nLater on in 2006, another couple were married. Again, the station received national interest. Becky, 28, and Craig, 30, were chosen for the stunt. Despite protests against the wedding, the two were married. The couple flew to Bermuda the day after the wedding for their honeymoon.\n\nFour months later on 7 May 2006, the News of the World reported the couple had split, but not divorced. These reports were confirmed on the morning radio show The Big Brum Breakfast, when Becky (the bride) was interviewed.\n\nNew Zealand competitions \nNew Zealand radio station The Edge ran a similar competition where they married Zane Nichol and Paula Stockwell in 1999, they now have two sons and a daughter.\n\nIn 2003, The Edge also married Steve Veix and Kersha Taylor. Again, the two are also still together and have a son, Mitchell. In early 2006, it was revealed that due to Steve's long days working on the couple's farm, Kersha suffered post-natal depression which she has since beaten. On Wednesday 16 January 2008, Kersha gave birth to their second son Finn.\n\nThe Edge ran 3 Strangers and a Wedding in 2007 where the bride has to pick which man out of 2 she will marry on the actual wedding day.\nChantelle Swanson picked Paul Court as her groom on 27 September 2007 in Auckland, New Zealand. In March 2010 Chantelle gave birth to the couple's first child Taylor Thomas Court on Sunday 7 March 2010. He weighed 8 pounds, 12 ounces.\n\nOther competitions \n95.5 WPLJ, a New York radio station, in 2006 married a couple. They were together for six months before divorcing.\n\nSimilar contests have been run in Los Angeles, Budapest, Hungary and in Estonia.\n95.5 KLOS in Los Angeles also ran, a variant of the competition called \"Three Strangers and a Wedding\" in 2007, this time the twist was that the Bride had to choose her groom in 60 seconds based on first looks. The couple split up after 1 week. She has a nickname of the Naughty Nurse.\n\nMost recently WTMX in Chicago ran 2 Strangers - Is Love Blind and the final couple refused to get married at the altar claiming marriage was too serious to be entered into via a radio competition.\n\nThe two most successful European 'social experiments' were held in Dublin on 98FM where the final couple are still together and have a child and in Budapest, Hungary where the couple from Danubius Radio are now media celebrities attending chat shows and film premieres.\n\nMore recently '2 Strangers' has also run successfully in on the WIL Cornbread show in St Louis, Energy FM on Calgary & and Kaya FM Johannesburg.\n\nIn Sept/Oct of 2008, Energy 101.5 of Calgary, Alberta, Canada ran Two Strangers and A Wedding. The Bride and Groom were to get married the last week of October. At the altar they opted out of marriage. They were to go on a date after the wedding and also spent a weekend with his family. No new info has been given since then.\n\nIn February 2009, a contest was launched by Waterford regional station Beat 102-103. There were 85 entrants, with the winners meeting minutes before the ceremony in April. The ceremony was legally void, since three months' notice is required. However, provision was made for a future legal ceremony and use of a shared house. The couple went to Portugal for a week's \"honeymoon\", accompanied by station staff. Upon their return, they split up, with the \"bride\" commenting, \"I'm definitely not going to see him again.\"\n\n2 Strangers TV \nStrangers over the years has appeared on TV many times.\n\n Channel 9 Australia 1998\n BBC TV News, ITV TV News, SKY News & Have I Got News for You February 1999\n ITV '2 Strangers & a Wedding' two-episode special 2 March 1999\n TV3 Ireland '2 Strangers & a Wedding' Special\n RTL TV Hungary & TV2 Hungary 2004\n ABC TV America 2007 & CBS TV coverage 2007\n\nThe TV format of 2 Strangers and a Wedding is represented internationally by Small World International Format Television LLC and was showcased at international content market MipTV in 2009.\n\nCriticisms and controversy \n\n Birmingham's Churches Together accused BRMB of \"reducing a sacred and momentous decision to a media event\", before the 1999 wedding of Greg and Carla.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n BRMB website\n 2 Strangers website\n Absolute & Dowse LLC\n Two Strangers and a Wedding homepage\n Small World Website\n\nCompetitions\nAustralian radio programs\nWorks about wedding",
"Edward Randolph (~October 1690 – after 1756), sometimes referred to as Edward Randolph of Bremo, was a ship captain, a London tobacco merchant, and the seventh and youngest son of William Randolph and Mary Isham.\n\nBiography\nIn 1713, Randolph inherited 625 acres of land near the Chickahominy River when his father's will was probated at the Henrico County court in Varina, Virginia. Although known as \"Edward Randolph of Bremo\", the Virginia Historical Society reported that the Bremo Plantation located along the James River in Henrico County near Malvern Hill and Turkey Island was actually owned by the Cocke family of Virginia during the 18th century. Randolph \"chose a seafaring life\" and operated merchant vessels between England and the Colony of Virginia. Residing in England, he met an heiress named \"Elizabeth\" (whose last name has been noted as \"Graves\", \"Groves\", and \"Grosvenor\") from Bristol, England at a launch at Gravesend, Kent. The couple married around 1715 and had four children:\nJoseph Randolph did not marry.\nEdward Randolph (? – April 1757) married Lucy Harrison of Berkeley (the daughter of Benjamin Harrison IV, the sister of Benjamin Harrison V, the sister-in-law of Peyton Randolph and William Randolph III, and the granddaughter of Robert \"King\" Carter) in the late 1740s and had two children. Harrison's sisters were married to Peyton Randolph and William Randolph III, Edward Randolph Jr's cousins.\nElizabeth Randolph first married Reverend William Yates, the fifth president of The College of William & Mary, and had three children. She then married Theodorick Bland of Cawsons.\nMary Randolph married Robert Yates, the brother of William Yates, and had three children.\n\nTwo sons of Bartholomew Yates, William and Robert, were members of the Church of England and married the two daughters of Randolph, Elizabeth and Mary, while visiting England to obtain their clerical orders.\n\nAlthough he came from a large, wealthy, and powerful family, Edward Randolph's children were born into a branch that was not very prosperous. Randolph was bankrupt by 1732 and misfortune had later brought him near poverty. Benjamin Harrison IV was among his many creditors and brought suit against him in 1737.\n\nIt is not known where or when Randolph died, but was placed in Virginia as late as 1756 by the Dinwiddie Papers.\n\nAncestry and descendants\n\nIn addition to the familial connections noted previously, Randolph was a great-great-great grandfather of Harrison Randolph, the President and Professor of Mathematics at the College of Charleston. He was also a great-uncle of United States President Thomas Jefferson.\n\nSee also\nFirst Families of Virginia\nRandolph family of Virginia\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\n1690 births\nDate of death unknown\nPeople from Henrico County, Virginia\nEdward"
] |
[
"H. G. Wells",
"Personal life",
"Who did he marry",
"1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells.",
"What happened to the couple",
"The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students,",
"What was her name",
"Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895.",
"Where was their house atthis time",
"They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months",
"When and where were the two married",
"married at St Pancras register office in October 1895."
] | C_86cc13fd852e4219a6fc0d2d8dd4d80e_0 | What did this help him with | 6 | What did marrying Amy Robbins help H.G. Wells with? | H. G. Wells | In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells. The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham. In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where in 1901 he constructed a large family home: Spade House. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip") in 1901 (died 1985) and Frank Richard in 1903 (died 1982). With his wife Jane's consent, Wells had affairs with a number of women, including the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger, adventurer and writer Odette Keun, Soviet spy Moura Budberg and novelist Elizabeth von Arnim. In 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society; and in 1914, a son, Anthony West (1914-1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells' "sordid intrigue" with the daughter of veteran Fabian Sidney Olivier, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011) - a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note) - gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others. Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989). CANNOTANSWER | he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, | Herbert George Wells (21 September 186613 August 1946) was an English writer. Prolific in many genres, he wrote dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, history, satire, biography and autobiography. His work also included two books on recreational war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is sometimes called the "father of science fiction."
During his own lifetime, however, he was most prominent as a forward-looking, even prophetic social critic who devoted his literary talents to the development of a progressive vision on a global scale. A futurist, he wrote a number of utopian works and foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. His science fiction imagined time travel, alien invasion, invisibility, and biological engineering. Brian Aldiss referred to Wells as the "Shakespeare of science fiction", while American writer Charles Fort referred to him as a "wild talent".
Wells rendered his works convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work – dubbed “Wells's law” – leading Joseph Conrad to hail him in 1898 as "O Realist of the Fantastic!". His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), which was his first novel, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), The War of the Worlds (1898) and the military science fiction The War in the Air (1907). Wells was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature four times.
Wells's earliest specialised training was in biology, and his thinking on ethical matters took place in a specifically and fundamentally Darwinian context. He was also an outspoken socialist from a young age, often (but not always, as at the beginning of the First World War) sympathising with pacifist views. His later works became increasingly political and didactic, and he wrote little science fiction, while he sometimes indicated on official documents that his profession was that of journalist. Novels such as Kipps and The History of Mr Polly, which describe lower-middle-class life, led to the suggestion that he was a worthy successor to Charles Dickens, but Wells described a range of social strata and even attempted, in Tono-Bungay (1909), a diagnosis of English society as a whole. Wells was a diabetic and co-founded the charity The Diabetic Association (known today as Diabetes UK) in 1934.
Life
Early life
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on 21 September 1866. Called "Bertie" by his family, he was the fourth and last child of Joseph Wells, a former domestic gardener, and at the time a shopkeeper and professional cricketer and Sarah Neal, a former domestic servant. An inheritance had allowed the family to acquire a shop in which they sold china and sporting goods, although it failed to prosper: the stock was old and worn out, and the location was poor. Joseph Wells managed to earn a meagre income, but little of it came from the shop and he received an unsteady amount of money from playing professional cricket for the Kent county team.
A defining incident of young Wells's life was an accident in 1874 that left him bedridden with a broken leg. To pass the time he began to read books from the local library, brought to him by his father. He soon became devoted to the other worlds and lives to which books gave him access; they also stimulated his desire to write. Later that year he entered Thomas Morley's Commercial Academy, a private school founded in 1849, following the bankruptcy of Morley's earlier school. The teaching was erratic, the curriculum mostly focused, Wells later said, on producing copperplate handwriting and doing the sort of sums useful to tradesmen. Wells continued at Morley's Academy until 1880. In 1877, his father, Joseph Wells, suffered a fractured thigh. The accident effectively put an end to Joseph's career as a cricketer, and his subsequent earnings as a shopkeeper were not enough to compensate for the loss of the primary source of family income.
No longer able to support themselves financially, the family instead sought to place their sons as apprentices in various occupations. From 1880 to 1883, Wells had an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at Hyde's Drapery Emporium in Southsea. His experiences at Hyde's, where he worked a thirteen-hour day and slept in a dormitory with other apprentices, later inspired his novels The Wheels of Chance, The History of Mr Polly, and Kipps, which portray the life of a draper's apprentice as well as providing a critique of society's distribution of wealth.
Wells's parents had a turbulent marriage, owing primarily to his mother's being a Protestant and his father's being a freethinker. When his mother returned to work as a lady's maid (at Uppark, a country house in Sussex), one of the conditions of work was that she would not be permitted to have living space for her husband and children. Thereafter, she and Joseph lived separate lives, though they never divorced and remained faithful to each other. As a consequence, Herbert's personal troubles increased as he subsequently failed as a draper and also, later, as a chemist's assistant. However, Uppark had a magnificent library in which he immersed himself, reading many classic works, including Plato's Republic, Thomas More's Utopia, and the works of Daniel Defoe. This was the beginning of Wells's venture into literature.
Teacher
In October 1879, Wells's mother arranged through a distant relative, Arthur Williams, for him to join the National School at Wookey in Somerset as a pupil–teacher, a senior pupil who acted as a teacher of younger children. In December that year, however, Williams was dismissed for irregularities in his qualifications and Wells was returned to Uppark. After a short apprenticeship at a chemist in nearby Midhurst and an even shorter stay as a boarder at Midhurst Grammar School, he signed his apprenticeship papers at Hyde's. In 1883, Wells persuaded his parents to release him from the apprenticeship, taking an opportunity offered by Midhurst Grammar School again to become a pupil–teacher; his proficiency in Latin and science during his earlier short stay had been remembered.
The years he spent in Southsea had been the most miserable of his life to that point, but his good fortune at securing a position at Midhurst Grammar School meant that Wells could continue his self-education in earnest. The following year, Wells won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science (later the Royal College of Science in South Kensington, now part of Imperial College London) in London, studying biology under Thomas Henry Huxley. As an alumnus, he later helped to set up the Royal College of Science Association, of which he became the first president in 1909. Wells studied in his new school until 1887, with a weekly allowance of 21 shillings (a guinea) thanks to his scholarship. This ought to have been a comfortable sum of money (at the time many working class families had "round about a pound a week" as their entire household income), yet in his Experiment in Autobiography Wells speaks of constantly being hungry, and indeed photographs of him at the time show a youth who is very thin and malnourished.
He soon entered the Debating Society of the school. These years mark the beginning of his interest in a possible reformation of society. At first approaching the subject through Plato's Republic, he soon turned to contemporary ideas of socialism as expressed by the recently formed Fabian Society and free lectures delivered at Kelmscott House, the home of William Morris. He was also among the founders of The Science School Journal, a school magazine that allowed him to express his views on literature and society, as well as trying his hand at fiction; a precursor to his novel The Time Machine was published in the journal under the title The Chronic Argonauts. The school year 1886–87 was the last year of his studies.
During 1888, Wells stayed in Stoke-on-Trent, living in Basford. The unique environment of The Potteries was certainly an inspiration. He wrote in a letter to a friend from the area that "the district made an immense impression on me." The inspiration for some of his descriptions in The War of the Worlds is thought to have come from his short time spent here, seeing the iron foundry furnaces burn over the city, shooting huge red light into the skies. His stay in The Potteries also resulted in the macabre short story "The Cone" (1895, contemporaneous with his famous The Time Machine), set in the north of the city.
After teaching for some time, he was briefly on the staff of Holt Academy in Wales – Wells found it necessary to supplement his knowledge relating to educational principles and methodology and entered the College of Preceptors (College of Teachers). He later received his Licentiate and Fellowship FCP diplomas from the college. It was not until 1890 that Wells earned a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology from the University of London External Programme. In 1889–90, he managed to find a post as a teacher at Henley House School in London, where he taught A. A. Milne (whose father ran the school). His first published work was a Text-Book of Biology in two volumes (1893).
Upon leaving the Normal School of Science, Wells was left without a source of income. His aunt Mary—his father's sister-in-law—invited him to stay with her for a while, which solved his immediate problem of accommodation. During his stay at his aunt's residence, he grew increasingly interested in her daughter, Isabel, whom he later courted. To earn money, he began writing short humorous articles for journals such as The Pall Mall Gazette, later collecting these in volume form as Select Conversations with an Uncle (1895) and Certain Personal Matters (1897). So prolific did Wells become at this mode of journalism that many of his early pieces remain unidentified. According to David C. Smith, "Most of Wells's occasional pieces have not been collected, and many have not even been identified as his. Wells did not automatically receive the byline his reputation demanded until after 1896 or so ... As a result, many of his early pieces are unknown. It is obvious that many early Wells items have been lost." His success with these shorter pieces encouraged him to write book-length work, and he published his first novel, The Time Machine, in 1895.
Personal life
In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells (1865–1931; from 1902 Isabel Mary Smith). The couple agreed to separate in 1894, when he had fallen in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (1872–1927; later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey, in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton' (now No.141), Maybury Road, in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Doctor Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When the Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham.
In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames, for two years; this lasted until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where he constructed a large family home, Spade House, in 1901. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip"; 1901–1985) and Frank Richard (1903–1982) (grandfather of film director Simon Wells). Jane died on 6 October 1927, in Dunmow, at the age of 55.
Wells had affairs with a significant number of women. In December 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society. Amber had married the barrister G. R. Blanco White in July of that year, as co-arranged by Wells. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells's "sordid intrigue" with Amber, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. Between 1910 and 1913, novelist Elizabeth von Arnim was one of his mistresses. In 1914, he had a son, Anthony West (1914–1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. In 1920–21, and intermittently until his death, he had a love affair with the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger.
Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with the 22-year younger Dutch adventurer and writer Odette Keun, with whom he lived in Lou Pidou, a house they built together in Grasse, France. Wells dedicated his longest book to her (The World of William Clissold, 1926). When visiting Maxim Gorky in Russia 1920, he had slept with Gorky's mistress Moura Budberg, then still Countess Benckendorf and 27 years his junior. In 1933, when she left Gorky and emigrated to London, their relationship renewed and she cared for him through his final illness. Wells repeatedly asked her to marry him, but Budberg strongly rejected his proposals.
In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011)—a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note)—gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others.
Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989).
Artist
One of the ways that Wells expressed himself was through his drawings and sketches. One common location for these was the endpapers and title pages of his own diaries, and they covered a wide variety of topics, from political commentary to his feelings toward his literary contemporaries and his current romantic interests. During his marriage to Amy Catherine, whom he nicknamed Jane, he drew a considerable number of pictures, many of them being overt comments on their marriage. During this period, he called these pictures "picshuas". These picshuas have been the topic of study by Wells scholars for many years, and in 2006, a book was published on the subject.
Writer
Some of his early novels, called "scientific romances", invented several themes now classic in science fiction in such works as The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, When the Sleeper Wakes, and The First Men in the Moon. He also wrote realistic novels that received critical acclaim, including Kipps and a critique of English culture during the Edwardian period, Tono-Bungay. Wells also wrote dozens of short stories and novellas, including, "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid", which helped bring the full impact of Darwin's revolutionary botanical ideas to a wider public, and was followed by many later successes such as "The Country of the Blind" (1904).
According to James E. Gunn, one of Wells's major contributions to the science fiction genre was his approach, which he referred to as his "new system of ideas". In his opinion, the author should always strive to make the story as credible as possible, even if both the writer and the reader knew certain elements are impossible, allowing the reader to accept the ideas as something that could really happen, today referred to as "the plausible impossible" and "suspension of disbelief". While neither invisibility nor time travel was new in speculative fiction, Wells added a sense of realism to the concepts which the readers were not familiar with. He conceived the idea of using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposely and selectively forwards or backwards in time. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle. He explained that while writing The Time Machine, he realized that "the more impossible the story I had to tell, the more ordinary must be the setting, and the circumstances in which I now set the Time Traveller were all that I could imagine of solid upper-class comforts." In "Wells's Law", a science fiction story should contain only a single extraordinary assumption. Therefore, as justifications for the impossible, he employed scientific ideas and theories. Wells's best-known statement of the "law" appears in his introduction to a collection of his works published in 1934:
As soon as the magic trick has been done the whole business of the fantasy writer is to keep everything else human and real. Touches of prosaic detail are imperative and a rigorous adherence to the hypothesis. Any extra fantasy outside the cardinal assumption immediately gives a touch of irresponsible silliness to the invention.
Dr. Griffin / The Invisible Man is a brilliant research scientist who discovers a method of invisibility, but finds himself unable to reverse the process. An enthusiast of random and irresponsible violence, Griffin has become an iconic character in horror fiction. The Island of Doctor Moreau sees a shipwrecked man left on the island home of Doctor Moreau, a mad scientist who creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. The earliest depiction of uplift, the novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature. In The First Men in the Moon Wells used the idea of radio communication between astronomical objects, a plot point inspired by Nikola Tesla's claim that he had received radio signals from Mars. Though Tono-Bungay is not a science-fiction novel, radioactive decay plays a small but consequential role in it. Radioactive decay plays a much larger role in The World Set Free (1914). This book contains what is surely his biggest prophetic "hit", with the first description of a nuclear weapon. Scientists of the day were well aware that the natural decay of radium releases energy at a slow rate over thousands of years. The rate of release is too slow to have practical utility, but the total amount released is huge. Wells's novel revolves around an (unspecified) invention that accelerates the process of radioactive decay, producing bombs that explode with no more than the force of ordinary high explosives—but which "continue to explode" for days on end. "Nothing could have been more obvious to the people of the earlier twentieth century", he wrote, "than the rapidity with which war was becoming impossible ... [but] they did not see it until the atomic bombs burst in their fumbling hands". In 1932, the physicist and conceiver of nuclear chain reaction Leó Szilárd read The World Set Free (the same year Sir James Chadwick discovered the neutron), a book which he said made a great impression on him. In addition to writing early science fiction, he produced work dealing with mythological beings like an angel in the novel The Wonderful Visit (1895) and a mermaid in the novel The Sea Lady (1902).
Wells also wrote non-fiction. His first non-fiction bestseller was Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought (1901). When originally serialised in a magazine it was subtitled "An Experiment in Prophecy", and is considered his most explicitly futuristic work. It offered the immediate political message of the privileged sections of society continuing to bar capable men from other classes from advancement until war would force a need to employ those most able, rather than the traditional upper classes, as leaders. Anticipating what the world would be like in the year 2000, the book is interesting both for its hits (trains and cars resulting in the dispersion of populations from cities to suburbs; moral restrictions declining as men and women seek greater sexual freedom; the defeat of German militarism, and the existence of a European Union) and its misses (he did not expect successful aircraft before 1950, and averred that "my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocate its crew and founder at sea").
His bestselling two-volume work, The Outline of History (1920), began a new era of popularised world history. It received a mixed critical response from professional historians. However, it was very popular amongst the general population and made Wells a rich man. Many other authors followed with "Outlines" of their own in other subjects. He reprised his Outline in 1922 with a much shorter popular work, A Short History of the World, a history book praised by Albert Einstein, and two long efforts, The Science of Life (1930)—written with his son G. P. Wells and evolutionary biologist Julian Huxley, and The Work, Wealth and Happiness of Mankind (1931). The "Outlines" became sufficiently common for James Thurber to parody the trend in his humorous essay, "An Outline of Scientists"—indeed, Wells's Outline of History remains in print with a new 2005 edition, while A Short History of the World has been re-edited (2006).
From quite early in Wells's career, he sought a better way to organise society and wrote a number of Utopian novels. The first of these was A Modern Utopia (1905), which shows a worldwide utopia with "no imports but meteorites, and no exports at all"; two travellers from our world fall into its alternate history. The others usually begin with the world rushing to catastrophe, until people realise a better way of living: whether by mysterious gases from a comet causing people to behave rationally and abandoning a European war (In the Days of the Comet (1906)), or a world council of scientists taking over, as in The Shape of Things to Come (1933, which he later adapted for the 1936 Alexander Korda film, Things to Come). This depicted, all too accurately, the impending World War, with cities being destroyed by aerial bombs. He also portrayed the rise of fascist dictators in The Autocracy of Mr Parham (1930) and The Holy Terror (1939). Men Like Gods (1923) is also a utopian novel. Wells in this period was regarded as an enormously influential figure; the critic Malcolm Cowley stated: "by the time he was forty, his influence was wider than any other living English writer".
Wells contemplates the ideas of nature and nurture and questions humanity in books such as The First Men in the Moon, where nature is completely suppressed by nurture, and The Island of Doctor Moreau, where the strong presence of nature represents a threat to a civilized society. Not all his scientific romances ended in a Utopia, and Wells also wrote a dystopian novel, When the Sleeper Wakes (1899, rewritten as The Sleeper Awakes, 1910), which pictures a future society where the classes have become more and more separated, leading to a revolt of the masses against the rulers. The Island of Doctor Moreau is even darker. The narrator, having been trapped on an island of animals vivisected (unsuccessfully) into human beings, eventually returns to England; like Gulliver on his return from the Houyhnhnms, he finds himself unable to shake off the perceptions of his fellow humans as barely civilised beasts, slowly reverting to their animal natures.
Wells also wrote the preface for the first edition of W. N. P. Barbellion's diaries, The Journal of a Disappointed Man, published in 1919. Since "Barbellion" was the real author's pen name, many reviewers believed Wells to have been the true author of the Journal; Wells always denied this, despite being full of praise for the diaries.
In 1927, a Canadian teacher and writer Florence Deeks unsuccessfully sued Wells for infringement of copyright and breach of trust, claiming that much of The Outline of History had been plagiarised from her unpublished manuscript, The Web of the World's Romance, which had spent nearly nine months in the hands of Wells's Canadian publisher, Macmillan Canada. However, it was sworn on oath at the trial that the manuscript remained in Toronto in the safekeeping of Macmillan, and that Wells did not even know it existed, let alone had seen it. The court found no proof of copying, and decided the similarities were due to the fact that the books had similar nature and both writers had access to the same sources. In 2000, A. B. McKillop, a professor of history at Carleton University, produced a book on the case, The Spinster & The Prophet: Florence Deeks, H. G. Wells, and the Mystery of the Purloined Past. According to McKillop, the lawsuit was unsuccessful due to the prejudice against a woman suing a well-known and famous male author, and he paints a detailed story based on the circumstantial evidence of the case. In 2004, Denis N. Magnusson, Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Law, Queen's University, Ontario, published an article on Deeks v. Wells. This re-examines the case in relation to McKillop's book. While having some sympathy for Deeks, he argues that she had a weak case that was not well presented, and though she may have met with sexism from her lawyers, she received a fair trial, adding that the law applied is essentially the same law that would be applied to a similar case today (i.e., 2004).
In 1933, Wells predicted in The Shape of Things to Come that the world war he feared would begin in January 1940, a prediction which ultimately came true four months early, in September 1939, with the outbreak of World War II. In 1936, before the Royal Institution, Wells called for the compilation of a constantly growing and changing World Encyclopaedia, to be reviewed by outstanding authorities and made accessible to every human being. In 1938, he published a collection of essays on the future organisation of knowledge and education, World Brain, including the essay "The Idea of a Permanent World Encyclopaedia".
Prior to 1933, Wells's books were widely read in Germany and Austria, and most of his science fiction works had been translated shortly after publication. By 1933, he had attracted the attention of German officials because of his criticism of the political situation in Germany, and on 10 May 1933, Wells's books were burned by the Nazi youth in Berlin's Opernplatz, and his works were banned from libraries and book stores. Wells, as president of PEN International (Poets, Essayists, Novelists), angered the Nazis by overseeing the expulsion of the German PEN club from the international body in 1934 following the German PEN's refusal to admit non-Aryan writers to its membership. At a PEN conference in Ragusa, Wells refused to yield to Nazi sympathisers who demanded that the exiled author Ernst Toller be prevented from speaking. Near the end of World War II, Allied forces discovered that the SS had compiled lists of people slated for immediate arrest during the invasion of Britain in the abandoned Operation Sea Lion, with Wells included in the alphabetical list of "The Black Book".
Wartime works
Seeking a more structured way to play war games, Wells wrote Floor Games (1911) followed by Little Wars (1913), which set out rules for fighting battles with toy soldiers (miniatures). A pacifist prior to the First World War, Wells stated "how much better is this amiable miniature [war] than the real thing". According to Wells, the idea of the game developed from a visit by his friend Jerome K. Jerome. After dinner, Jerome began shooting down toy soldiers with a toy cannon and Wells joined in to compete.
During August 1914, immediately after the outbreak of the First World War, Wells published a number of articles in London newspapers that subsequently appeared as a book entitled The War That Will End War. He coined the expression with the idealistic belief that the result of the war would make a future conflict impossible. Wells blamed the Central Powers for the coming of the war and argued that only the defeat of German militarism could bring about an end to war. Wells used the shorter form of the phrase, "the war to end war", in In the Fourth Year (1918), in which he noted that the phrase "got into circulation" in the second half of 1914. In fact, it had become one of the most common catchphrases of the war.
In 1918 Wells worked for the British War Propaganda Bureau, also called Wellington House. Wells was also one of fifty-three leading British authors — a number that included Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — who signed their names to the “Authors' Declaration.” This manifesto declared that the German invasion of Belgium had been a brutal crime, and that Britain “could not without dishonour have refused to take part in the present war.”
Travels to Russia and the Soviet Union
Wells visited Russia three times: 1914, 1920 and 1934. During his second visit, he saw his old friend Maxim Gorky and with Gorky's help, met Vladimir Lenin. In his book Russia in the Shadows, Wells portrayed Russia as recovering from a total social collapse, "the completest that has ever happened to any modern social organisation." On 23 July 1934, after visiting U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Wells went to the Soviet Union and interviewed Joseph Stalin for three hours for the New Statesman magazine, which was extremely rare at that time. He told Stalin how he had seen 'the happy faces of healthy people' in contrast with his previous visit to Moscow in 1920. However, he also criticised the lawlessness, class discrimination, state violence, and absence of free expression. Stalin enjoyed the conversation and replied accordingly. As the chairman of the London-based PEN International, which protected the rights of authors to write without being intimidated, Wells hoped by his trip to USSR, he could win Stalin over by force of argument. Before he left, he realised that no reform was to happen in the near future.
Final years
Wells’s greatest literary output occurred before the First World War, which was lamented by younger authors whom he had influenced. In this connection, George Orwell described Wells as "too sane to understand the modern world", and "since 1920 he has squandered his talents in slaying paper dragons." G. K. Chesterton quipped: "Mr Wells is a born storyteller who has sold his birthright for a pot of message".
Wells had diabetes, and was a co-founder in 1934 of The Diabetic Association (now Diabetes UK, the leading charity for people with diabetes in the UK).
On 28 October 1940, on the radio station KTSA in San Antonio, Texas, Wells took part in a radio interview with Orson Welles, who two years previously had performed a famous radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds. During the interview, by Charles C Shaw, a KTSA radio host, Wells admitted his surprise at the sensation that resulted from the broadcast but acknowledged his debt to Welles for increasing sales of one of his "more obscure" titles.
Death
Wells died of unspecified causes on 13 August 1946, aged 79, at his home at 13 Hanover Terrace, overlooking Regent's Park, London. In his preface to the 1941 edition of The War in the Air, Wells had stated that his epitaph should be: "I told you so. You damned fools". Wells's body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on 16 August 1946; his ashes were subsequently scattered into the English Channel at Old Harry Rocks, the most eastern point of the Jurassic Coast and about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) from Swanage in Dorset.
A commemorative blue plaque in his honour was installed by the Greater London Council at his home in Regent's Park in 1966.
Futurist
A futurist and “visionary”, Wells foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. Asserting that "Wells' visions of the future remain unsurpassed", John Higgs, author of Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century, states that in the late 19th century Wells “saw the coming century clearer than anyone else. He anticipated wars in the air, the sexual revolution, motorised transport causing the growth of suburbs and a proto-Wikipedia he called the "world brain". In his novel The World Set Free, he imagined an “atomic bomb” of terrifying power that would be dropped from aeroplanes. This was an extraordinary insight for an author writing in 1913, and it made a deep impression on Winston Churchill."
In 2011, Wells was among a group of science fiction writers featured in the Prophets of Science Fiction series, a show produced and hosted by film director Sir Ridley Scott, which depicts how predictions influenced the development of scientific advancements by inspiring many readers to assist in transforming those futuristic visions into everyday reality. In a 2013 review of The Time Machine for the New Yorker magazine, Brad Leithauser writes, "At the base of Wells's great visionary exploit is this rational, ultimately scientific attempt to tease out the potential future consequences of present conditions—not as they might arise in a few years, or even decades, but millennia hence, epochs hence. He is world literature's Great Extrapolator. Like no other fiction writer before him, he embraced "deep time."
Political views
Wells was a socialist and a member of the Fabian Society. Winston Churchill was an avid reader of Wells's books, and after they first met in 1902 they kept in touch until Wells died in 1946. As a junior minister Churchill borrowed lines from Wells for one of his most famous early landmark speeches in 1906, and as Prime Minister the phrase "the gathering storm"—used by Churchill to describe the rise of Nazi Germany—had been written by Wells in The War of the Worlds, which depicts an attack on Britain by Martians. Wells's extensive writings on equality and human rights, most notably his most influential work, The Rights of Man (1940), laid the groundwork for the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations shortly after his death.
His efforts regarding the League of Nations, on which he collaborated on the project with Leonard Woolf with the booklets The Idea of a League of Nations, Prolegomena to the Study of World Organization, and The Way of the League of Nations, became a disappointment as the organization turned out to be a weak one unable to prevent the Second World War, which itself occurred towards the very end of his life and only increased the pessimistic side of his nature. In his last book Mind at the End of Its Tether (1945), he considered the idea that humanity being replaced by another species might not be a bad idea. He referred to the era between the two World Wars as "The Age of Frustration".
Religious views
Wells's views on God and religion changed over his lifetime. Early in his life he distanced himself from Christianity, and later from theism, and finally, late in life, he was essentially atheistic. Martin Gardner summarises this progression:[The younger Wells] ... did not object to using the word "God" provided it did not imply anything resembling human personality. In his middle years Wells went through a phase of defending the concept of a "finite God," similar to the god of such process theologians as Samuel Alexander, Edgar Brightman, and Charles Hartshorne. (He even wrote a book about it called God the Invisible King.) Later Wells decided he was really an atheist.
In God the Invisible King (1917), Wells wrote that his idea of God did not draw upon the traditional religions of the world: This book sets out as forcibly and exactly as possible the religious belief of the writer. [Which] is a profound belief in a personal and intimate God. ... Putting the leading idea of this book very roughly, these two antagonistic typical conceptions of God may be best contrasted by speaking of one of them as God-as-Nature or the Creator, and of the other as God-as-Christ or the Redeemer. One is the great Outward God; the other is the Inmost God. The first idea was perhaps developed most highly and completely in the God of Spinoza. It is a conception of God tending to pantheism, to an idea of a comprehensive God as ruling with justice rather than affection, to a conception of aloofness and awestriking worshipfulness. The second idea, which is contradictory to this idea of an absolute God, is the God of the human heart. The writer suggested that the great outline of the theological struggles of that phase of civilisation and world unity which produced Christianity, was a persistent but unsuccessful attempt to get these two different ideas of God into one focus. Later in the work, he aligns himself with a "renascent or modern religion ... neither atheist nor Buddhist nor Mohammedan nor Christian ... [that] he has found growing up in himself".
Of Christianity, he said: "it is not now true for me. ... Every believing Christian is, I am sure, my spiritual brother ... but if systemically I called myself a Christian I feel that to most men I should imply too much and so tell a lie". Of other world religions, he writes: "All these religions are true for me as Canterbury Cathedral is a true thing and as a Swiss chalet is a true thing. There they are, and they have served a purpose, they have worked. Only they are not true for me to live in them. ... They do not work for me". In The Fate of Homo Sapiens (1939), Wells criticised almost all world religions and philosophies, stating "there is no creed, no way of living left in the world at all, that really meets the needs of the time… When we come to look at them coolly and dispassionately, all the main religions, patriotic, moral and customary systems in which human beings are sheltering today, appear to be in a state of jostling and mutually destructive movement, like the houses and palaces and other buildings of some vast, sprawling city overtaken by a landslide.
Wells's opposition to organised religion reached a fever pitch in 1943 with publication of his book Crux Ansata, subtitled "An Indictment of the Roman Catholic Church".
Literary influence and legacy
The science fiction historian John Clute describes Wells as "the most important writer the genre has yet seen", and notes his work has been central to both British and American science fiction. Science fiction author and critic Algis Budrys said Wells "remains the outstanding expositor of both the hope, and the despair, which are embodied in the technology and which are the major facts of life in our world". He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921, 1932, 1935, and 1946. Wells so influenced real exploration of space that an impact crater on Mars (and the Moon) was named after him.
In the United Kingdom, Wells's work was a key model for the British "scientific romance", and other writers in that mode, such as Olaf Stapledon, J. D. Beresford, S. Fowler Wright, and Naomi Mitchison, all drew on Wells's example. Wells was also an important influence on British science fiction of the period after the Second World War, with Arthur C. Clarke and Brian Aldiss expressing strong admiration for Wells's work. Among contemporary British science fiction writers, Stephen Baxter, Christopher Priest and Adam Roberts have all acknowledged Wells's influence on their writing; all three are Vice-Presidents of the H. G. Wells Society. He also had a strong influence on British scientist J. B. S. Haldane, who wrote Daedalus; or, Science and the Future (1924), "The Last Judgement" and "On Being the Right Size" from the essay collection Possible Worlds (1927), and Biological Possibilities for the Human Species in the Next Ten Thousand Years (1963), which are speculations about the future of human evolution and life on other planets. Haldane gave several lectures about these topics which in turn influenced other science fiction writers.
In the United States, Hugo Gernsback reprinted most of Wells's work in the pulp magazine Amazing Stories, regarding Wells's work as "texts of central importance to the self-conscious new genre". Later American writers such as Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Carl Sagan, and Ursula K. Le Guin all recalled being influenced by Wells.
Sinclair Lewis's early novels were strongly influenced by Wells's realistic social novels, such as The History of Mr Polly; Lewis also named his first son Wells after the author. Lewis nominated H. G. Wells for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.
In an interview with The Paris Review, Vladimir Nabokov described Wells as his favourite writer when he was a boy and "a great artist." He went on to cite The Passionate Friends, Ann Veronica, The Time Machine, and The Country of the Blind as superior to anything else written by Wells's British contemporaries. Nabokov said: "His sociological cogitations can be safely ignored, of course, but his romances and fantasies are superb."
Jorge Luis Borges wrote many short pieces on Wells in which he demonstrates a deep familiarity with much of Wells's work. While Borges wrote several critical reviews, including a mostly negative review of Wells's film Things to Come, he regularly treated Wells as a canonical figure of fantastic literature. Late in his life, Borges included The Invisible Man and The Time Machine in his Prologue to a Personal Library, a curated list of 100 great works of literature that he undertook at the behest of the Argentine publishing house Emecé. Canadian author Margaret Atwood read Wells's books, and he also inspired writers of European speculative fiction such as Karel Čapek and Yevgeny Zamyatin.
Representations
Literary
The superhuman protagonist of J. D. Beresford's 1911 novel, The Hampdenshire Wonder, Victor Stott, was based on Wells.
In M. P. Shiel's short story "The Primate of the Rose" (1928), there is an unpleasant womaniser named E. P. Crooks, who was written as a parody of Wells. Wells had attacked Shiel's Prince Zaleski when it was published in 1895, and this was Shiel's response. Wells praised Shiel's The Purple Cloud (1901); in turn Shiel expressed admiration for Wells, referring to him at a speech to the Horsham Rotary Club in 1933 as "my friend Mr. Wells".
In C. S. Lewis's novel That Hideous Strength (1945), the character Jules is a caricature of Wells, and much of Lewis's science fiction was written both under the influence of Wells and as an antithesis to his work (or, as he put it, an "exorcism" of the influence it had on him).
In Brian Aldiss's novella The Saliva Tree (1966), Wells has a small off-screen guest role.
In Saul Bellow's novel Mr. Sammler's Planet (1970), Wells is one of several historical figures the protagonist met when he was a young man.
In The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock (1976) Wells has an important part.
In The Map of Time (2008) by Spanish author Félix J. Palma; Wells is one of several historical characters.
Wells is one of the two Georges in Paul Levinson's 2013 time-travel novelette, "Ian, George, and George," published in Analog magazine.
Dramatic
Rod Taylor portrays Wells in the 1960 science fiction film The Time Machine (based on the novel of the same name), in which Wells uses his time machine to try and find his Utopian society.
Malcolm McDowell portrays Wells in the 1979 science fiction film Time After Time, in which Wells uses a time machine to pursue Jack the Ripper to the present day. In the film, Wells meets "Amy" in the future who then returns to 1893 to become his second wife Amy Catherine Robbins.
Wells is portrayed in the 1985 story Timelash from the 22nd season of the BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who. In this story, Herbert, an enthusiastic temporary companion to the Doctor, is revealed to be a young H. G. Wells. The plot is loosely based upon the themes and characters of The Time Machine with references to The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man and The Island of Doctor Moreau. The story jokingly suggests that Wells's inspiration for his later novels came from his adventure with the Sixth Doctor.
In the BBC2 anthology series Encounters about imagined meetings between historical figures, Beautiful Lies, by Paul Pender (15 August 1992) centred on an acrimonious dinner party attended by Wells (Richard Todd), George Orwell (Jon Finch), and William Empson (Patrick Ryecart).
The character of Wells also appeared in several episodes of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993–1997), usually pitted against the time-travelling villain known as Tempus (Lane Davies). Wells's younger self was played by Terry Kiser, and the older Wells was played by Hamilton Camp.
In the British TV mini-series The Infinite Worlds of H. G. Wells (2001), several of Wells's short stories are dramatised but are adapted using Wells himself (Tom Ward) as the main protagonist in each story.
In the Disney Channel Original Series Phil of the Future, which centres on time-travel, the present-day high school that the main characters attend is named "H. G. Wells".
In the 2006 television docudrama H. G. Wells: War with the World, Wells is played by Michael Sheen.
Television episode "World's End" of Cold Case (2007) is about the discovery of human remains in the bottom of a well leads to the reinvestigation of the case of a housewife who went missing during Orson Welles' radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds".
On the science fiction television series Warehouse 13 (2009–2014), there is a female version Helena G. Wells. When she appeared she explained that her brother was her front for her writing because a female science fiction author would not be accepted.
Comedian Paul F. Tompkins portrays a fictional Wells as the host of The Dead Authors Podcast, wherein Wells uses his time machine to bring dead authors (played by other comedians) to the present and interview them.
H. G. Wells as a young boy appears in the Legends of Tomorrow episode "The Magnificent Eight". In this story, the boy Wells is dying of consumption but is cured by a time-travelling Martin Stein.
In the four part series The Nightmare Worlds of H. G. Wells (2016), Wells is played by Ray Winstone.
In the 2017 television series version of Time After Time, based on the 1979 film, H. G. Wells is portrayed by Freddie Stroma.
In the 2019 television adaptation of The War of the Worlds, the character of 'George', played by Rafe Spall, demonstrates a number of elements of Wells's own life, including his estrangement from his wife and unmarried co-habitation with the character of 'Amy'.
Literary papers
In 1954, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign purchased the H. G. Wells literary papers and correspondence collection. The University's Rare Book & Manuscript Library holds the largest collection of Wells manuscripts, correspondence, first editions and publications in the United States. Among these is unpublished material and the manuscripts of such works as The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine. The collection includes first editions, revisions and translations. The letters contain general family correspondence, communications from publishers, material regarding the Fabian Society, and letters from politicians and public figures, most notably George Bernard Shaw and Joseph Conrad.
Bibliography
See also
References
Further reading
Dickson, Lovat. H. G. Wells: His Turbulent Life & Times. 1969.
Foot, Michael. H. G.: History of Mr. Wells. Doubleday, 1985 (), Black Swan, New edition, Oct 1996 (paperback, )
Gilmour, David. The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002 (paperback, ); 2003 (paperback, ).
Gomme, A. W., Mr. Wells as Historian. Glasgow: MacLehose, Jackson, and Co., 1921.
Gosling, John. Waging the War of the Worlds. Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland, 2009 (paperback, ).
Jasanoff, Maya, "The Future Was His" (review of Sarah Cole, Inventing Tomorrow: H.G. Wells and the Twentieth Century, Columbia University Press, 374 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXVII, no. 12 (23 July 2020), pp. 50–51. Writes Jasanoff (p. 51): "Although [Wells] was prophetically right, and right-minded, about some things... [n]owhere was he more disturbingly wrong than in his loathsome affinity for eugenics..."
Lynn, Andrea The secret love life of H.G. Wells
Mackenzie, Norman and Jean, The Time Traveller: the Life of H G Wells, London: Weidenfeld, 1973,
Mauthner, Martin. German Writers in French Exile, 1933–1940, London: Vallentine and Mitchell, 2007, .
McLean, Steven. 'The Early Fiction of H. G. Wells: Fantasies of Science'. Palgrave, 2009, .
Partington, John S. Building Cosmopolis: The Political Thought of H. G. Wells. Ashgate, 2003, .
Roberts, Adam. H G Wells A Literary Life. Springer International Publishing, 2019, ISBN 9783030264215.
Shadurski, Maxim. The Nationality of Utopia: H. G. Wells, England, and the World State. London: Routledge, 2020, .
Sherborne, Michael. H. G. Wells: Another Kind of Life. London: Peter Owen, 2010, .
Smith, David C., H. G. Wells: Desperately Mortal: A Biography. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986,
West, Anthony. H. G. Wells: Aspects of a Life. London: Hutchinson, 1984.
External links
Future Tense – The Story of H. G. Wells at BBC One – 150th anniversary documentary (2016)
"In the footsteps of H G Wells" at New Statesman – "The great author called for a Human Rights Act; 60 years later, we have it" (2000)
Sources—collections
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Free H. G. Wells downloads for iPhone, iPad, Nook, Android, and Kindle in PDF and all popular eBook reader formats (AZW3, EPUB, MOBI) at ebooktakeaway.com
H G Wells at the British Library
H. G. Wells papers at University of Illinois
Ebooks by H. G. Wells at Global Grey Ebooks
Sources—letters, essays and interviews
Archive of Wells's BBC broadcasts
Film interview with H. G. Wells
"Stephen Crane. From an English Standpoint", by Wells, 1900.
Rabindranath Tagore: In conversation with H. G. Wells. Rabindranath Tagore and Wells conversing in Geneva in 1930.
"Introduction", to W. N. P. Barbellion's The Journal of a Disappointed Man, by Wells, 1919.
"Woman and Primitive Culture", by Wells, 1895.
Letter, to M. P. Shiel, by Wells, 1937.
Biography
"H. G. Wells". In Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Critical essays
An introduction to The War of the Worlds by Iain Sinclair on the British Library's Discovering Literature website.
"An Appreciation of H. G. Wells", by Mary Austin, 1911.
"Socialism and the Family" (1906) by Belfort Bax, Part 1, Part 2.
"H. G. Wells warned us how it would feel to fight a War of the Worlds", by Niall Ferguson, in The Telegraph, 24 June 2005.
"H. G. Wells's Idea of a World Brain: A Critical Re-assessment", by W. Boyd Rayward, in Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50 (15 May 1999): 557–579
"Mr H. G. Wells and the Giants", by G. K. Chesterton, from his book Heretics (1908).
"The Internet: a world brain?", by Martin Gardner, in Skeptical Inquirer, Jan–Feb 1999.
"Science Fiction: The Shape of Things to Come", by Mark Bould, in The Socialist Review, May 2005.
"Who needs Utopia? A dialogue with my utopian self (with apologies, and thanks, to H. G. Wells)", by Gregory Claeys in Spaces of Utopia: An Electronic Journal, no 1, Spring 2006.
"When H. G. Wells Split the Atom: A 1914 Preview of 1945", by Freda Kirchwey, in The Nation, posted 4 September 2003 (original 18 August 1945 issue).
"Wells, Hitler and the World State", by George Orwell. First published: Horizon. GB, London. Aug 1941.
"War of the Worldviews", by John J. Miller, in The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal, 21 June 2005.
"Wells's Autobiography", by John Hart, from New International, Vol.2 No.2, Mar 1935, pp. 75–76.
"History in the Science Fiction of H. G. Wells", by Patrick Parrinder, Cycnos, 22.2 (2006).
"From the World Brain to the Worldwide Web", by Martin Campbell-Kelly, Gresham College Lecture, 9 November 2006.
"The Beginning of Wisdom: On Reading H. G. Wells", by Vivian Gornick, Boston Review, 31.1 (2007).
John Hammond, The Complete List of Short Stories of H. G. Wells
"H. G. Wells Predictions Ring True, 143 Years Later" at National Geographic
"H. G. Wells, the man I knew" Obituary of Wells by George Bernard Shaw, at the New Statesman
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"\"Plan B\" is the 6th episode of the second season of The CW television series, The Vampire Diaries and the 28th episode of the series overall. It originally aired on October 21, 2010. The episode was written by Elizabeth Craft and Sarah Fain and directed by John Behring.\n\nPlot\nThe episode starts with the scenes switching between Elena (Nina Dobrev) with Stefan (Paul Wesley) and Katherine with Mason (Taylor Kinney) waking up together. Elena and Stefan talk about how to keep hiding from Katherine and she keeps feeding Stefan with her blood, meanwhile Katherine tries to make Mason tell her where he hid the moonstone, however he tells her that it is safe and that he will give it to her later that night.\n\nJeremy (Steven R. McQueen) pays a visit to Damon (Ian Somerhalder) because he wants to help, as he says, and tells Damon what he has learnt about werewolves from Tyler (Michael Trevino) and that Mason is looking for a moonstone. Alaric (Matt Davis) arrives with more information from Isobel's research that says that moonstones can be used to seal a curse and they wonder if Mason wants it so he can reverse the werewolf curse.\n\nEveryone is at the preparations for the Masquerade Ball and Elena gets the chance to fill Bonnie (Kat Graham) in on everything around Katherine and what she was doing all this time with Caroline (Candice Accola) and her fake fights with Stefan. Meanwhile, Mason looks surprised to see Stefan alive and he asks him what they did to Sheriff Forbes (Marguerite MacIntyre). Stefan reassures him that Liz is fine and Mason leaves. While walking away, Mason bumps into Bonnie who gets a vision of him and \"Elena\". She tells Stefan about it and he figures out that Bonnie did not see Elena kissing Mason but Katherine.\n\nStefan informs Damon about the connection between Mason and Katherine and they are sure that Katherine is using him for something and they need to find out what. Jeremy offers his help and says that he can take the moonstone from Tyler, but Tyler gave the moonstone to Mason because he doesn't want to have anything to do with curses and supernatural anymore. Stefan and Damon ask for Bonnie's help so they can \"kidnap\" Mason and make him tell them Katherine's plan and where the moonstone is. Even though at first Bonnie does not want to help, she eventually agrees to do it.\n\nIn the meantime, Caroline is at the basement with her mom and tries to explain to her about her new life. Liz listens to her and even though she is negative with Caroline at the beginning, Liz ends up telling her that she doesn't have to compel her because she will never do anything to hurt her. Caroline believes her but she knows that Liz will never trust Damon and Stefan, so she compels her to forget everything and think that she has been sick with the flu for the past couple of days.\n\nDamon and Bonnie arrive at the Salvatore house with Mason and Damon ties him up to question him while Bonnie tries to read his mind with her powers to find out where the moonstone is. She tells Damon that the moonstone is in a well and heads out when Mason wakes up. On her way out, she runs into Caroline and tells her that she is going to the old well at the Lockwood property. Caroline wants to go with her and Bonnie texts Stefan where he can find the moonstone. He heads there and Elena follows him.\n\nDamon starts questioning Mason about Katherine but he refuses to say anything, leading Damon to torture him. After a while, Mason tells Damon where the moonstone is, but Damon wants to know why Katherine wants it. Mason says she wants it to reverse the werewolf curse because she loves him, something that makes Damon burst out laughing. He tells Mason that Katherine is just using him and when he realizes that Mason does not know anything more that could help him, he kills him.\n\nIn the meantime, Stefan gets to the well with Elena and he jumps in to search for the moonstone, but the water is full of vervain and he starts screaming for help. Caroline and Bonnie find them, and they help Elena to get down to Stefan. She ties the unconscious Stefan to the chain and tells Caroline to pull him up while she is searching for the moonstone. She finds it and Caroline pulls her up where she gives Stefan her blood to help him heal faster.\n\nStefan returns home where Damon tries to get rid of Mason's body. He texts Carol (Susan Walters) from Mason's phone to tell her that he left town and then calls Katherine despite Stefan's warning not to. Katherine is surprised and when Damon reveals to her that Mason is dead and they have the moonstone, she reassures him that she has a Plan B.\n\nAlaric and Jenna (Sara Canning) are having dinner when Elena get home. Katherine calls and asks for Elena telling her that she knows about her fake fights with Stefan because she had warned Jenna off of vervain and could control her and Jenna has been informing her about everything. In the background, Jenna stabs herself while under Katherine's compulsion and collapses. Alaric and Elena take her to the hospital and the doctor informs them that she will be fine.\n\nElena, after what happened with Jenna, goes to Stefan to tell him that they were fools to ignore Katherine's orders and to fool her. They cannot be together because they put the ones they love in danger and she breaks up with him.\n\nThe episode ends with Katherine compelling Matt (Zach Roerig) to attack Tyler and won't step back until Tyler kills him because as she says she needs a werewolf and since Mason is gone, she needs a new one.\n\nFeature music\nIn \"Plan B\" we can hear the songs:\n\"This = Love\" by The Script\n\"Tighten Up\" by The Black Keys\n\"Science of Fear\" by The Temper Trap\n\"Wires\" by Athlete\n\nReception\n\nRatings\nIn its original American broadcast, \"Plan B\" was watched by 3.62 million; up by 0.15 from the previous episode.\n\nReviews\n\"Plan B\" received positive reviews.\n\nMatt Richenthal of TV Fanatic rated the episode with 4.8/5 saying that the episode was dark, shocking and exciting. \"Did anyone actually expect Damon to kill Mason?!? Shades of this vampire's humanity appeared to be coming out after he realized Mason was just like him (only less dashing and intelligent), seduced by Katherine's charms and being manipulated. But that's what makes Damon such an intriguing character.\"\n\nDiana Steenbergen from IGN rated the episode with 8.5/10 praising Candice Accola's acting: \"Every episode I find myself having more good things to say about Candice Accola's portrayal of Caroline. While this week has the very sad (and real) breakup of Stefan and Elena, it is Caroline's time spent with her mother that is the most heartbreaking. [...] The journey Accola is taking Caroline through this season continues to be one of the more compelling storylines on the show.\"\n\nJosie Kafka of Doux Reviews rated the episode with 3.9/4 thanking the writers (Elizabeth Craft and Sarah Fain) for their work on the episode. \"Elizabeth Craft and Sarah Fain have worked on some great shows, but I never loved their episodes on Angel or Dollhouse. So I was both nervous and excited when I saw that this was their first VD episode. And then I forgot all about both nerves and excitement, as I was too busy hooting with merriment and then, at the end, gasping a \"No they didn’t!\" at the unanswering TV screen. And then doing it again, five minutes later.\"\n\nAlyse Wax from Fearnet gave a good review to the episode saying that it was good and brutal. \"I don’t think I have ever seen such intense torture on network television. I honestly did not see it coming that Jenna would be compelled to stab herself. It was an intense episode, with lots of darkness, and not too much mushy-gushy stuff.\"\n\nReagan from The TV Chick gave a B+ rate to the episode saying that it was another great one with a lot of information and several touching moments. \"I can’t wait for the masquerade ball and to see who else will crop up this season (surely we’re not going to fight only Katherine and it’s still early in the season). [...] My score’s a little lower because I really think they killed off Hot Uncle Mason a little early.\"\n\nDespite the positive reaction, Robin Franson Pruter of Forced Viewing rated the episode with 2/4 saying that the episode had a few good scenes but was hampered by excessive violence. \"The violence in this episode is unrelenting and largely unmotivated. I felt bad for Mason. [...] The torture scenes that follow are out of character for Damon and extreme enough to make even Dick Cheney uncomfortable. [...] The violence wouldn’t bother me so much if it was 1) in character; 2) in service of good-storytelling; or 3) socially responsible. Damon is erratic but not a sadist.\"\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n2010 American television episodes\nThe Vampire Diaries (season 2) episodes",
"\"O Come, All Ye Faithful\" is the ninth episode of The Vampire Diaries's fourth season, premiering December 13, 2012 on The CW.\n\nPlot\nA winter-themed party takes place in Mystic Falls, but during the celebration Caroline and Stefan argue with Tyler over what to do with Klaus and his hybrids. Elena and Damon wake up in his bed but with clothes on. They are sad because they don't know if her feelings are real or because of the sire bond. She almost gets him to make out with her again, but they are interrupted by the cellphone: Elena needs to meet Bonnie because she is teaching Jeremy how to not kill her.\n\nMeanwhile, Elena and Damon go to the Gilbert Lake House to help Jeremy face some dangerous inner demons with the help of Bonnie and Professor Shane, who shares a piece of ancient history that leaves them all speechless.\n\nHayley reveals to Tyler that there is no witch, and that she made a deal that could help her find her family which included a sacrifice of the twelve hybrids for which Klaus was needed. Meanwhile, Klaus discovers Tyler's plan and kills all twelve hybrids. Later on, an agitated Klaus drowns Carol Lockwood when he cannot find Tyler. Caroline reveals to Stefan that Damon and Elena are still together right after Damon, still being at the lake house, sets Elena free after he sees her being normal and happy family with her brother. Damon was already conflicted between doing what he wants and what would be the right thing to do by her and by his brother. He didn't feel good about lying to Stefan who feels enraged when he comes to know that Elena was with Damon.\n\nShe tried to fight him but he's too fast this time and at the end she tells him that she was ready to fight him on this, but that suddenly every part of her body is telling her to get in Bonnie's car and leave him. He answers just: \"So do it,\"and she kisses him goodbye. Also he told her that he would take care of her brother and would help him complete his hunters mark.\n\nApril opens Rebekah's tomb.\n\nReception\n\nRatings \nWhen the episode aired on December 13, 2012, the episode was viewed by 2.81 million American viewers.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \nRecap from Official Website\n\n2012 American television episodes\nThe Vampire Diaries (season 4) episodes\nTelevision episodes about murder"
] |
[
"H. G. Wells",
"Personal life",
"Who did he marry",
"1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells.",
"What happened to the couple",
"The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students,",
"What was her name",
"Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895.",
"Where was their house atthis time",
"They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months",
"When and where were the two married",
"married at St Pancras register office in October 1895.",
"What did this help him with",
"he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance,"
] | C_86cc13fd852e4219a6fc0d2d8dd4d80e_0 | What else did he do there | 7 | Besides writing The War of the Worlds, The Time Machine, The Island of Dr. Moreau, The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, what else did H.G. Wells do in Woking, Surrey? | H. G. Wells | In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells. The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham. In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where in 1901 he constructed a large family home: Spade House. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip") in 1901 (died 1985) and Frank Richard in 1903 (died 1982). With his wife Jane's consent, Wells had affairs with a number of women, including the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger, adventurer and writer Odette Keun, Soviet spy Moura Budberg and novelist Elizabeth von Arnim. In 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society; and in 1914, a son, Anthony West (1914-1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells' "sordid intrigue" with the daughter of veteran Fabian Sidney Olivier, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011) - a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note) - gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others. Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989). CANNOTANSWER | began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham. | Herbert George Wells (21 September 186613 August 1946) was an English writer. Prolific in many genres, he wrote dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, history, satire, biography and autobiography. His work also included two books on recreational war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is sometimes called the "father of science fiction."
During his own lifetime, however, he was most prominent as a forward-looking, even prophetic social critic who devoted his literary talents to the development of a progressive vision on a global scale. A futurist, he wrote a number of utopian works and foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. His science fiction imagined time travel, alien invasion, invisibility, and biological engineering. Brian Aldiss referred to Wells as the "Shakespeare of science fiction", while American writer Charles Fort referred to him as a "wild talent".
Wells rendered his works convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work – dubbed “Wells's law” – leading Joseph Conrad to hail him in 1898 as "O Realist of the Fantastic!". His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), which was his first novel, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), The War of the Worlds (1898) and the military science fiction The War in the Air (1907). Wells was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature four times.
Wells's earliest specialised training was in biology, and his thinking on ethical matters took place in a specifically and fundamentally Darwinian context. He was also an outspoken socialist from a young age, often (but not always, as at the beginning of the First World War) sympathising with pacifist views. His later works became increasingly political and didactic, and he wrote little science fiction, while he sometimes indicated on official documents that his profession was that of journalist. Novels such as Kipps and The History of Mr Polly, which describe lower-middle-class life, led to the suggestion that he was a worthy successor to Charles Dickens, but Wells described a range of social strata and even attempted, in Tono-Bungay (1909), a diagnosis of English society as a whole. Wells was a diabetic and co-founded the charity The Diabetic Association (known today as Diabetes UK) in 1934.
Life
Early life
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on 21 September 1866. Called "Bertie" by his family, he was the fourth and last child of Joseph Wells, a former domestic gardener, and at the time a shopkeeper and professional cricketer and Sarah Neal, a former domestic servant. An inheritance had allowed the family to acquire a shop in which they sold china and sporting goods, although it failed to prosper: the stock was old and worn out, and the location was poor. Joseph Wells managed to earn a meagre income, but little of it came from the shop and he received an unsteady amount of money from playing professional cricket for the Kent county team.
A defining incident of young Wells's life was an accident in 1874 that left him bedridden with a broken leg. To pass the time he began to read books from the local library, brought to him by his father. He soon became devoted to the other worlds and lives to which books gave him access; they also stimulated his desire to write. Later that year he entered Thomas Morley's Commercial Academy, a private school founded in 1849, following the bankruptcy of Morley's earlier school. The teaching was erratic, the curriculum mostly focused, Wells later said, on producing copperplate handwriting and doing the sort of sums useful to tradesmen. Wells continued at Morley's Academy until 1880. In 1877, his father, Joseph Wells, suffered a fractured thigh. The accident effectively put an end to Joseph's career as a cricketer, and his subsequent earnings as a shopkeeper were not enough to compensate for the loss of the primary source of family income.
No longer able to support themselves financially, the family instead sought to place their sons as apprentices in various occupations. From 1880 to 1883, Wells had an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at Hyde's Drapery Emporium in Southsea. His experiences at Hyde's, where he worked a thirteen-hour day and slept in a dormitory with other apprentices, later inspired his novels The Wheels of Chance, The History of Mr Polly, and Kipps, which portray the life of a draper's apprentice as well as providing a critique of society's distribution of wealth.
Wells's parents had a turbulent marriage, owing primarily to his mother's being a Protestant and his father's being a freethinker. When his mother returned to work as a lady's maid (at Uppark, a country house in Sussex), one of the conditions of work was that she would not be permitted to have living space for her husband and children. Thereafter, she and Joseph lived separate lives, though they never divorced and remained faithful to each other. As a consequence, Herbert's personal troubles increased as he subsequently failed as a draper and also, later, as a chemist's assistant. However, Uppark had a magnificent library in which he immersed himself, reading many classic works, including Plato's Republic, Thomas More's Utopia, and the works of Daniel Defoe. This was the beginning of Wells's venture into literature.
Teacher
In October 1879, Wells's mother arranged through a distant relative, Arthur Williams, for him to join the National School at Wookey in Somerset as a pupil–teacher, a senior pupil who acted as a teacher of younger children. In December that year, however, Williams was dismissed for irregularities in his qualifications and Wells was returned to Uppark. After a short apprenticeship at a chemist in nearby Midhurst and an even shorter stay as a boarder at Midhurst Grammar School, he signed his apprenticeship papers at Hyde's. In 1883, Wells persuaded his parents to release him from the apprenticeship, taking an opportunity offered by Midhurst Grammar School again to become a pupil–teacher; his proficiency in Latin and science during his earlier short stay had been remembered.
The years he spent in Southsea had been the most miserable of his life to that point, but his good fortune at securing a position at Midhurst Grammar School meant that Wells could continue his self-education in earnest. The following year, Wells won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science (later the Royal College of Science in South Kensington, now part of Imperial College London) in London, studying biology under Thomas Henry Huxley. As an alumnus, he later helped to set up the Royal College of Science Association, of which he became the first president in 1909. Wells studied in his new school until 1887, with a weekly allowance of 21 shillings (a guinea) thanks to his scholarship. This ought to have been a comfortable sum of money (at the time many working class families had "round about a pound a week" as their entire household income), yet in his Experiment in Autobiography Wells speaks of constantly being hungry, and indeed photographs of him at the time show a youth who is very thin and malnourished.
He soon entered the Debating Society of the school. These years mark the beginning of his interest in a possible reformation of society. At first approaching the subject through Plato's Republic, he soon turned to contemporary ideas of socialism as expressed by the recently formed Fabian Society and free lectures delivered at Kelmscott House, the home of William Morris. He was also among the founders of The Science School Journal, a school magazine that allowed him to express his views on literature and society, as well as trying his hand at fiction; a precursor to his novel The Time Machine was published in the journal under the title The Chronic Argonauts. The school year 1886–87 was the last year of his studies.
During 1888, Wells stayed in Stoke-on-Trent, living in Basford. The unique environment of The Potteries was certainly an inspiration. He wrote in a letter to a friend from the area that "the district made an immense impression on me." The inspiration for some of his descriptions in The War of the Worlds is thought to have come from his short time spent here, seeing the iron foundry furnaces burn over the city, shooting huge red light into the skies. His stay in The Potteries also resulted in the macabre short story "The Cone" (1895, contemporaneous with his famous The Time Machine), set in the north of the city.
After teaching for some time, he was briefly on the staff of Holt Academy in Wales – Wells found it necessary to supplement his knowledge relating to educational principles and methodology and entered the College of Preceptors (College of Teachers). He later received his Licentiate and Fellowship FCP diplomas from the college. It was not until 1890 that Wells earned a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology from the University of London External Programme. In 1889–90, he managed to find a post as a teacher at Henley House School in London, where he taught A. A. Milne (whose father ran the school). His first published work was a Text-Book of Biology in two volumes (1893).
Upon leaving the Normal School of Science, Wells was left without a source of income. His aunt Mary—his father's sister-in-law—invited him to stay with her for a while, which solved his immediate problem of accommodation. During his stay at his aunt's residence, he grew increasingly interested in her daughter, Isabel, whom he later courted. To earn money, he began writing short humorous articles for journals such as The Pall Mall Gazette, later collecting these in volume form as Select Conversations with an Uncle (1895) and Certain Personal Matters (1897). So prolific did Wells become at this mode of journalism that many of his early pieces remain unidentified. According to David C. Smith, "Most of Wells's occasional pieces have not been collected, and many have not even been identified as his. Wells did not automatically receive the byline his reputation demanded until after 1896 or so ... As a result, many of his early pieces are unknown. It is obvious that many early Wells items have been lost." His success with these shorter pieces encouraged him to write book-length work, and he published his first novel, The Time Machine, in 1895.
Personal life
In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells (1865–1931; from 1902 Isabel Mary Smith). The couple agreed to separate in 1894, when he had fallen in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (1872–1927; later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey, in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton' (now No.141), Maybury Road, in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Doctor Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When the Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham.
In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames, for two years; this lasted until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where he constructed a large family home, Spade House, in 1901. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip"; 1901–1985) and Frank Richard (1903–1982) (grandfather of film director Simon Wells). Jane died on 6 October 1927, in Dunmow, at the age of 55.
Wells had affairs with a significant number of women. In December 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society. Amber had married the barrister G. R. Blanco White in July of that year, as co-arranged by Wells. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells's "sordid intrigue" with Amber, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. Between 1910 and 1913, novelist Elizabeth von Arnim was one of his mistresses. In 1914, he had a son, Anthony West (1914–1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. In 1920–21, and intermittently until his death, he had a love affair with the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger.
Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with the 22-year younger Dutch adventurer and writer Odette Keun, with whom he lived in Lou Pidou, a house they built together in Grasse, France. Wells dedicated his longest book to her (The World of William Clissold, 1926). When visiting Maxim Gorky in Russia 1920, he had slept with Gorky's mistress Moura Budberg, then still Countess Benckendorf and 27 years his junior. In 1933, when she left Gorky and emigrated to London, their relationship renewed and she cared for him through his final illness. Wells repeatedly asked her to marry him, but Budberg strongly rejected his proposals.
In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011)—a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note)—gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others.
Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989).
Artist
One of the ways that Wells expressed himself was through his drawings and sketches. One common location for these was the endpapers and title pages of his own diaries, and they covered a wide variety of topics, from political commentary to his feelings toward his literary contemporaries and his current romantic interests. During his marriage to Amy Catherine, whom he nicknamed Jane, he drew a considerable number of pictures, many of them being overt comments on their marriage. During this period, he called these pictures "picshuas". These picshuas have been the topic of study by Wells scholars for many years, and in 2006, a book was published on the subject.
Writer
Some of his early novels, called "scientific romances", invented several themes now classic in science fiction in such works as The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, When the Sleeper Wakes, and The First Men in the Moon. He also wrote realistic novels that received critical acclaim, including Kipps and a critique of English culture during the Edwardian period, Tono-Bungay. Wells also wrote dozens of short stories and novellas, including, "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid", which helped bring the full impact of Darwin's revolutionary botanical ideas to a wider public, and was followed by many later successes such as "The Country of the Blind" (1904).
According to James E. Gunn, one of Wells's major contributions to the science fiction genre was his approach, which he referred to as his "new system of ideas". In his opinion, the author should always strive to make the story as credible as possible, even if both the writer and the reader knew certain elements are impossible, allowing the reader to accept the ideas as something that could really happen, today referred to as "the plausible impossible" and "suspension of disbelief". While neither invisibility nor time travel was new in speculative fiction, Wells added a sense of realism to the concepts which the readers were not familiar with. He conceived the idea of using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposely and selectively forwards or backwards in time. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle. He explained that while writing The Time Machine, he realized that "the more impossible the story I had to tell, the more ordinary must be the setting, and the circumstances in which I now set the Time Traveller were all that I could imagine of solid upper-class comforts." In "Wells's Law", a science fiction story should contain only a single extraordinary assumption. Therefore, as justifications for the impossible, he employed scientific ideas and theories. Wells's best-known statement of the "law" appears in his introduction to a collection of his works published in 1934:
As soon as the magic trick has been done the whole business of the fantasy writer is to keep everything else human and real. Touches of prosaic detail are imperative and a rigorous adherence to the hypothesis. Any extra fantasy outside the cardinal assumption immediately gives a touch of irresponsible silliness to the invention.
Dr. Griffin / The Invisible Man is a brilliant research scientist who discovers a method of invisibility, but finds himself unable to reverse the process. An enthusiast of random and irresponsible violence, Griffin has become an iconic character in horror fiction. The Island of Doctor Moreau sees a shipwrecked man left on the island home of Doctor Moreau, a mad scientist who creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. The earliest depiction of uplift, the novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature. In The First Men in the Moon Wells used the idea of radio communication between astronomical objects, a plot point inspired by Nikola Tesla's claim that he had received radio signals from Mars. Though Tono-Bungay is not a science-fiction novel, radioactive decay plays a small but consequential role in it. Radioactive decay plays a much larger role in The World Set Free (1914). This book contains what is surely his biggest prophetic "hit", with the first description of a nuclear weapon. Scientists of the day were well aware that the natural decay of radium releases energy at a slow rate over thousands of years. The rate of release is too slow to have practical utility, but the total amount released is huge. Wells's novel revolves around an (unspecified) invention that accelerates the process of radioactive decay, producing bombs that explode with no more than the force of ordinary high explosives—but which "continue to explode" for days on end. "Nothing could have been more obvious to the people of the earlier twentieth century", he wrote, "than the rapidity with which war was becoming impossible ... [but] they did not see it until the atomic bombs burst in their fumbling hands". In 1932, the physicist and conceiver of nuclear chain reaction Leó Szilárd read The World Set Free (the same year Sir James Chadwick discovered the neutron), a book which he said made a great impression on him. In addition to writing early science fiction, he produced work dealing with mythological beings like an angel in the novel The Wonderful Visit (1895) and a mermaid in the novel The Sea Lady (1902).
Wells also wrote non-fiction. His first non-fiction bestseller was Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought (1901). When originally serialised in a magazine it was subtitled "An Experiment in Prophecy", and is considered his most explicitly futuristic work. It offered the immediate political message of the privileged sections of society continuing to bar capable men from other classes from advancement until war would force a need to employ those most able, rather than the traditional upper classes, as leaders. Anticipating what the world would be like in the year 2000, the book is interesting both for its hits (trains and cars resulting in the dispersion of populations from cities to suburbs; moral restrictions declining as men and women seek greater sexual freedom; the defeat of German militarism, and the existence of a European Union) and its misses (he did not expect successful aircraft before 1950, and averred that "my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocate its crew and founder at sea").
His bestselling two-volume work, The Outline of History (1920), began a new era of popularised world history. It received a mixed critical response from professional historians. However, it was very popular amongst the general population and made Wells a rich man. Many other authors followed with "Outlines" of their own in other subjects. He reprised his Outline in 1922 with a much shorter popular work, A Short History of the World, a history book praised by Albert Einstein, and two long efforts, The Science of Life (1930)—written with his son G. P. Wells and evolutionary biologist Julian Huxley, and The Work, Wealth and Happiness of Mankind (1931). The "Outlines" became sufficiently common for James Thurber to parody the trend in his humorous essay, "An Outline of Scientists"—indeed, Wells's Outline of History remains in print with a new 2005 edition, while A Short History of the World has been re-edited (2006).
From quite early in Wells's career, he sought a better way to organise society and wrote a number of Utopian novels. The first of these was A Modern Utopia (1905), which shows a worldwide utopia with "no imports but meteorites, and no exports at all"; two travellers from our world fall into its alternate history. The others usually begin with the world rushing to catastrophe, until people realise a better way of living: whether by mysterious gases from a comet causing people to behave rationally and abandoning a European war (In the Days of the Comet (1906)), or a world council of scientists taking over, as in The Shape of Things to Come (1933, which he later adapted for the 1936 Alexander Korda film, Things to Come). This depicted, all too accurately, the impending World War, with cities being destroyed by aerial bombs. He also portrayed the rise of fascist dictators in The Autocracy of Mr Parham (1930) and The Holy Terror (1939). Men Like Gods (1923) is also a utopian novel. Wells in this period was regarded as an enormously influential figure; the critic Malcolm Cowley stated: "by the time he was forty, his influence was wider than any other living English writer".
Wells contemplates the ideas of nature and nurture and questions humanity in books such as The First Men in the Moon, where nature is completely suppressed by nurture, and The Island of Doctor Moreau, where the strong presence of nature represents a threat to a civilized society. Not all his scientific romances ended in a Utopia, and Wells also wrote a dystopian novel, When the Sleeper Wakes (1899, rewritten as The Sleeper Awakes, 1910), which pictures a future society where the classes have become more and more separated, leading to a revolt of the masses against the rulers. The Island of Doctor Moreau is even darker. The narrator, having been trapped on an island of animals vivisected (unsuccessfully) into human beings, eventually returns to England; like Gulliver on his return from the Houyhnhnms, he finds himself unable to shake off the perceptions of his fellow humans as barely civilised beasts, slowly reverting to their animal natures.
Wells also wrote the preface for the first edition of W. N. P. Barbellion's diaries, The Journal of a Disappointed Man, published in 1919. Since "Barbellion" was the real author's pen name, many reviewers believed Wells to have been the true author of the Journal; Wells always denied this, despite being full of praise for the diaries.
In 1927, a Canadian teacher and writer Florence Deeks unsuccessfully sued Wells for infringement of copyright and breach of trust, claiming that much of The Outline of History had been plagiarised from her unpublished manuscript, The Web of the World's Romance, which had spent nearly nine months in the hands of Wells's Canadian publisher, Macmillan Canada. However, it was sworn on oath at the trial that the manuscript remained in Toronto in the safekeeping of Macmillan, and that Wells did not even know it existed, let alone had seen it. The court found no proof of copying, and decided the similarities were due to the fact that the books had similar nature and both writers had access to the same sources. In 2000, A. B. McKillop, a professor of history at Carleton University, produced a book on the case, The Spinster & The Prophet: Florence Deeks, H. G. Wells, and the Mystery of the Purloined Past. According to McKillop, the lawsuit was unsuccessful due to the prejudice against a woman suing a well-known and famous male author, and he paints a detailed story based on the circumstantial evidence of the case. In 2004, Denis N. Magnusson, Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Law, Queen's University, Ontario, published an article on Deeks v. Wells. This re-examines the case in relation to McKillop's book. While having some sympathy for Deeks, he argues that she had a weak case that was not well presented, and though she may have met with sexism from her lawyers, she received a fair trial, adding that the law applied is essentially the same law that would be applied to a similar case today (i.e., 2004).
In 1933, Wells predicted in The Shape of Things to Come that the world war he feared would begin in January 1940, a prediction which ultimately came true four months early, in September 1939, with the outbreak of World War II. In 1936, before the Royal Institution, Wells called for the compilation of a constantly growing and changing World Encyclopaedia, to be reviewed by outstanding authorities and made accessible to every human being. In 1938, he published a collection of essays on the future organisation of knowledge and education, World Brain, including the essay "The Idea of a Permanent World Encyclopaedia".
Prior to 1933, Wells's books were widely read in Germany and Austria, and most of his science fiction works had been translated shortly after publication. By 1933, he had attracted the attention of German officials because of his criticism of the political situation in Germany, and on 10 May 1933, Wells's books were burned by the Nazi youth in Berlin's Opernplatz, and his works were banned from libraries and book stores. Wells, as president of PEN International (Poets, Essayists, Novelists), angered the Nazis by overseeing the expulsion of the German PEN club from the international body in 1934 following the German PEN's refusal to admit non-Aryan writers to its membership. At a PEN conference in Ragusa, Wells refused to yield to Nazi sympathisers who demanded that the exiled author Ernst Toller be prevented from speaking. Near the end of World War II, Allied forces discovered that the SS had compiled lists of people slated for immediate arrest during the invasion of Britain in the abandoned Operation Sea Lion, with Wells included in the alphabetical list of "The Black Book".
Wartime works
Seeking a more structured way to play war games, Wells wrote Floor Games (1911) followed by Little Wars (1913), which set out rules for fighting battles with toy soldiers (miniatures). A pacifist prior to the First World War, Wells stated "how much better is this amiable miniature [war] than the real thing". According to Wells, the idea of the game developed from a visit by his friend Jerome K. Jerome. After dinner, Jerome began shooting down toy soldiers with a toy cannon and Wells joined in to compete.
During August 1914, immediately after the outbreak of the First World War, Wells published a number of articles in London newspapers that subsequently appeared as a book entitled The War That Will End War. He coined the expression with the idealistic belief that the result of the war would make a future conflict impossible. Wells blamed the Central Powers for the coming of the war and argued that only the defeat of German militarism could bring about an end to war. Wells used the shorter form of the phrase, "the war to end war", in In the Fourth Year (1918), in which he noted that the phrase "got into circulation" in the second half of 1914. In fact, it had become one of the most common catchphrases of the war.
In 1918 Wells worked for the British War Propaganda Bureau, also called Wellington House. Wells was also one of fifty-three leading British authors — a number that included Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — who signed their names to the “Authors' Declaration.” This manifesto declared that the German invasion of Belgium had been a brutal crime, and that Britain “could not without dishonour have refused to take part in the present war.”
Travels to Russia and the Soviet Union
Wells visited Russia three times: 1914, 1920 and 1934. During his second visit, he saw his old friend Maxim Gorky and with Gorky's help, met Vladimir Lenin. In his book Russia in the Shadows, Wells portrayed Russia as recovering from a total social collapse, "the completest that has ever happened to any modern social organisation." On 23 July 1934, after visiting U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Wells went to the Soviet Union and interviewed Joseph Stalin for three hours for the New Statesman magazine, which was extremely rare at that time. He told Stalin how he had seen 'the happy faces of healthy people' in contrast with his previous visit to Moscow in 1920. However, he also criticised the lawlessness, class discrimination, state violence, and absence of free expression. Stalin enjoyed the conversation and replied accordingly. As the chairman of the London-based PEN International, which protected the rights of authors to write without being intimidated, Wells hoped by his trip to USSR, he could win Stalin over by force of argument. Before he left, he realised that no reform was to happen in the near future.
Final years
Wells’s greatest literary output occurred before the First World War, which was lamented by younger authors whom he had influenced. In this connection, George Orwell described Wells as "too sane to understand the modern world", and "since 1920 he has squandered his talents in slaying paper dragons." G. K. Chesterton quipped: "Mr Wells is a born storyteller who has sold his birthright for a pot of message".
Wells had diabetes, and was a co-founder in 1934 of The Diabetic Association (now Diabetes UK, the leading charity for people with diabetes in the UK).
On 28 October 1940, on the radio station KTSA in San Antonio, Texas, Wells took part in a radio interview with Orson Welles, who two years previously had performed a famous radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds. During the interview, by Charles C Shaw, a KTSA radio host, Wells admitted his surprise at the sensation that resulted from the broadcast but acknowledged his debt to Welles for increasing sales of one of his "more obscure" titles.
Death
Wells died of unspecified causes on 13 August 1946, aged 79, at his home at 13 Hanover Terrace, overlooking Regent's Park, London. In his preface to the 1941 edition of The War in the Air, Wells had stated that his epitaph should be: "I told you so. You damned fools". Wells's body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on 16 August 1946; his ashes were subsequently scattered into the English Channel at Old Harry Rocks, the most eastern point of the Jurassic Coast and about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) from Swanage in Dorset.
A commemorative blue plaque in his honour was installed by the Greater London Council at his home in Regent's Park in 1966.
Futurist
A futurist and “visionary”, Wells foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. Asserting that "Wells' visions of the future remain unsurpassed", John Higgs, author of Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century, states that in the late 19th century Wells “saw the coming century clearer than anyone else. He anticipated wars in the air, the sexual revolution, motorised transport causing the growth of suburbs and a proto-Wikipedia he called the "world brain". In his novel The World Set Free, he imagined an “atomic bomb” of terrifying power that would be dropped from aeroplanes. This was an extraordinary insight for an author writing in 1913, and it made a deep impression on Winston Churchill."
In 2011, Wells was among a group of science fiction writers featured in the Prophets of Science Fiction series, a show produced and hosted by film director Sir Ridley Scott, which depicts how predictions influenced the development of scientific advancements by inspiring many readers to assist in transforming those futuristic visions into everyday reality. In a 2013 review of The Time Machine for the New Yorker magazine, Brad Leithauser writes, "At the base of Wells's great visionary exploit is this rational, ultimately scientific attempt to tease out the potential future consequences of present conditions—not as they might arise in a few years, or even decades, but millennia hence, epochs hence. He is world literature's Great Extrapolator. Like no other fiction writer before him, he embraced "deep time."
Political views
Wells was a socialist and a member of the Fabian Society. Winston Churchill was an avid reader of Wells's books, and after they first met in 1902 they kept in touch until Wells died in 1946. As a junior minister Churchill borrowed lines from Wells for one of his most famous early landmark speeches in 1906, and as Prime Minister the phrase "the gathering storm"—used by Churchill to describe the rise of Nazi Germany—had been written by Wells in The War of the Worlds, which depicts an attack on Britain by Martians. Wells's extensive writings on equality and human rights, most notably his most influential work, The Rights of Man (1940), laid the groundwork for the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations shortly after his death.
His efforts regarding the League of Nations, on which he collaborated on the project with Leonard Woolf with the booklets The Idea of a League of Nations, Prolegomena to the Study of World Organization, and The Way of the League of Nations, became a disappointment as the organization turned out to be a weak one unable to prevent the Second World War, which itself occurred towards the very end of his life and only increased the pessimistic side of his nature. In his last book Mind at the End of Its Tether (1945), he considered the idea that humanity being replaced by another species might not be a bad idea. He referred to the era between the two World Wars as "The Age of Frustration".
Religious views
Wells's views on God and religion changed over his lifetime. Early in his life he distanced himself from Christianity, and later from theism, and finally, late in life, he was essentially atheistic. Martin Gardner summarises this progression:[The younger Wells] ... did not object to using the word "God" provided it did not imply anything resembling human personality. In his middle years Wells went through a phase of defending the concept of a "finite God," similar to the god of such process theologians as Samuel Alexander, Edgar Brightman, and Charles Hartshorne. (He even wrote a book about it called God the Invisible King.) Later Wells decided he was really an atheist.
In God the Invisible King (1917), Wells wrote that his idea of God did not draw upon the traditional religions of the world: This book sets out as forcibly and exactly as possible the religious belief of the writer. [Which] is a profound belief in a personal and intimate God. ... Putting the leading idea of this book very roughly, these two antagonistic typical conceptions of God may be best contrasted by speaking of one of them as God-as-Nature or the Creator, and of the other as God-as-Christ or the Redeemer. One is the great Outward God; the other is the Inmost God. The first idea was perhaps developed most highly and completely in the God of Spinoza. It is a conception of God tending to pantheism, to an idea of a comprehensive God as ruling with justice rather than affection, to a conception of aloofness and awestriking worshipfulness. The second idea, which is contradictory to this idea of an absolute God, is the God of the human heart. The writer suggested that the great outline of the theological struggles of that phase of civilisation and world unity which produced Christianity, was a persistent but unsuccessful attempt to get these two different ideas of God into one focus. Later in the work, he aligns himself with a "renascent or modern religion ... neither atheist nor Buddhist nor Mohammedan nor Christian ... [that] he has found growing up in himself".
Of Christianity, he said: "it is not now true for me. ... Every believing Christian is, I am sure, my spiritual brother ... but if systemically I called myself a Christian I feel that to most men I should imply too much and so tell a lie". Of other world religions, he writes: "All these religions are true for me as Canterbury Cathedral is a true thing and as a Swiss chalet is a true thing. There they are, and they have served a purpose, they have worked. Only they are not true for me to live in them. ... They do not work for me". In The Fate of Homo Sapiens (1939), Wells criticised almost all world religions and philosophies, stating "there is no creed, no way of living left in the world at all, that really meets the needs of the time… When we come to look at them coolly and dispassionately, all the main religions, patriotic, moral and customary systems in which human beings are sheltering today, appear to be in a state of jostling and mutually destructive movement, like the houses and palaces and other buildings of some vast, sprawling city overtaken by a landslide.
Wells's opposition to organised religion reached a fever pitch in 1943 with publication of his book Crux Ansata, subtitled "An Indictment of the Roman Catholic Church".
Literary influence and legacy
The science fiction historian John Clute describes Wells as "the most important writer the genre has yet seen", and notes his work has been central to both British and American science fiction. Science fiction author and critic Algis Budrys said Wells "remains the outstanding expositor of both the hope, and the despair, which are embodied in the technology and which are the major facts of life in our world". He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921, 1932, 1935, and 1946. Wells so influenced real exploration of space that an impact crater on Mars (and the Moon) was named after him.
In the United Kingdom, Wells's work was a key model for the British "scientific romance", and other writers in that mode, such as Olaf Stapledon, J. D. Beresford, S. Fowler Wright, and Naomi Mitchison, all drew on Wells's example. Wells was also an important influence on British science fiction of the period after the Second World War, with Arthur C. Clarke and Brian Aldiss expressing strong admiration for Wells's work. Among contemporary British science fiction writers, Stephen Baxter, Christopher Priest and Adam Roberts have all acknowledged Wells's influence on their writing; all three are Vice-Presidents of the H. G. Wells Society. He also had a strong influence on British scientist J. B. S. Haldane, who wrote Daedalus; or, Science and the Future (1924), "The Last Judgement" and "On Being the Right Size" from the essay collection Possible Worlds (1927), and Biological Possibilities for the Human Species in the Next Ten Thousand Years (1963), which are speculations about the future of human evolution and life on other planets. Haldane gave several lectures about these topics which in turn influenced other science fiction writers.
In the United States, Hugo Gernsback reprinted most of Wells's work in the pulp magazine Amazing Stories, regarding Wells's work as "texts of central importance to the self-conscious new genre". Later American writers such as Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Carl Sagan, and Ursula K. Le Guin all recalled being influenced by Wells.
Sinclair Lewis's early novels were strongly influenced by Wells's realistic social novels, such as The History of Mr Polly; Lewis also named his first son Wells after the author. Lewis nominated H. G. Wells for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.
In an interview with The Paris Review, Vladimir Nabokov described Wells as his favourite writer when he was a boy and "a great artist." He went on to cite The Passionate Friends, Ann Veronica, The Time Machine, and The Country of the Blind as superior to anything else written by Wells's British contemporaries. Nabokov said: "His sociological cogitations can be safely ignored, of course, but his romances and fantasies are superb."
Jorge Luis Borges wrote many short pieces on Wells in which he demonstrates a deep familiarity with much of Wells's work. While Borges wrote several critical reviews, including a mostly negative review of Wells's film Things to Come, he regularly treated Wells as a canonical figure of fantastic literature. Late in his life, Borges included The Invisible Man and The Time Machine in his Prologue to a Personal Library, a curated list of 100 great works of literature that he undertook at the behest of the Argentine publishing house Emecé. Canadian author Margaret Atwood read Wells's books, and he also inspired writers of European speculative fiction such as Karel Čapek and Yevgeny Zamyatin.
Representations
Literary
The superhuman protagonist of J. D. Beresford's 1911 novel, The Hampdenshire Wonder, Victor Stott, was based on Wells.
In M. P. Shiel's short story "The Primate of the Rose" (1928), there is an unpleasant womaniser named E. P. Crooks, who was written as a parody of Wells. Wells had attacked Shiel's Prince Zaleski when it was published in 1895, and this was Shiel's response. Wells praised Shiel's The Purple Cloud (1901); in turn Shiel expressed admiration for Wells, referring to him at a speech to the Horsham Rotary Club in 1933 as "my friend Mr. Wells".
In C. S. Lewis's novel That Hideous Strength (1945), the character Jules is a caricature of Wells, and much of Lewis's science fiction was written both under the influence of Wells and as an antithesis to his work (or, as he put it, an "exorcism" of the influence it had on him).
In Brian Aldiss's novella The Saliva Tree (1966), Wells has a small off-screen guest role.
In Saul Bellow's novel Mr. Sammler's Planet (1970), Wells is one of several historical figures the protagonist met when he was a young man.
In The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock (1976) Wells has an important part.
In The Map of Time (2008) by Spanish author Félix J. Palma; Wells is one of several historical characters.
Wells is one of the two Georges in Paul Levinson's 2013 time-travel novelette, "Ian, George, and George," published in Analog magazine.
Dramatic
Rod Taylor portrays Wells in the 1960 science fiction film The Time Machine (based on the novel of the same name), in which Wells uses his time machine to try and find his Utopian society.
Malcolm McDowell portrays Wells in the 1979 science fiction film Time After Time, in which Wells uses a time machine to pursue Jack the Ripper to the present day. In the film, Wells meets "Amy" in the future who then returns to 1893 to become his second wife Amy Catherine Robbins.
Wells is portrayed in the 1985 story Timelash from the 22nd season of the BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who. In this story, Herbert, an enthusiastic temporary companion to the Doctor, is revealed to be a young H. G. Wells. The plot is loosely based upon the themes and characters of The Time Machine with references to The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man and The Island of Doctor Moreau. The story jokingly suggests that Wells's inspiration for his later novels came from his adventure with the Sixth Doctor.
In the BBC2 anthology series Encounters about imagined meetings between historical figures, Beautiful Lies, by Paul Pender (15 August 1992) centred on an acrimonious dinner party attended by Wells (Richard Todd), George Orwell (Jon Finch), and William Empson (Patrick Ryecart).
The character of Wells also appeared in several episodes of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993–1997), usually pitted against the time-travelling villain known as Tempus (Lane Davies). Wells's younger self was played by Terry Kiser, and the older Wells was played by Hamilton Camp.
In the British TV mini-series The Infinite Worlds of H. G. Wells (2001), several of Wells's short stories are dramatised but are adapted using Wells himself (Tom Ward) as the main protagonist in each story.
In the Disney Channel Original Series Phil of the Future, which centres on time-travel, the present-day high school that the main characters attend is named "H. G. Wells".
In the 2006 television docudrama H. G. Wells: War with the World, Wells is played by Michael Sheen.
Television episode "World's End" of Cold Case (2007) is about the discovery of human remains in the bottom of a well leads to the reinvestigation of the case of a housewife who went missing during Orson Welles' radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds".
On the science fiction television series Warehouse 13 (2009–2014), there is a female version Helena G. Wells. When she appeared she explained that her brother was her front for her writing because a female science fiction author would not be accepted.
Comedian Paul F. Tompkins portrays a fictional Wells as the host of The Dead Authors Podcast, wherein Wells uses his time machine to bring dead authors (played by other comedians) to the present and interview them.
H. G. Wells as a young boy appears in the Legends of Tomorrow episode "The Magnificent Eight". In this story, the boy Wells is dying of consumption but is cured by a time-travelling Martin Stein.
In the four part series The Nightmare Worlds of H. G. Wells (2016), Wells is played by Ray Winstone.
In the 2017 television series version of Time After Time, based on the 1979 film, H. G. Wells is portrayed by Freddie Stroma.
In the 2019 television adaptation of The War of the Worlds, the character of 'George', played by Rafe Spall, demonstrates a number of elements of Wells's own life, including his estrangement from his wife and unmarried co-habitation with the character of 'Amy'.
Literary papers
In 1954, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign purchased the H. G. Wells literary papers and correspondence collection. The University's Rare Book & Manuscript Library holds the largest collection of Wells manuscripts, correspondence, first editions and publications in the United States. Among these is unpublished material and the manuscripts of such works as The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine. The collection includes first editions, revisions and translations. The letters contain general family correspondence, communications from publishers, material regarding the Fabian Society, and letters from politicians and public figures, most notably George Bernard Shaw and Joseph Conrad.
Bibliography
See also
References
Further reading
Dickson, Lovat. H. G. Wells: His Turbulent Life & Times. 1969.
Foot, Michael. H. G.: History of Mr. Wells. Doubleday, 1985 (), Black Swan, New edition, Oct 1996 (paperback, )
Gilmour, David. The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002 (paperback, ); 2003 (paperback, ).
Gomme, A. W., Mr. Wells as Historian. Glasgow: MacLehose, Jackson, and Co., 1921.
Gosling, John. Waging the War of the Worlds. Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland, 2009 (paperback, ).
Jasanoff, Maya, "The Future Was His" (review of Sarah Cole, Inventing Tomorrow: H.G. Wells and the Twentieth Century, Columbia University Press, 374 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXVII, no. 12 (23 July 2020), pp. 50–51. Writes Jasanoff (p. 51): "Although [Wells] was prophetically right, and right-minded, about some things... [n]owhere was he more disturbingly wrong than in his loathsome affinity for eugenics..."
Lynn, Andrea The secret love life of H.G. Wells
Mackenzie, Norman and Jean, The Time Traveller: the Life of H G Wells, London: Weidenfeld, 1973,
Mauthner, Martin. German Writers in French Exile, 1933–1940, London: Vallentine and Mitchell, 2007, .
McLean, Steven. 'The Early Fiction of H. G. Wells: Fantasies of Science'. Palgrave, 2009, .
Partington, John S. Building Cosmopolis: The Political Thought of H. G. Wells. Ashgate, 2003, .
Roberts, Adam. H G Wells A Literary Life. Springer International Publishing, 2019, ISBN 9783030264215.
Shadurski, Maxim. The Nationality of Utopia: H. G. Wells, England, and the World State. London: Routledge, 2020, .
Sherborne, Michael. H. G. Wells: Another Kind of Life. London: Peter Owen, 2010, .
Smith, David C., H. G. Wells: Desperately Mortal: A Biography. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986,
West, Anthony. H. G. Wells: Aspects of a Life. London: Hutchinson, 1984.
External links
Future Tense – The Story of H. G. Wells at BBC One – 150th anniversary documentary (2016)
"In the footsteps of H G Wells" at New Statesman – "The great author called for a Human Rights Act; 60 years later, we have it" (2000)
Sources—collections
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Free H. G. Wells downloads for iPhone, iPad, Nook, Android, and Kindle in PDF and all popular eBook reader formats (AZW3, EPUB, MOBI) at ebooktakeaway.com
H G Wells at the British Library
H. G. Wells papers at University of Illinois
Ebooks by H. G. Wells at Global Grey Ebooks
Sources—letters, essays and interviews
Archive of Wells's BBC broadcasts
Film interview with H. G. Wells
"Stephen Crane. From an English Standpoint", by Wells, 1900.
Rabindranath Tagore: In conversation with H. G. Wells. Rabindranath Tagore and Wells conversing in Geneva in 1930.
"Introduction", to W. N. P. Barbellion's The Journal of a Disappointed Man, by Wells, 1919.
"Woman and Primitive Culture", by Wells, 1895.
Letter, to M. P. Shiel, by Wells, 1937.
Biography
"H. G. Wells". In Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Critical essays
An introduction to The War of the Worlds by Iain Sinclair on the British Library's Discovering Literature website.
"An Appreciation of H. G. Wells", by Mary Austin, 1911.
"Socialism and the Family" (1906) by Belfort Bax, Part 1, Part 2.
"H. G. Wells warned us how it would feel to fight a War of the Worlds", by Niall Ferguson, in The Telegraph, 24 June 2005.
"H. G. Wells's Idea of a World Brain: A Critical Re-assessment", by W. Boyd Rayward, in Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50 (15 May 1999): 557–579
"Mr H. G. Wells and the Giants", by G. K. Chesterton, from his book Heretics (1908).
"The Internet: a world brain?", by Martin Gardner, in Skeptical Inquirer, Jan–Feb 1999.
"Science Fiction: The Shape of Things to Come", by Mark Bould, in The Socialist Review, May 2005.
"Who needs Utopia? A dialogue with my utopian self (with apologies, and thanks, to H. G. Wells)", by Gregory Claeys in Spaces of Utopia: An Electronic Journal, no 1, Spring 2006.
"When H. G. Wells Split the Atom: A 1914 Preview of 1945", by Freda Kirchwey, in The Nation, posted 4 September 2003 (original 18 August 1945 issue).
"Wells, Hitler and the World State", by George Orwell. First published: Horizon. GB, London. Aug 1941.
"War of the Worldviews", by John J. Miller, in The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal, 21 June 2005.
"Wells's Autobiography", by John Hart, from New International, Vol.2 No.2, Mar 1935, pp. 75–76.
"History in the Science Fiction of H. G. Wells", by Patrick Parrinder, Cycnos, 22.2 (2006).
"From the World Brain to the Worldwide Web", by Martin Campbell-Kelly, Gresham College Lecture, 9 November 2006.
"The Beginning of Wisdom: On Reading H. G. Wells", by Vivian Gornick, Boston Review, 31.1 (2007).
John Hammond, The Complete List of Short Stories of H. G. Wells
"H. G. Wells Predictions Ring True, 143 Years Later" at National Geographic
"H. G. Wells, the man I knew" Obituary of Wells by George Bernard Shaw, at the New Statesman
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Writers with disabilities | true | [
"What Else Do You Do? (A Compilation of Quiet Music) is a various artists compilation album, released in 1990 by Shimmy Disc.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel \nAdapted from the What Else Do You Do? (A Compilation of Quiet Music) liner notes.\n Kramer – production, engineering\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n \n\n1990 compilation albums\nAlbums produced by Kramer (musician)\nShimmy Disc compilation albums",
"\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer"
] |
[
"H. G. Wells",
"Personal life",
"Who did he marry",
"1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells.",
"What happened to the couple",
"The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students,",
"What was her name",
"Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895.",
"Where was their house atthis time",
"They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months",
"When and where were the two married",
"married at St Pancras register office in October 1895.",
"What did this help him with",
"he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance,",
"What else did he do there",
"began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham."
] | C_86cc13fd852e4219a6fc0d2d8dd4d80e_0 | What happened to the young family next | 8 | What happened to H.G. and Amy Wells after Wells began writing When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr. Lewisham? | H. G. Wells | In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells. The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham. In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where in 1901 he constructed a large family home: Spade House. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip") in 1901 (died 1985) and Frank Richard in 1903 (died 1982). With his wife Jane's consent, Wells had affairs with a number of women, including the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger, adventurer and writer Odette Keun, Soviet spy Moura Budberg and novelist Elizabeth von Arnim. In 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society; and in 1914, a son, Anthony West (1914-1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells' "sordid intrigue" with the daughter of veteran Fabian Sidney Olivier, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011) - a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note) - gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others. Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989). CANNOTANSWER | late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate, | Herbert George Wells (21 September 186613 August 1946) was an English writer. Prolific in many genres, he wrote dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, history, satire, biography and autobiography. His work also included two books on recreational war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is sometimes called the "father of science fiction."
During his own lifetime, however, he was most prominent as a forward-looking, even prophetic social critic who devoted his literary talents to the development of a progressive vision on a global scale. A futurist, he wrote a number of utopian works and foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. His science fiction imagined time travel, alien invasion, invisibility, and biological engineering. Brian Aldiss referred to Wells as the "Shakespeare of science fiction", while American writer Charles Fort referred to him as a "wild talent".
Wells rendered his works convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work – dubbed “Wells's law” – leading Joseph Conrad to hail him in 1898 as "O Realist of the Fantastic!". His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), which was his first novel, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), The War of the Worlds (1898) and the military science fiction The War in the Air (1907). Wells was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature four times.
Wells's earliest specialised training was in biology, and his thinking on ethical matters took place in a specifically and fundamentally Darwinian context. He was also an outspoken socialist from a young age, often (but not always, as at the beginning of the First World War) sympathising with pacifist views. His later works became increasingly political and didactic, and he wrote little science fiction, while he sometimes indicated on official documents that his profession was that of journalist. Novels such as Kipps and The History of Mr Polly, which describe lower-middle-class life, led to the suggestion that he was a worthy successor to Charles Dickens, but Wells described a range of social strata and even attempted, in Tono-Bungay (1909), a diagnosis of English society as a whole. Wells was a diabetic and co-founded the charity The Diabetic Association (known today as Diabetes UK) in 1934.
Life
Early life
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on 21 September 1866. Called "Bertie" by his family, he was the fourth and last child of Joseph Wells, a former domestic gardener, and at the time a shopkeeper and professional cricketer and Sarah Neal, a former domestic servant. An inheritance had allowed the family to acquire a shop in which they sold china and sporting goods, although it failed to prosper: the stock was old and worn out, and the location was poor. Joseph Wells managed to earn a meagre income, but little of it came from the shop and he received an unsteady amount of money from playing professional cricket for the Kent county team.
A defining incident of young Wells's life was an accident in 1874 that left him bedridden with a broken leg. To pass the time he began to read books from the local library, brought to him by his father. He soon became devoted to the other worlds and lives to which books gave him access; they also stimulated his desire to write. Later that year he entered Thomas Morley's Commercial Academy, a private school founded in 1849, following the bankruptcy of Morley's earlier school. The teaching was erratic, the curriculum mostly focused, Wells later said, on producing copperplate handwriting and doing the sort of sums useful to tradesmen. Wells continued at Morley's Academy until 1880. In 1877, his father, Joseph Wells, suffered a fractured thigh. The accident effectively put an end to Joseph's career as a cricketer, and his subsequent earnings as a shopkeeper were not enough to compensate for the loss of the primary source of family income.
No longer able to support themselves financially, the family instead sought to place their sons as apprentices in various occupations. From 1880 to 1883, Wells had an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at Hyde's Drapery Emporium in Southsea. His experiences at Hyde's, where he worked a thirteen-hour day and slept in a dormitory with other apprentices, later inspired his novels The Wheels of Chance, The History of Mr Polly, and Kipps, which portray the life of a draper's apprentice as well as providing a critique of society's distribution of wealth.
Wells's parents had a turbulent marriage, owing primarily to his mother's being a Protestant and his father's being a freethinker. When his mother returned to work as a lady's maid (at Uppark, a country house in Sussex), one of the conditions of work was that she would not be permitted to have living space for her husband and children. Thereafter, she and Joseph lived separate lives, though they never divorced and remained faithful to each other. As a consequence, Herbert's personal troubles increased as he subsequently failed as a draper and also, later, as a chemist's assistant. However, Uppark had a magnificent library in which he immersed himself, reading many classic works, including Plato's Republic, Thomas More's Utopia, and the works of Daniel Defoe. This was the beginning of Wells's venture into literature.
Teacher
In October 1879, Wells's mother arranged through a distant relative, Arthur Williams, for him to join the National School at Wookey in Somerset as a pupil–teacher, a senior pupil who acted as a teacher of younger children. In December that year, however, Williams was dismissed for irregularities in his qualifications and Wells was returned to Uppark. After a short apprenticeship at a chemist in nearby Midhurst and an even shorter stay as a boarder at Midhurst Grammar School, he signed his apprenticeship papers at Hyde's. In 1883, Wells persuaded his parents to release him from the apprenticeship, taking an opportunity offered by Midhurst Grammar School again to become a pupil–teacher; his proficiency in Latin and science during his earlier short stay had been remembered.
The years he spent in Southsea had been the most miserable of his life to that point, but his good fortune at securing a position at Midhurst Grammar School meant that Wells could continue his self-education in earnest. The following year, Wells won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science (later the Royal College of Science in South Kensington, now part of Imperial College London) in London, studying biology under Thomas Henry Huxley. As an alumnus, he later helped to set up the Royal College of Science Association, of which he became the first president in 1909. Wells studied in his new school until 1887, with a weekly allowance of 21 shillings (a guinea) thanks to his scholarship. This ought to have been a comfortable sum of money (at the time many working class families had "round about a pound a week" as their entire household income), yet in his Experiment in Autobiography Wells speaks of constantly being hungry, and indeed photographs of him at the time show a youth who is very thin and malnourished.
He soon entered the Debating Society of the school. These years mark the beginning of his interest in a possible reformation of society. At first approaching the subject through Plato's Republic, he soon turned to contemporary ideas of socialism as expressed by the recently formed Fabian Society and free lectures delivered at Kelmscott House, the home of William Morris. He was also among the founders of The Science School Journal, a school magazine that allowed him to express his views on literature and society, as well as trying his hand at fiction; a precursor to his novel The Time Machine was published in the journal under the title The Chronic Argonauts. The school year 1886–87 was the last year of his studies.
During 1888, Wells stayed in Stoke-on-Trent, living in Basford. The unique environment of The Potteries was certainly an inspiration. He wrote in a letter to a friend from the area that "the district made an immense impression on me." The inspiration for some of his descriptions in The War of the Worlds is thought to have come from his short time spent here, seeing the iron foundry furnaces burn over the city, shooting huge red light into the skies. His stay in The Potteries also resulted in the macabre short story "The Cone" (1895, contemporaneous with his famous The Time Machine), set in the north of the city.
After teaching for some time, he was briefly on the staff of Holt Academy in Wales – Wells found it necessary to supplement his knowledge relating to educational principles and methodology and entered the College of Preceptors (College of Teachers). He later received his Licentiate and Fellowship FCP diplomas from the college. It was not until 1890 that Wells earned a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology from the University of London External Programme. In 1889–90, he managed to find a post as a teacher at Henley House School in London, where he taught A. A. Milne (whose father ran the school). His first published work was a Text-Book of Biology in two volumes (1893).
Upon leaving the Normal School of Science, Wells was left without a source of income. His aunt Mary—his father's sister-in-law—invited him to stay with her for a while, which solved his immediate problem of accommodation. During his stay at his aunt's residence, he grew increasingly interested in her daughter, Isabel, whom he later courted. To earn money, he began writing short humorous articles for journals such as The Pall Mall Gazette, later collecting these in volume form as Select Conversations with an Uncle (1895) and Certain Personal Matters (1897). So prolific did Wells become at this mode of journalism that many of his early pieces remain unidentified. According to David C. Smith, "Most of Wells's occasional pieces have not been collected, and many have not even been identified as his. Wells did not automatically receive the byline his reputation demanded until after 1896 or so ... As a result, many of his early pieces are unknown. It is obvious that many early Wells items have been lost." His success with these shorter pieces encouraged him to write book-length work, and he published his first novel, The Time Machine, in 1895.
Personal life
In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells (1865–1931; from 1902 Isabel Mary Smith). The couple agreed to separate in 1894, when he had fallen in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (1872–1927; later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey, in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton' (now No.141), Maybury Road, in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Doctor Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When the Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham.
In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames, for two years; this lasted until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where he constructed a large family home, Spade House, in 1901. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip"; 1901–1985) and Frank Richard (1903–1982) (grandfather of film director Simon Wells). Jane died on 6 October 1927, in Dunmow, at the age of 55.
Wells had affairs with a significant number of women. In December 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society. Amber had married the barrister G. R. Blanco White in July of that year, as co-arranged by Wells. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells's "sordid intrigue" with Amber, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. Between 1910 and 1913, novelist Elizabeth von Arnim was one of his mistresses. In 1914, he had a son, Anthony West (1914–1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. In 1920–21, and intermittently until his death, he had a love affair with the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger.
Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with the 22-year younger Dutch adventurer and writer Odette Keun, with whom he lived in Lou Pidou, a house they built together in Grasse, France. Wells dedicated his longest book to her (The World of William Clissold, 1926). When visiting Maxim Gorky in Russia 1920, he had slept with Gorky's mistress Moura Budberg, then still Countess Benckendorf and 27 years his junior. In 1933, when she left Gorky and emigrated to London, their relationship renewed and she cared for him through his final illness. Wells repeatedly asked her to marry him, but Budberg strongly rejected his proposals.
In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011)—a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note)—gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others.
Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989).
Artist
One of the ways that Wells expressed himself was through his drawings and sketches. One common location for these was the endpapers and title pages of his own diaries, and they covered a wide variety of topics, from political commentary to his feelings toward his literary contemporaries and his current romantic interests. During his marriage to Amy Catherine, whom he nicknamed Jane, he drew a considerable number of pictures, many of them being overt comments on their marriage. During this period, he called these pictures "picshuas". These picshuas have been the topic of study by Wells scholars for many years, and in 2006, a book was published on the subject.
Writer
Some of his early novels, called "scientific romances", invented several themes now classic in science fiction in such works as The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, When the Sleeper Wakes, and The First Men in the Moon. He also wrote realistic novels that received critical acclaim, including Kipps and a critique of English culture during the Edwardian period, Tono-Bungay. Wells also wrote dozens of short stories and novellas, including, "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid", which helped bring the full impact of Darwin's revolutionary botanical ideas to a wider public, and was followed by many later successes such as "The Country of the Blind" (1904).
According to James E. Gunn, one of Wells's major contributions to the science fiction genre was his approach, which he referred to as his "new system of ideas". In his opinion, the author should always strive to make the story as credible as possible, even if both the writer and the reader knew certain elements are impossible, allowing the reader to accept the ideas as something that could really happen, today referred to as "the plausible impossible" and "suspension of disbelief". While neither invisibility nor time travel was new in speculative fiction, Wells added a sense of realism to the concepts which the readers were not familiar with. He conceived the idea of using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposely and selectively forwards or backwards in time. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle. He explained that while writing The Time Machine, he realized that "the more impossible the story I had to tell, the more ordinary must be the setting, and the circumstances in which I now set the Time Traveller were all that I could imagine of solid upper-class comforts." In "Wells's Law", a science fiction story should contain only a single extraordinary assumption. Therefore, as justifications for the impossible, he employed scientific ideas and theories. Wells's best-known statement of the "law" appears in his introduction to a collection of his works published in 1934:
As soon as the magic trick has been done the whole business of the fantasy writer is to keep everything else human and real. Touches of prosaic detail are imperative and a rigorous adherence to the hypothesis. Any extra fantasy outside the cardinal assumption immediately gives a touch of irresponsible silliness to the invention.
Dr. Griffin / The Invisible Man is a brilliant research scientist who discovers a method of invisibility, but finds himself unable to reverse the process. An enthusiast of random and irresponsible violence, Griffin has become an iconic character in horror fiction. The Island of Doctor Moreau sees a shipwrecked man left on the island home of Doctor Moreau, a mad scientist who creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. The earliest depiction of uplift, the novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature. In The First Men in the Moon Wells used the idea of radio communication between astronomical objects, a plot point inspired by Nikola Tesla's claim that he had received radio signals from Mars. Though Tono-Bungay is not a science-fiction novel, radioactive decay plays a small but consequential role in it. Radioactive decay plays a much larger role in The World Set Free (1914). This book contains what is surely his biggest prophetic "hit", with the first description of a nuclear weapon. Scientists of the day were well aware that the natural decay of radium releases energy at a slow rate over thousands of years. The rate of release is too slow to have practical utility, but the total amount released is huge. Wells's novel revolves around an (unspecified) invention that accelerates the process of radioactive decay, producing bombs that explode with no more than the force of ordinary high explosives—but which "continue to explode" for days on end. "Nothing could have been more obvious to the people of the earlier twentieth century", he wrote, "than the rapidity with which war was becoming impossible ... [but] they did not see it until the atomic bombs burst in their fumbling hands". In 1932, the physicist and conceiver of nuclear chain reaction Leó Szilárd read The World Set Free (the same year Sir James Chadwick discovered the neutron), a book which he said made a great impression on him. In addition to writing early science fiction, he produced work dealing with mythological beings like an angel in the novel The Wonderful Visit (1895) and a mermaid in the novel The Sea Lady (1902).
Wells also wrote non-fiction. His first non-fiction bestseller was Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought (1901). When originally serialised in a magazine it was subtitled "An Experiment in Prophecy", and is considered his most explicitly futuristic work. It offered the immediate political message of the privileged sections of society continuing to bar capable men from other classes from advancement until war would force a need to employ those most able, rather than the traditional upper classes, as leaders. Anticipating what the world would be like in the year 2000, the book is interesting both for its hits (trains and cars resulting in the dispersion of populations from cities to suburbs; moral restrictions declining as men and women seek greater sexual freedom; the defeat of German militarism, and the existence of a European Union) and its misses (he did not expect successful aircraft before 1950, and averred that "my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocate its crew and founder at sea").
His bestselling two-volume work, The Outline of History (1920), began a new era of popularised world history. It received a mixed critical response from professional historians. However, it was very popular amongst the general population and made Wells a rich man. Many other authors followed with "Outlines" of their own in other subjects. He reprised his Outline in 1922 with a much shorter popular work, A Short History of the World, a history book praised by Albert Einstein, and two long efforts, The Science of Life (1930)—written with his son G. P. Wells and evolutionary biologist Julian Huxley, and The Work, Wealth and Happiness of Mankind (1931). The "Outlines" became sufficiently common for James Thurber to parody the trend in his humorous essay, "An Outline of Scientists"—indeed, Wells's Outline of History remains in print with a new 2005 edition, while A Short History of the World has been re-edited (2006).
From quite early in Wells's career, he sought a better way to organise society and wrote a number of Utopian novels. The first of these was A Modern Utopia (1905), which shows a worldwide utopia with "no imports but meteorites, and no exports at all"; two travellers from our world fall into its alternate history. The others usually begin with the world rushing to catastrophe, until people realise a better way of living: whether by mysterious gases from a comet causing people to behave rationally and abandoning a European war (In the Days of the Comet (1906)), or a world council of scientists taking over, as in The Shape of Things to Come (1933, which he later adapted for the 1936 Alexander Korda film, Things to Come). This depicted, all too accurately, the impending World War, with cities being destroyed by aerial bombs. He also portrayed the rise of fascist dictators in The Autocracy of Mr Parham (1930) and The Holy Terror (1939). Men Like Gods (1923) is also a utopian novel. Wells in this period was regarded as an enormously influential figure; the critic Malcolm Cowley stated: "by the time he was forty, his influence was wider than any other living English writer".
Wells contemplates the ideas of nature and nurture and questions humanity in books such as The First Men in the Moon, where nature is completely suppressed by nurture, and The Island of Doctor Moreau, where the strong presence of nature represents a threat to a civilized society. Not all his scientific romances ended in a Utopia, and Wells also wrote a dystopian novel, When the Sleeper Wakes (1899, rewritten as The Sleeper Awakes, 1910), which pictures a future society where the classes have become more and more separated, leading to a revolt of the masses against the rulers. The Island of Doctor Moreau is even darker. The narrator, having been trapped on an island of animals vivisected (unsuccessfully) into human beings, eventually returns to England; like Gulliver on his return from the Houyhnhnms, he finds himself unable to shake off the perceptions of his fellow humans as barely civilised beasts, slowly reverting to their animal natures.
Wells also wrote the preface for the first edition of W. N. P. Barbellion's diaries, The Journal of a Disappointed Man, published in 1919. Since "Barbellion" was the real author's pen name, many reviewers believed Wells to have been the true author of the Journal; Wells always denied this, despite being full of praise for the diaries.
In 1927, a Canadian teacher and writer Florence Deeks unsuccessfully sued Wells for infringement of copyright and breach of trust, claiming that much of The Outline of History had been plagiarised from her unpublished manuscript, The Web of the World's Romance, which had spent nearly nine months in the hands of Wells's Canadian publisher, Macmillan Canada. However, it was sworn on oath at the trial that the manuscript remained in Toronto in the safekeeping of Macmillan, and that Wells did not even know it existed, let alone had seen it. The court found no proof of copying, and decided the similarities were due to the fact that the books had similar nature and both writers had access to the same sources. In 2000, A. B. McKillop, a professor of history at Carleton University, produced a book on the case, The Spinster & The Prophet: Florence Deeks, H. G. Wells, and the Mystery of the Purloined Past. According to McKillop, the lawsuit was unsuccessful due to the prejudice against a woman suing a well-known and famous male author, and he paints a detailed story based on the circumstantial evidence of the case. In 2004, Denis N. Magnusson, Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Law, Queen's University, Ontario, published an article on Deeks v. Wells. This re-examines the case in relation to McKillop's book. While having some sympathy for Deeks, he argues that she had a weak case that was not well presented, and though she may have met with sexism from her lawyers, she received a fair trial, adding that the law applied is essentially the same law that would be applied to a similar case today (i.e., 2004).
In 1933, Wells predicted in The Shape of Things to Come that the world war he feared would begin in January 1940, a prediction which ultimately came true four months early, in September 1939, with the outbreak of World War II. In 1936, before the Royal Institution, Wells called for the compilation of a constantly growing and changing World Encyclopaedia, to be reviewed by outstanding authorities and made accessible to every human being. In 1938, he published a collection of essays on the future organisation of knowledge and education, World Brain, including the essay "The Idea of a Permanent World Encyclopaedia".
Prior to 1933, Wells's books were widely read in Germany and Austria, and most of his science fiction works had been translated shortly after publication. By 1933, he had attracted the attention of German officials because of his criticism of the political situation in Germany, and on 10 May 1933, Wells's books were burned by the Nazi youth in Berlin's Opernplatz, and his works were banned from libraries and book stores. Wells, as president of PEN International (Poets, Essayists, Novelists), angered the Nazis by overseeing the expulsion of the German PEN club from the international body in 1934 following the German PEN's refusal to admit non-Aryan writers to its membership. At a PEN conference in Ragusa, Wells refused to yield to Nazi sympathisers who demanded that the exiled author Ernst Toller be prevented from speaking. Near the end of World War II, Allied forces discovered that the SS had compiled lists of people slated for immediate arrest during the invasion of Britain in the abandoned Operation Sea Lion, with Wells included in the alphabetical list of "The Black Book".
Wartime works
Seeking a more structured way to play war games, Wells wrote Floor Games (1911) followed by Little Wars (1913), which set out rules for fighting battles with toy soldiers (miniatures). A pacifist prior to the First World War, Wells stated "how much better is this amiable miniature [war] than the real thing". According to Wells, the idea of the game developed from a visit by his friend Jerome K. Jerome. After dinner, Jerome began shooting down toy soldiers with a toy cannon and Wells joined in to compete.
During August 1914, immediately after the outbreak of the First World War, Wells published a number of articles in London newspapers that subsequently appeared as a book entitled The War That Will End War. He coined the expression with the idealistic belief that the result of the war would make a future conflict impossible. Wells blamed the Central Powers for the coming of the war and argued that only the defeat of German militarism could bring about an end to war. Wells used the shorter form of the phrase, "the war to end war", in In the Fourth Year (1918), in which he noted that the phrase "got into circulation" in the second half of 1914. In fact, it had become one of the most common catchphrases of the war.
In 1918 Wells worked for the British War Propaganda Bureau, also called Wellington House. Wells was also one of fifty-three leading British authors — a number that included Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — who signed their names to the “Authors' Declaration.” This manifesto declared that the German invasion of Belgium had been a brutal crime, and that Britain “could not without dishonour have refused to take part in the present war.”
Travels to Russia and the Soviet Union
Wells visited Russia three times: 1914, 1920 and 1934. During his second visit, he saw his old friend Maxim Gorky and with Gorky's help, met Vladimir Lenin. In his book Russia in the Shadows, Wells portrayed Russia as recovering from a total social collapse, "the completest that has ever happened to any modern social organisation." On 23 July 1934, after visiting U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Wells went to the Soviet Union and interviewed Joseph Stalin for three hours for the New Statesman magazine, which was extremely rare at that time. He told Stalin how he had seen 'the happy faces of healthy people' in contrast with his previous visit to Moscow in 1920. However, he also criticised the lawlessness, class discrimination, state violence, and absence of free expression. Stalin enjoyed the conversation and replied accordingly. As the chairman of the London-based PEN International, which protected the rights of authors to write without being intimidated, Wells hoped by his trip to USSR, he could win Stalin over by force of argument. Before he left, he realised that no reform was to happen in the near future.
Final years
Wells’s greatest literary output occurred before the First World War, which was lamented by younger authors whom he had influenced. In this connection, George Orwell described Wells as "too sane to understand the modern world", and "since 1920 he has squandered his talents in slaying paper dragons." G. K. Chesterton quipped: "Mr Wells is a born storyteller who has sold his birthright for a pot of message".
Wells had diabetes, and was a co-founder in 1934 of The Diabetic Association (now Diabetes UK, the leading charity for people with diabetes in the UK).
On 28 October 1940, on the radio station KTSA in San Antonio, Texas, Wells took part in a radio interview with Orson Welles, who two years previously had performed a famous radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds. During the interview, by Charles C Shaw, a KTSA radio host, Wells admitted his surprise at the sensation that resulted from the broadcast but acknowledged his debt to Welles for increasing sales of one of his "more obscure" titles.
Death
Wells died of unspecified causes on 13 August 1946, aged 79, at his home at 13 Hanover Terrace, overlooking Regent's Park, London. In his preface to the 1941 edition of The War in the Air, Wells had stated that his epitaph should be: "I told you so. You damned fools". Wells's body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on 16 August 1946; his ashes were subsequently scattered into the English Channel at Old Harry Rocks, the most eastern point of the Jurassic Coast and about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) from Swanage in Dorset.
A commemorative blue plaque in his honour was installed by the Greater London Council at his home in Regent's Park in 1966.
Futurist
A futurist and “visionary”, Wells foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. Asserting that "Wells' visions of the future remain unsurpassed", John Higgs, author of Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century, states that in the late 19th century Wells “saw the coming century clearer than anyone else. He anticipated wars in the air, the sexual revolution, motorised transport causing the growth of suburbs and a proto-Wikipedia he called the "world brain". In his novel The World Set Free, he imagined an “atomic bomb” of terrifying power that would be dropped from aeroplanes. This was an extraordinary insight for an author writing in 1913, and it made a deep impression on Winston Churchill."
In 2011, Wells was among a group of science fiction writers featured in the Prophets of Science Fiction series, a show produced and hosted by film director Sir Ridley Scott, which depicts how predictions influenced the development of scientific advancements by inspiring many readers to assist in transforming those futuristic visions into everyday reality. In a 2013 review of The Time Machine for the New Yorker magazine, Brad Leithauser writes, "At the base of Wells's great visionary exploit is this rational, ultimately scientific attempt to tease out the potential future consequences of present conditions—not as they might arise in a few years, or even decades, but millennia hence, epochs hence. He is world literature's Great Extrapolator. Like no other fiction writer before him, he embraced "deep time."
Political views
Wells was a socialist and a member of the Fabian Society. Winston Churchill was an avid reader of Wells's books, and after they first met in 1902 they kept in touch until Wells died in 1946. As a junior minister Churchill borrowed lines from Wells for one of his most famous early landmark speeches in 1906, and as Prime Minister the phrase "the gathering storm"—used by Churchill to describe the rise of Nazi Germany—had been written by Wells in The War of the Worlds, which depicts an attack on Britain by Martians. Wells's extensive writings on equality and human rights, most notably his most influential work, The Rights of Man (1940), laid the groundwork for the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations shortly after his death.
His efforts regarding the League of Nations, on which he collaborated on the project with Leonard Woolf with the booklets The Idea of a League of Nations, Prolegomena to the Study of World Organization, and The Way of the League of Nations, became a disappointment as the organization turned out to be a weak one unable to prevent the Second World War, which itself occurred towards the very end of his life and only increased the pessimistic side of his nature. In his last book Mind at the End of Its Tether (1945), he considered the idea that humanity being replaced by another species might not be a bad idea. He referred to the era between the two World Wars as "The Age of Frustration".
Religious views
Wells's views on God and religion changed over his lifetime. Early in his life he distanced himself from Christianity, and later from theism, and finally, late in life, he was essentially atheistic. Martin Gardner summarises this progression:[The younger Wells] ... did not object to using the word "God" provided it did not imply anything resembling human personality. In his middle years Wells went through a phase of defending the concept of a "finite God," similar to the god of such process theologians as Samuel Alexander, Edgar Brightman, and Charles Hartshorne. (He even wrote a book about it called God the Invisible King.) Later Wells decided he was really an atheist.
In God the Invisible King (1917), Wells wrote that his idea of God did not draw upon the traditional religions of the world: This book sets out as forcibly and exactly as possible the religious belief of the writer. [Which] is a profound belief in a personal and intimate God. ... Putting the leading idea of this book very roughly, these two antagonistic typical conceptions of God may be best contrasted by speaking of one of them as God-as-Nature or the Creator, and of the other as God-as-Christ or the Redeemer. One is the great Outward God; the other is the Inmost God. The first idea was perhaps developed most highly and completely in the God of Spinoza. It is a conception of God tending to pantheism, to an idea of a comprehensive God as ruling with justice rather than affection, to a conception of aloofness and awestriking worshipfulness. The second idea, which is contradictory to this idea of an absolute God, is the God of the human heart. The writer suggested that the great outline of the theological struggles of that phase of civilisation and world unity which produced Christianity, was a persistent but unsuccessful attempt to get these two different ideas of God into one focus. Later in the work, he aligns himself with a "renascent or modern religion ... neither atheist nor Buddhist nor Mohammedan nor Christian ... [that] he has found growing up in himself".
Of Christianity, he said: "it is not now true for me. ... Every believing Christian is, I am sure, my spiritual brother ... but if systemically I called myself a Christian I feel that to most men I should imply too much and so tell a lie". Of other world religions, he writes: "All these religions are true for me as Canterbury Cathedral is a true thing and as a Swiss chalet is a true thing. There they are, and they have served a purpose, they have worked. Only they are not true for me to live in them. ... They do not work for me". In The Fate of Homo Sapiens (1939), Wells criticised almost all world religions and philosophies, stating "there is no creed, no way of living left in the world at all, that really meets the needs of the time… When we come to look at them coolly and dispassionately, all the main religions, patriotic, moral and customary systems in which human beings are sheltering today, appear to be in a state of jostling and mutually destructive movement, like the houses and palaces and other buildings of some vast, sprawling city overtaken by a landslide.
Wells's opposition to organised religion reached a fever pitch in 1943 with publication of his book Crux Ansata, subtitled "An Indictment of the Roman Catholic Church".
Literary influence and legacy
The science fiction historian John Clute describes Wells as "the most important writer the genre has yet seen", and notes his work has been central to both British and American science fiction. Science fiction author and critic Algis Budrys said Wells "remains the outstanding expositor of both the hope, and the despair, which are embodied in the technology and which are the major facts of life in our world". He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921, 1932, 1935, and 1946. Wells so influenced real exploration of space that an impact crater on Mars (and the Moon) was named after him.
In the United Kingdom, Wells's work was a key model for the British "scientific romance", and other writers in that mode, such as Olaf Stapledon, J. D. Beresford, S. Fowler Wright, and Naomi Mitchison, all drew on Wells's example. Wells was also an important influence on British science fiction of the period after the Second World War, with Arthur C. Clarke and Brian Aldiss expressing strong admiration for Wells's work. Among contemporary British science fiction writers, Stephen Baxter, Christopher Priest and Adam Roberts have all acknowledged Wells's influence on their writing; all three are Vice-Presidents of the H. G. Wells Society. He also had a strong influence on British scientist J. B. S. Haldane, who wrote Daedalus; or, Science and the Future (1924), "The Last Judgement" and "On Being the Right Size" from the essay collection Possible Worlds (1927), and Biological Possibilities for the Human Species in the Next Ten Thousand Years (1963), which are speculations about the future of human evolution and life on other planets. Haldane gave several lectures about these topics which in turn influenced other science fiction writers.
In the United States, Hugo Gernsback reprinted most of Wells's work in the pulp magazine Amazing Stories, regarding Wells's work as "texts of central importance to the self-conscious new genre". Later American writers such as Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Carl Sagan, and Ursula K. Le Guin all recalled being influenced by Wells.
Sinclair Lewis's early novels were strongly influenced by Wells's realistic social novels, such as The History of Mr Polly; Lewis also named his first son Wells after the author. Lewis nominated H. G. Wells for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.
In an interview with The Paris Review, Vladimir Nabokov described Wells as his favourite writer when he was a boy and "a great artist." He went on to cite The Passionate Friends, Ann Veronica, The Time Machine, and The Country of the Blind as superior to anything else written by Wells's British contemporaries. Nabokov said: "His sociological cogitations can be safely ignored, of course, but his romances and fantasies are superb."
Jorge Luis Borges wrote many short pieces on Wells in which he demonstrates a deep familiarity with much of Wells's work. While Borges wrote several critical reviews, including a mostly negative review of Wells's film Things to Come, he regularly treated Wells as a canonical figure of fantastic literature. Late in his life, Borges included The Invisible Man and The Time Machine in his Prologue to a Personal Library, a curated list of 100 great works of literature that he undertook at the behest of the Argentine publishing house Emecé. Canadian author Margaret Atwood read Wells's books, and he also inspired writers of European speculative fiction such as Karel Čapek and Yevgeny Zamyatin.
Representations
Literary
The superhuman protagonist of J. D. Beresford's 1911 novel, The Hampdenshire Wonder, Victor Stott, was based on Wells.
In M. P. Shiel's short story "The Primate of the Rose" (1928), there is an unpleasant womaniser named E. P. Crooks, who was written as a parody of Wells. Wells had attacked Shiel's Prince Zaleski when it was published in 1895, and this was Shiel's response. Wells praised Shiel's The Purple Cloud (1901); in turn Shiel expressed admiration for Wells, referring to him at a speech to the Horsham Rotary Club in 1933 as "my friend Mr. Wells".
In C. S. Lewis's novel That Hideous Strength (1945), the character Jules is a caricature of Wells, and much of Lewis's science fiction was written both under the influence of Wells and as an antithesis to his work (or, as he put it, an "exorcism" of the influence it had on him).
In Brian Aldiss's novella The Saliva Tree (1966), Wells has a small off-screen guest role.
In Saul Bellow's novel Mr. Sammler's Planet (1970), Wells is one of several historical figures the protagonist met when he was a young man.
In The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock (1976) Wells has an important part.
In The Map of Time (2008) by Spanish author Félix J. Palma; Wells is one of several historical characters.
Wells is one of the two Georges in Paul Levinson's 2013 time-travel novelette, "Ian, George, and George," published in Analog magazine.
Dramatic
Rod Taylor portrays Wells in the 1960 science fiction film The Time Machine (based on the novel of the same name), in which Wells uses his time machine to try and find his Utopian society.
Malcolm McDowell portrays Wells in the 1979 science fiction film Time After Time, in which Wells uses a time machine to pursue Jack the Ripper to the present day. In the film, Wells meets "Amy" in the future who then returns to 1893 to become his second wife Amy Catherine Robbins.
Wells is portrayed in the 1985 story Timelash from the 22nd season of the BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who. In this story, Herbert, an enthusiastic temporary companion to the Doctor, is revealed to be a young H. G. Wells. The plot is loosely based upon the themes and characters of The Time Machine with references to The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man and The Island of Doctor Moreau. The story jokingly suggests that Wells's inspiration for his later novels came from his adventure with the Sixth Doctor.
In the BBC2 anthology series Encounters about imagined meetings between historical figures, Beautiful Lies, by Paul Pender (15 August 1992) centred on an acrimonious dinner party attended by Wells (Richard Todd), George Orwell (Jon Finch), and William Empson (Patrick Ryecart).
The character of Wells also appeared in several episodes of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993–1997), usually pitted against the time-travelling villain known as Tempus (Lane Davies). Wells's younger self was played by Terry Kiser, and the older Wells was played by Hamilton Camp.
In the British TV mini-series The Infinite Worlds of H. G. Wells (2001), several of Wells's short stories are dramatised but are adapted using Wells himself (Tom Ward) as the main protagonist in each story.
In the Disney Channel Original Series Phil of the Future, which centres on time-travel, the present-day high school that the main characters attend is named "H. G. Wells".
In the 2006 television docudrama H. G. Wells: War with the World, Wells is played by Michael Sheen.
Television episode "World's End" of Cold Case (2007) is about the discovery of human remains in the bottom of a well leads to the reinvestigation of the case of a housewife who went missing during Orson Welles' radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds".
On the science fiction television series Warehouse 13 (2009–2014), there is a female version Helena G. Wells. When she appeared she explained that her brother was her front for her writing because a female science fiction author would not be accepted.
Comedian Paul F. Tompkins portrays a fictional Wells as the host of The Dead Authors Podcast, wherein Wells uses his time machine to bring dead authors (played by other comedians) to the present and interview them.
H. G. Wells as a young boy appears in the Legends of Tomorrow episode "The Magnificent Eight". In this story, the boy Wells is dying of consumption but is cured by a time-travelling Martin Stein.
In the four part series The Nightmare Worlds of H. G. Wells (2016), Wells is played by Ray Winstone.
In the 2017 television series version of Time After Time, based on the 1979 film, H. G. Wells is portrayed by Freddie Stroma.
In the 2019 television adaptation of The War of the Worlds, the character of 'George', played by Rafe Spall, demonstrates a number of elements of Wells's own life, including his estrangement from his wife and unmarried co-habitation with the character of 'Amy'.
Literary papers
In 1954, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign purchased the H. G. Wells literary papers and correspondence collection. The University's Rare Book & Manuscript Library holds the largest collection of Wells manuscripts, correspondence, first editions and publications in the United States. Among these is unpublished material and the manuscripts of such works as The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine. The collection includes first editions, revisions and translations. The letters contain general family correspondence, communications from publishers, material regarding the Fabian Society, and letters from politicians and public figures, most notably George Bernard Shaw and Joseph Conrad.
Bibliography
See also
References
Further reading
Dickson, Lovat. H. G. Wells: His Turbulent Life & Times. 1969.
Foot, Michael. H. G.: History of Mr. Wells. Doubleday, 1985 (), Black Swan, New edition, Oct 1996 (paperback, )
Gilmour, David. The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002 (paperback, ); 2003 (paperback, ).
Gomme, A. W., Mr. Wells as Historian. Glasgow: MacLehose, Jackson, and Co., 1921.
Gosling, John. Waging the War of the Worlds. Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland, 2009 (paperback, ).
Jasanoff, Maya, "The Future Was His" (review of Sarah Cole, Inventing Tomorrow: H.G. Wells and the Twentieth Century, Columbia University Press, 374 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXVII, no. 12 (23 July 2020), pp. 50–51. Writes Jasanoff (p. 51): "Although [Wells] was prophetically right, and right-minded, about some things... [n]owhere was he more disturbingly wrong than in his loathsome affinity for eugenics..."
Lynn, Andrea The secret love life of H.G. Wells
Mackenzie, Norman and Jean, The Time Traveller: the Life of H G Wells, London: Weidenfeld, 1973,
Mauthner, Martin. German Writers in French Exile, 1933–1940, London: Vallentine and Mitchell, 2007, .
McLean, Steven. 'The Early Fiction of H. G. Wells: Fantasies of Science'. Palgrave, 2009, .
Partington, John S. Building Cosmopolis: The Political Thought of H. G. Wells. Ashgate, 2003, .
Roberts, Adam. H G Wells A Literary Life. Springer International Publishing, 2019, ISBN 9783030264215.
Shadurski, Maxim. The Nationality of Utopia: H. G. Wells, England, and the World State. London: Routledge, 2020, .
Sherborne, Michael. H. G. Wells: Another Kind of Life. London: Peter Owen, 2010, .
Smith, David C., H. G. Wells: Desperately Mortal: A Biography. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986,
West, Anthony. H. G. Wells: Aspects of a Life. London: Hutchinson, 1984.
External links
Future Tense – The Story of H. G. Wells at BBC One – 150th anniversary documentary (2016)
"In the footsteps of H G Wells" at New Statesman – "The great author called for a Human Rights Act; 60 years later, we have it" (2000)
Sources—collections
*
Free H. G. Wells downloads for iPhone, iPad, Nook, Android, and Kindle in PDF and all popular eBook reader formats (AZW3, EPUB, MOBI) at ebooktakeaway.com
H G Wells at the British Library
H. G. Wells papers at University of Illinois
Ebooks by H. G. Wells at Global Grey Ebooks
Sources—letters, essays and interviews
Archive of Wells's BBC broadcasts
Film interview with H. G. Wells
"Stephen Crane. From an English Standpoint", by Wells, 1900.
Rabindranath Tagore: In conversation with H. G. Wells. Rabindranath Tagore and Wells conversing in Geneva in 1930.
"Introduction", to W. N. P. Barbellion's The Journal of a Disappointed Man, by Wells, 1919.
"Woman and Primitive Culture", by Wells, 1895.
Letter, to M. P. Shiel, by Wells, 1937.
Biography
"H. G. Wells". In Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Critical essays
An introduction to The War of the Worlds by Iain Sinclair on the British Library's Discovering Literature website.
"An Appreciation of H. G. Wells", by Mary Austin, 1911.
"Socialism and the Family" (1906) by Belfort Bax, Part 1, Part 2.
"H. G. Wells warned us how it would feel to fight a War of the Worlds", by Niall Ferguson, in The Telegraph, 24 June 2005.
"H. G. Wells's Idea of a World Brain: A Critical Re-assessment", by W. Boyd Rayward, in Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50 (15 May 1999): 557–579
"Mr H. G. Wells and the Giants", by G. K. Chesterton, from his book Heretics (1908).
"The Internet: a world brain?", by Martin Gardner, in Skeptical Inquirer, Jan–Feb 1999.
"Science Fiction: The Shape of Things to Come", by Mark Bould, in The Socialist Review, May 2005.
"Who needs Utopia? A dialogue with my utopian self (with apologies, and thanks, to H. G. Wells)", by Gregory Claeys in Spaces of Utopia: An Electronic Journal, no 1, Spring 2006.
"When H. G. Wells Split the Atom: A 1914 Preview of 1945", by Freda Kirchwey, in The Nation, posted 4 September 2003 (original 18 August 1945 issue).
"Wells, Hitler and the World State", by George Orwell. First published: Horizon. GB, London. Aug 1941.
"War of the Worldviews", by John J. Miller, in The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal, 21 June 2005.
"Wells's Autobiography", by John Hart, from New International, Vol.2 No.2, Mar 1935, pp. 75–76.
"History in the Science Fiction of H. G. Wells", by Patrick Parrinder, Cycnos, 22.2 (2006).
"From the World Brain to the Worldwide Web", by Martin Campbell-Kelly, Gresham College Lecture, 9 November 2006.
"The Beginning of Wisdom: On Reading H. G. Wells", by Vivian Gornick, Boston Review, 31.1 (2007).
John Hammond, The Complete List of Short Stories of H. G. Wells
"H. G. Wells Predictions Ring True, 143 Years Later" at National Geographic
"H. G. Wells, the man I knew" Obituary of Wells by George Bernard Shaw, at the New Statesman
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"Don Juan Manuel's Tales of Count Lucanor, in Spanish Libro de los ejemplos del conde Lucanor y de Patronio (Book of the Examples of Count Lucanor and of Patronio), also commonly known as El Conde Lucanor, Libro de Patronio, or Libro de los ejemplos (original Old Castilian: Libro de los enxiemplos del Conde Lucanor et de Patronio), is one of the earliest works of prose in Castilian Spanish. It was first written in 1335.\n\nThe book is divided into four parts. The first and most well-known part is a series of 51 short stories (some no more than a page or two) drawn from various sources, such as Aesop and other classical writers, and Arabic folktales.\n\nTales of Count Lucanor was first printed in 1575 when it was published at Seville under the auspices of Argote de Molina. It was again printed at Madrid in 1642, after which it lay forgotten for nearly two centuries.\n\nPurpose and structure\n\nA didactic, moralistic purpose, which would color so much of the Spanish literature to follow (see Novela picaresca), is the mark of this book. Count Lucanor engages in conversation with his advisor Patronio, putting to him a problem (\"Some man has made me a proposition...\" or \"I fear that such and such person intends to...\") and asking for advice. Patronio responds always with the greatest humility, claiming not to wish to offer advice to so illustrious a person as the Count, but offering to tell him a story of which the Count's problem reminds him. (Thus, the stories are \"examples\" [ejemplos] of wise action.) At the end he advises the Count to do as the protagonist of his story did.\n\nEach chapter ends in more or less the same way, with slight variations on: \"And this pleased the Count greatly and he did just so, and found it well. And Don Johán (Juan) saw that this example was very good, and had it written in this book, and composed the following verses.\" A rhymed couplet closes, giving the moral of the story.\n\nOrigin of stories and influence on later literature\nMany of the stories written in the book are the first examples written in a modern European language of various stories, which many other writers would use in the proceeding centuries. Many of the stories he included were themselves derived from other stories, coming from western and Arab sources.\n\nShakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew has the basic elements of Tale 35, \"What Happened to a Young Man Who Married a Strong and Ill-tempered Woman\".\n\nTale 32, \"What Happened to the King and the Tricksters Who Made Cloth\" tells the story that Hans Christian Andersen made popular as The Emperor's New Clothes.\n\nStory 7, \"What Happened to a Woman Named Truhana\", a version of Aesop's The Milkmaid and Her Pail, was claimed by Max Müller to originate in the Hindu cycle Panchatantra.\n\nTale 2, \"What happened to a good Man and his Son, leading a beast to market,\" is the familiar fable The miller, his son and the donkey.\n\nIn 2016, Baroque Decay released a game under the name \"The Count Lucanor\". As well as some protagonists' names, certain events from the books inspired past events in the game.\n\nThe stories\n\nThe book opens with a prologue which introduces the characters of the Count and Patronio. The titles in the following list are those given in Keller and Keating's 1977 translation into English. James York's 1868 translation into English gives a significantly different ordering of the stories and omits the fifty-first.\n\n What Happened to a King and His Favorite \n What Happened to a Good Man and His Son \n How King Richard of England Leapt into the Sea against the Moors\n What a Genoese Said to His Soul When He Was about to Die \n What Happened to a Fox and a Crow Who Had a Piece of Cheese in His Beak\n How the Swallow Warned the Other Birds When She Saw Flax Being Sown \n What Happened to a Woman Named Truhana \n What Happened to a Man Whose Liver Had to Be Washed \n What Happened to Two Horses Which Were Thrown to the Lion \n What Happened to a Man Who on Account of Poverty and Lack of Other Food Was Eating Bitter Lentils \n What Happened to a Dean of Santiago de Compostela and Don Yllán, the Grand Master of Toledo\n What Happened to the Fox and the Rooster \n What Happened to a Man Who Was Hunting Partridges \n The Miracle of Saint Dominick When He Preached against the Usurer \n What Happened to Lorenzo Suárez at the Siege of Seville \n The Reply that count Fernán González Gave to His Relative Núño Laynes \n What Happened to a Very Hungry Man Who Was Half-heartedly Invited to Dinner \n What Happened to Pero Meléndez de Valdés When He Broke His Leg \n What Happened to the Crows and the Owls \n What Happened to a King for Whom a Man Promised to Perform Alchemy \n What Happened to a Young King and a Philosopher to Whom his Father Commended Him \n What Happened to the Lion and the Bull \n How the Ants Provide for Themselves \n What Happened to the King Who Wanted to Test His Three Sons \n What Happened to the Count of Provence and How He Was Freed from Prison by the Advice of Saladin\n What Happened to the Tree of Lies \n What Happened to an Emperor and to Don Alvarfáñez Minaya and Their Wives \n What Happened in Granada to Don Lorenzo Suárez Gallinato When He Beheaded the Renegade Chaplain \n What Happened to a Fox Who Lay down in the Street to Play Dead \n What Happened to King Abenabet of Seville and Ramayquía His Wife \n How a Cardinal Judged between the Canons of Paris and the Friars Minor \n What Happened to the King and the Tricksters Who Made Cloth \n What Happened to Don Juan Manuel's Saker Falcon and an Eagle and a Heron \n What Happened to a Blind Man Who Was Leading Another \n What Happened to a Young Man Who Married a Strong and Ill-tempered Woman\n What Happened to a Merchant When He Found His Son and His Wife Sleeping Together \n What Happened to Count Fernán González with His Men after He Had Won the Battle of Hacinas \n What Happened to a Man Who Was Loaded down with Precious Stones and Drowned in the River \n What Happened to a Man and a Swallow and a Sparrow \n Why the Seneschal of Carcassonne Lost His Soul \n What Happened to a King of Córdova Named Al-Haquem \n What Happened to a Woman of Sham Piety \n What Happened to Good and Evil and the Wise Man and the Madman \n What Happened to Don Pero Núñez the Loyal, to Don Ruy González de Zavallos, and to Don Gutier Roiz de Blaguiello with Don Rodrigo the Generous \n What Happened to a Man Who Became the Devil's Friend and Vassal \n What Happened to a Philosopher who by Accident Went down a Street Where Prostitutes Lived \n What Befell a Moor and His Sister Who Pretended That She Was Timid \n What Happened to a Man Who Tested His Friends \n What Happened to the Man Whom They Cast out Naked on an Island When They Took away from Him the Kingdom He Ruled \n What Happened to Saladin and a Lady, the Wife of a Knight Who Was His Vassal \n What Happened to a Christian King Who Was Very Powerful and Haughty\n\nReferences\n\nNotes\n\nBibliography\n\n Sturm, Harlan\n\n Wacks, David\n\nExternal links\n\nThe Internet Archive provides free access to the 1868 translation by James York.\nJSTOR has the to the 1977 translation by Keller and Keating.\nSelections in English and Spanish (pedagogical edition) with introduction, notes, and bibliography in Open Iberia/América (open access teaching anthology)\n\n14th-century books\nSpanish literature\n1335 books",
"Debbie Burton was an American singer. She is best known for dubbing the singing voice of the young Baby Jane Hudson (played by child actress Julie Allred) in the 1962 film What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, singing the song \"I've Written a Letter to Daddy\". Burton also sang a duet with Bette Davis, the rock and roll song \"What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?\", written by Frank DeVol and Lukas Heller. It was released as a promotional single, with Burton's rendition of \"I've Written a Letter to Daddy\" on the flipside. An instrumental version of \"What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?\" can be heard in the movie.\n\nIn 1964 Burton released a single entitled \"The Next Day\", which was co-written by Perry Botkin, Jr. with Harry Nilsson. The song was featured on the 2004 compilation Girls Go Zonk: US Beat Chicks and Harmony Honeys.\n\nThe single \"Baby It's Over\" (Capitol 1966) was also written by Nilsson and produced by Botkin.\n\nThe music to the song was originally If I Had My Life to Live Over, written by Henry Tobias, Moe Jaffe and Larry Vincent in 1939.\n\nFilmography\n\nNotes\n\nExternal links\n\n[ Debbie Burton on Allmusic]\nDebbie Burton on Myspace\n\nAmerican women singers\nMGM Records artists\nLiving people\nYear of birth missing (living people)\n21st-century American women"
] |
[
"H. G. Wells",
"Personal life",
"Who did he marry",
"1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells.",
"What happened to the couple",
"The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students,",
"What was her name",
"Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895.",
"Where was their house atthis time",
"They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months",
"When and where were the two married",
"married at St Pancras register office in October 1895.",
"What did this help him with",
"he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance,",
"What else did he do there",
"began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham.",
"What happened to the young family next",
"late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate,"
] | C_86cc13fd852e4219a6fc0d2d8dd4d80e_0 | What did he do there | 9 | What did H.G. Wells do in Sandgate? | H. G. Wells | In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells. The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he fell in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton', (now No.141) Maybury Road in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Dr Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When The Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham. In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames for two years until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where in 1901 he constructed a large family home: Spade House. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip") in 1901 (died 1985) and Frank Richard in 1903 (died 1982). With his wife Jane's consent, Wells had affairs with a number of women, including the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger, adventurer and writer Odette Keun, Soviet spy Moura Budberg and novelist Elizabeth von Arnim. In 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society; and in 1914, a son, Anthony West (1914-1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells' "sordid intrigue" with the daughter of veteran Fabian Sidney Olivier, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011) - a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note) - gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others. Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989). CANNOTANSWER | 1901 he constructed a large family home: Spade House. | Herbert George Wells (21 September 186613 August 1946) was an English writer. Prolific in many genres, he wrote dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, history, satire, biography and autobiography. His work also included two books on recreational war games. Wells is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is sometimes called the "father of science fiction."
During his own lifetime, however, he was most prominent as a forward-looking, even prophetic social critic who devoted his literary talents to the development of a progressive vision on a global scale. A futurist, he wrote a number of utopian works and foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. His science fiction imagined time travel, alien invasion, invisibility, and biological engineering. Brian Aldiss referred to Wells as the "Shakespeare of science fiction", while American writer Charles Fort referred to him as a "wild talent".
Wells rendered his works convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work – dubbed “Wells's law” – leading Joseph Conrad to hail him in 1898 as "O Realist of the Fantastic!". His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine (1895), which was his first novel, The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), The War of the Worlds (1898) and the military science fiction The War in the Air (1907). Wells was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature four times.
Wells's earliest specialised training was in biology, and his thinking on ethical matters took place in a specifically and fundamentally Darwinian context. He was also an outspoken socialist from a young age, often (but not always, as at the beginning of the First World War) sympathising with pacifist views. His later works became increasingly political and didactic, and he wrote little science fiction, while he sometimes indicated on official documents that his profession was that of journalist. Novels such as Kipps and The History of Mr Polly, which describe lower-middle-class life, led to the suggestion that he was a worthy successor to Charles Dickens, but Wells described a range of social strata and even attempted, in Tono-Bungay (1909), a diagnosis of English society as a whole. Wells was a diabetic and co-founded the charity The Diabetic Association (known today as Diabetes UK) in 1934.
Life
Early life
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on 21 September 1866. Called "Bertie" by his family, he was the fourth and last child of Joseph Wells, a former domestic gardener, and at the time a shopkeeper and professional cricketer and Sarah Neal, a former domestic servant. An inheritance had allowed the family to acquire a shop in which they sold china and sporting goods, although it failed to prosper: the stock was old and worn out, and the location was poor. Joseph Wells managed to earn a meagre income, but little of it came from the shop and he received an unsteady amount of money from playing professional cricket for the Kent county team.
A defining incident of young Wells's life was an accident in 1874 that left him bedridden with a broken leg. To pass the time he began to read books from the local library, brought to him by his father. He soon became devoted to the other worlds and lives to which books gave him access; they also stimulated his desire to write. Later that year he entered Thomas Morley's Commercial Academy, a private school founded in 1849, following the bankruptcy of Morley's earlier school. The teaching was erratic, the curriculum mostly focused, Wells later said, on producing copperplate handwriting and doing the sort of sums useful to tradesmen. Wells continued at Morley's Academy until 1880. In 1877, his father, Joseph Wells, suffered a fractured thigh. The accident effectively put an end to Joseph's career as a cricketer, and his subsequent earnings as a shopkeeper were not enough to compensate for the loss of the primary source of family income.
No longer able to support themselves financially, the family instead sought to place their sons as apprentices in various occupations. From 1880 to 1883, Wells had an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at Hyde's Drapery Emporium in Southsea. His experiences at Hyde's, where he worked a thirteen-hour day and slept in a dormitory with other apprentices, later inspired his novels The Wheels of Chance, The History of Mr Polly, and Kipps, which portray the life of a draper's apprentice as well as providing a critique of society's distribution of wealth.
Wells's parents had a turbulent marriage, owing primarily to his mother's being a Protestant and his father's being a freethinker. When his mother returned to work as a lady's maid (at Uppark, a country house in Sussex), one of the conditions of work was that she would not be permitted to have living space for her husband and children. Thereafter, she and Joseph lived separate lives, though they never divorced and remained faithful to each other. As a consequence, Herbert's personal troubles increased as he subsequently failed as a draper and also, later, as a chemist's assistant. However, Uppark had a magnificent library in which he immersed himself, reading many classic works, including Plato's Republic, Thomas More's Utopia, and the works of Daniel Defoe. This was the beginning of Wells's venture into literature.
Teacher
In October 1879, Wells's mother arranged through a distant relative, Arthur Williams, for him to join the National School at Wookey in Somerset as a pupil–teacher, a senior pupil who acted as a teacher of younger children. In December that year, however, Williams was dismissed for irregularities in his qualifications and Wells was returned to Uppark. After a short apprenticeship at a chemist in nearby Midhurst and an even shorter stay as a boarder at Midhurst Grammar School, he signed his apprenticeship papers at Hyde's. In 1883, Wells persuaded his parents to release him from the apprenticeship, taking an opportunity offered by Midhurst Grammar School again to become a pupil–teacher; his proficiency in Latin and science during his earlier short stay had been remembered.
The years he spent in Southsea had been the most miserable of his life to that point, but his good fortune at securing a position at Midhurst Grammar School meant that Wells could continue his self-education in earnest. The following year, Wells won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science (later the Royal College of Science in South Kensington, now part of Imperial College London) in London, studying biology under Thomas Henry Huxley. As an alumnus, he later helped to set up the Royal College of Science Association, of which he became the first president in 1909. Wells studied in his new school until 1887, with a weekly allowance of 21 shillings (a guinea) thanks to his scholarship. This ought to have been a comfortable sum of money (at the time many working class families had "round about a pound a week" as their entire household income), yet in his Experiment in Autobiography Wells speaks of constantly being hungry, and indeed photographs of him at the time show a youth who is very thin and malnourished.
He soon entered the Debating Society of the school. These years mark the beginning of his interest in a possible reformation of society. At first approaching the subject through Plato's Republic, he soon turned to contemporary ideas of socialism as expressed by the recently formed Fabian Society and free lectures delivered at Kelmscott House, the home of William Morris. He was also among the founders of The Science School Journal, a school magazine that allowed him to express his views on literature and society, as well as trying his hand at fiction; a precursor to his novel The Time Machine was published in the journal under the title The Chronic Argonauts. The school year 1886–87 was the last year of his studies.
During 1888, Wells stayed in Stoke-on-Trent, living in Basford. The unique environment of The Potteries was certainly an inspiration. He wrote in a letter to a friend from the area that "the district made an immense impression on me." The inspiration for some of his descriptions in The War of the Worlds is thought to have come from his short time spent here, seeing the iron foundry furnaces burn over the city, shooting huge red light into the skies. His stay in The Potteries also resulted in the macabre short story "The Cone" (1895, contemporaneous with his famous The Time Machine), set in the north of the city.
After teaching for some time, he was briefly on the staff of Holt Academy in Wales – Wells found it necessary to supplement his knowledge relating to educational principles and methodology and entered the College of Preceptors (College of Teachers). He later received his Licentiate and Fellowship FCP diplomas from the college. It was not until 1890 that Wells earned a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology from the University of London External Programme. In 1889–90, he managed to find a post as a teacher at Henley House School in London, where he taught A. A. Milne (whose father ran the school). His first published work was a Text-Book of Biology in two volumes (1893).
Upon leaving the Normal School of Science, Wells was left without a source of income. His aunt Mary—his father's sister-in-law—invited him to stay with her for a while, which solved his immediate problem of accommodation. During his stay at his aunt's residence, he grew increasingly interested in her daughter, Isabel, whom he later courted. To earn money, he began writing short humorous articles for journals such as The Pall Mall Gazette, later collecting these in volume form as Select Conversations with an Uncle (1895) and Certain Personal Matters (1897). So prolific did Wells become at this mode of journalism that many of his early pieces remain unidentified. According to David C. Smith, "Most of Wells's occasional pieces have not been collected, and many have not even been identified as his. Wells did not automatically receive the byline his reputation demanded until after 1896 or so ... As a result, many of his early pieces are unknown. It is obvious that many early Wells items have been lost." His success with these shorter pieces encouraged him to write book-length work, and he published his first novel, The Time Machine, in 1895.
Personal life
In 1891, Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells (1865–1931; from 1902 Isabel Mary Smith). The couple agreed to separate in 1894, when he had fallen in love with one of his students, Amy Catherine Robbins (1872–1927; later known as Jane), with whom he moved to Woking, Surrey, in May 1895. They lived in a rented house, 'Lynton' (now No.141), Maybury Road, in the town centre for just under 18 months and married at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps the most creative and productive of his whole writing career, for while there he planned and wrote The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine, completed The Island of Doctor Moreau, wrote and published The Wonderful Visit and The Wheels of Chance, and began writing two other early books, When the Sleeper Wakes and Love and Mr Lewisham.
In late summer 1896, Wells and Jane moved to a larger house in Worcester Park, near Kingston upon Thames, for two years; this lasted until his poor health took them to Sandgate, near Folkestone, where he constructed a large family home, Spade House, in 1901. He had two sons with Jane: George Philip (known as "Gip"; 1901–1985) and Frank Richard (1903–1982) (grandfather of film director Simon Wells). Jane died on 6 October 1927, in Dunmow, at the age of 55.
Wells had affairs with a significant number of women. In December 1909, he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, whose parents, William and Maud Pember Reeves, he had met through the Fabian Society. Amber had married the barrister G. R. Blanco White in July of that year, as co-arranged by Wells. After Beatrice Webb voiced disapproval of Wells's "sordid intrigue" with Amber, he responded by lampooning Beatrice Webb and her husband Sidney Webb in his 1911 novel The New Machiavelli as 'Altiora and Oscar Bailey', a pair of short-sighted, bourgeois manipulators. Between 1910 and 1913, novelist Elizabeth von Arnim was one of his mistresses. In 1914, he had a son, Anthony West (1914–1987), by the novelist and feminist Rebecca West, 26 years his junior. In 1920–21, and intermittently until his death, he had a love affair with the American birth control activist Margaret Sanger.
Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with the 22-year younger Dutch adventurer and writer Odette Keun, with whom he lived in Lou Pidou, a house they built together in Grasse, France. Wells dedicated his longest book to her (The World of William Clissold, 1926). When visiting Maxim Gorky in Russia 1920, he had slept with Gorky's mistress Moura Budberg, then still Countess Benckendorf and 27 years his junior. In 1933, when she left Gorky and emigrated to London, their relationship renewed and she cared for him through his final illness. Wells repeatedly asked her to marry him, but Budberg strongly rejected his proposals.
In Experiment in Autobiography (1934), Wells wrote: "I was never a great amorist, though I have loved several people very deeply". David Lodge's novel A Man of Parts (2011)—a 'narrative based on factual sources' (author's note)—gives a convincing and generally sympathetic account of Wells's relations with the women mentioned above, and others.
Director Simon Wells (born 1961), the author's great-grandson, was a consultant on the future scenes in Back to the Future Part II (1989).
Artist
One of the ways that Wells expressed himself was through his drawings and sketches. One common location for these was the endpapers and title pages of his own diaries, and they covered a wide variety of topics, from political commentary to his feelings toward his literary contemporaries and his current romantic interests. During his marriage to Amy Catherine, whom he nicknamed Jane, he drew a considerable number of pictures, many of them being overt comments on their marriage. During this period, he called these pictures "picshuas". These picshuas have been the topic of study by Wells scholars for many years, and in 2006, a book was published on the subject.
Writer
Some of his early novels, called "scientific romances", invented several themes now classic in science fiction in such works as The Time Machine, The Island of Doctor Moreau, The Invisible Man, The War of the Worlds, When the Sleeper Wakes, and The First Men in the Moon. He also wrote realistic novels that received critical acclaim, including Kipps and a critique of English culture during the Edwardian period, Tono-Bungay. Wells also wrote dozens of short stories and novellas, including, "The Flowering of the Strange Orchid", which helped bring the full impact of Darwin's revolutionary botanical ideas to a wider public, and was followed by many later successes such as "The Country of the Blind" (1904).
According to James E. Gunn, one of Wells's major contributions to the science fiction genre was his approach, which he referred to as his "new system of ideas". In his opinion, the author should always strive to make the story as credible as possible, even if both the writer and the reader knew certain elements are impossible, allowing the reader to accept the ideas as something that could really happen, today referred to as "the plausible impossible" and "suspension of disbelief". While neither invisibility nor time travel was new in speculative fiction, Wells added a sense of realism to the concepts which the readers were not familiar with. He conceived the idea of using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposely and selectively forwards or backwards in time. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle. He explained that while writing The Time Machine, he realized that "the more impossible the story I had to tell, the more ordinary must be the setting, and the circumstances in which I now set the Time Traveller were all that I could imagine of solid upper-class comforts." In "Wells's Law", a science fiction story should contain only a single extraordinary assumption. Therefore, as justifications for the impossible, he employed scientific ideas and theories. Wells's best-known statement of the "law" appears in his introduction to a collection of his works published in 1934:
As soon as the magic trick has been done the whole business of the fantasy writer is to keep everything else human and real. Touches of prosaic detail are imperative and a rigorous adherence to the hypothesis. Any extra fantasy outside the cardinal assumption immediately gives a touch of irresponsible silliness to the invention.
Dr. Griffin / The Invisible Man is a brilliant research scientist who discovers a method of invisibility, but finds himself unable to reverse the process. An enthusiast of random and irresponsible violence, Griffin has become an iconic character in horror fiction. The Island of Doctor Moreau sees a shipwrecked man left on the island home of Doctor Moreau, a mad scientist who creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. The earliest depiction of uplift, the novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature. In The First Men in the Moon Wells used the idea of radio communication between astronomical objects, a plot point inspired by Nikola Tesla's claim that he had received radio signals from Mars. Though Tono-Bungay is not a science-fiction novel, radioactive decay plays a small but consequential role in it. Radioactive decay plays a much larger role in The World Set Free (1914). This book contains what is surely his biggest prophetic "hit", with the first description of a nuclear weapon. Scientists of the day were well aware that the natural decay of radium releases energy at a slow rate over thousands of years. The rate of release is too slow to have practical utility, but the total amount released is huge. Wells's novel revolves around an (unspecified) invention that accelerates the process of radioactive decay, producing bombs that explode with no more than the force of ordinary high explosives—but which "continue to explode" for days on end. "Nothing could have been more obvious to the people of the earlier twentieth century", he wrote, "than the rapidity with which war was becoming impossible ... [but] they did not see it until the atomic bombs burst in their fumbling hands". In 1932, the physicist and conceiver of nuclear chain reaction Leó Szilárd read The World Set Free (the same year Sir James Chadwick discovered the neutron), a book which he said made a great impression on him. In addition to writing early science fiction, he produced work dealing with mythological beings like an angel in the novel The Wonderful Visit (1895) and a mermaid in the novel The Sea Lady (1902).
Wells also wrote non-fiction. His first non-fiction bestseller was Anticipations of the Reaction of Mechanical and Scientific Progress upon Human Life and Thought (1901). When originally serialised in a magazine it was subtitled "An Experiment in Prophecy", and is considered his most explicitly futuristic work. It offered the immediate political message of the privileged sections of society continuing to bar capable men from other classes from advancement until war would force a need to employ those most able, rather than the traditional upper classes, as leaders. Anticipating what the world would be like in the year 2000, the book is interesting both for its hits (trains and cars resulting in the dispersion of populations from cities to suburbs; moral restrictions declining as men and women seek greater sexual freedom; the defeat of German militarism, and the existence of a European Union) and its misses (he did not expect successful aircraft before 1950, and averred that "my imagination refuses to see any sort of submarine doing anything but suffocate its crew and founder at sea").
His bestselling two-volume work, The Outline of History (1920), began a new era of popularised world history. It received a mixed critical response from professional historians. However, it was very popular amongst the general population and made Wells a rich man. Many other authors followed with "Outlines" of their own in other subjects. He reprised his Outline in 1922 with a much shorter popular work, A Short History of the World, a history book praised by Albert Einstein, and two long efforts, The Science of Life (1930)—written with his son G. P. Wells and evolutionary biologist Julian Huxley, and The Work, Wealth and Happiness of Mankind (1931). The "Outlines" became sufficiently common for James Thurber to parody the trend in his humorous essay, "An Outline of Scientists"—indeed, Wells's Outline of History remains in print with a new 2005 edition, while A Short History of the World has been re-edited (2006).
From quite early in Wells's career, he sought a better way to organise society and wrote a number of Utopian novels. The first of these was A Modern Utopia (1905), which shows a worldwide utopia with "no imports but meteorites, and no exports at all"; two travellers from our world fall into its alternate history. The others usually begin with the world rushing to catastrophe, until people realise a better way of living: whether by mysterious gases from a comet causing people to behave rationally and abandoning a European war (In the Days of the Comet (1906)), or a world council of scientists taking over, as in The Shape of Things to Come (1933, which he later adapted for the 1936 Alexander Korda film, Things to Come). This depicted, all too accurately, the impending World War, with cities being destroyed by aerial bombs. He also portrayed the rise of fascist dictators in The Autocracy of Mr Parham (1930) and The Holy Terror (1939). Men Like Gods (1923) is also a utopian novel. Wells in this period was regarded as an enormously influential figure; the critic Malcolm Cowley stated: "by the time he was forty, his influence was wider than any other living English writer".
Wells contemplates the ideas of nature and nurture and questions humanity in books such as The First Men in the Moon, where nature is completely suppressed by nurture, and The Island of Doctor Moreau, where the strong presence of nature represents a threat to a civilized society. Not all his scientific romances ended in a Utopia, and Wells also wrote a dystopian novel, When the Sleeper Wakes (1899, rewritten as The Sleeper Awakes, 1910), which pictures a future society where the classes have become more and more separated, leading to a revolt of the masses against the rulers. The Island of Doctor Moreau is even darker. The narrator, having been trapped on an island of animals vivisected (unsuccessfully) into human beings, eventually returns to England; like Gulliver on his return from the Houyhnhnms, he finds himself unable to shake off the perceptions of his fellow humans as barely civilised beasts, slowly reverting to their animal natures.
Wells also wrote the preface for the first edition of W. N. P. Barbellion's diaries, The Journal of a Disappointed Man, published in 1919. Since "Barbellion" was the real author's pen name, many reviewers believed Wells to have been the true author of the Journal; Wells always denied this, despite being full of praise for the diaries.
In 1927, a Canadian teacher and writer Florence Deeks unsuccessfully sued Wells for infringement of copyright and breach of trust, claiming that much of The Outline of History had been plagiarised from her unpublished manuscript, The Web of the World's Romance, which had spent nearly nine months in the hands of Wells's Canadian publisher, Macmillan Canada. However, it was sworn on oath at the trial that the manuscript remained in Toronto in the safekeeping of Macmillan, and that Wells did not even know it existed, let alone had seen it. The court found no proof of copying, and decided the similarities were due to the fact that the books had similar nature and both writers had access to the same sources. In 2000, A. B. McKillop, a professor of history at Carleton University, produced a book on the case, The Spinster & The Prophet: Florence Deeks, H. G. Wells, and the Mystery of the Purloined Past. According to McKillop, the lawsuit was unsuccessful due to the prejudice against a woman suing a well-known and famous male author, and he paints a detailed story based on the circumstantial evidence of the case. In 2004, Denis N. Magnusson, Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Law, Queen's University, Ontario, published an article on Deeks v. Wells. This re-examines the case in relation to McKillop's book. While having some sympathy for Deeks, he argues that she had a weak case that was not well presented, and though she may have met with sexism from her lawyers, she received a fair trial, adding that the law applied is essentially the same law that would be applied to a similar case today (i.e., 2004).
In 1933, Wells predicted in The Shape of Things to Come that the world war he feared would begin in January 1940, a prediction which ultimately came true four months early, in September 1939, with the outbreak of World War II. In 1936, before the Royal Institution, Wells called for the compilation of a constantly growing and changing World Encyclopaedia, to be reviewed by outstanding authorities and made accessible to every human being. In 1938, he published a collection of essays on the future organisation of knowledge and education, World Brain, including the essay "The Idea of a Permanent World Encyclopaedia".
Prior to 1933, Wells's books were widely read in Germany and Austria, and most of his science fiction works had been translated shortly after publication. By 1933, he had attracted the attention of German officials because of his criticism of the political situation in Germany, and on 10 May 1933, Wells's books were burned by the Nazi youth in Berlin's Opernplatz, and his works were banned from libraries and book stores. Wells, as president of PEN International (Poets, Essayists, Novelists), angered the Nazis by overseeing the expulsion of the German PEN club from the international body in 1934 following the German PEN's refusal to admit non-Aryan writers to its membership. At a PEN conference in Ragusa, Wells refused to yield to Nazi sympathisers who demanded that the exiled author Ernst Toller be prevented from speaking. Near the end of World War II, Allied forces discovered that the SS had compiled lists of people slated for immediate arrest during the invasion of Britain in the abandoned Operation Sea Lion, with Wells included in the alphabetical list of "The Black Book".
Wartime works
Seeking a more structured way to play war games, Wells wrote Floor Games (1911) followed by Little Wars (1913), which set out rules for fighting battles with toy soldiers (miniatures). A pacifist prior to the First World War, Wells stated "how much better is this amiable miniature [war] than the real thing". According to Wells, the idea of the game developed from a visit by his friend Jerome K. Jerome. After dinner, Jerome began shooting down toy soldiers with a toy cannon and Wells joined in to compete.
During August 1914, immediately after the outbreak of the First World War, Wells published a number of articles in London newspapers that subsequently appeared as a book entitled The War That Will End War. He coined the expression with the idealistic belief that the result of the war would make a future conflict impossible. Wells blamed the Central Powers for the coming of the war and argued that only the defeat of German militarism could bring about an end to war. Wells used the shorter form of the phrase, "the war to end war", in In the Fourth Year (1918), in which he noted that the phrase "got into circulation" in the second half of 1914. In fact, it had become one of the most common catchphrases of the war.
In 1918 Wells worked for the British War Propaganda Bureau, also called Wellington House. Wells was also one of fifty-three leading British authors — a number that included Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle — who signed their names to the “Authors' Declaration.” This manifesto declared that the German invasion of Belgium had been a brutal crime, and that Britain “could not without dishonour have refused to take part in the present war.”
Travels to Russia and the Soviet Union
Wells visited Russia three times: 1914, 1920 and 1934. During his second visit, he saw his old friend Maxim Gorky and with Gorky's help, met Vladimir Lenin. In his book Russia in the Shadows, Wells portrayed Russia as recovering from a total social collapse, "the completest that has ever happened to any modern social organisation." On 23 July 1934, after visiting U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Wells went to the Soviet Union and interviewed Joseph Stalin for three hours for the New Statesman magazine, which was extremely rare at that time. He told Stalin how he had seen 'the happy faces of healthy people' in contrast with his previous visit to Moscow in 1920. However, he also criticised the lawlessness, class discrimination, state violence, and absence of free expression. Stalin enjoyed the conversation and replied accordingly. As the chairman of the London-based PEN International, which protected the rights of authors to write without being intimidated, Wells hoped by his trip to USSR, he could win Stalin over by force of argument. Before he left, he realised that no reform was to happen in the near future.
Final years
Wells’s greatest literary output occurred before the First World War, which was lamented by younger authors whom he had influenced. In this connection, George Orwell described Wells as "too sane to understand the modern world", and "since 1920 he has squandered his talents in slaying paper dragons." G. K. Chesterton quipped: "Mr Wells is a born storyteller who has sold his birthright for a pot of message".
Wells had diabetes, and was a co-founder in 1934 of The Diabetic Association (now Diabetes UK, the leading charity for people with diabetes in the UK).
On 28 October 1940, on the radio station KTSA in San Antonio, Texas, Wells took part in a radio interview with Orson Welles, who two years previously had performed a famous radio adaptation of The War of the Worlds. During the interview, by Charles C Shaw, a KTSA radio host, Wells admitted his surprise at the sensation that resulted from the broadcast but acknowledged his debt to Welles for increasing sales of one of his "more obscure" titles.
Death
Wells died of unspecified causes on 13 August 1946, aged 79, at his home at 13 Hanover Terrace, overlooking Regent's Park, London. In his preface to the 1941 edition of The War in the Air, Wells had stated that his epitaph should be: "I told you so. You damned fools". Wells's body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on 16 August 1946; his ashes were subsequently scattered into the English Channel at Old Harry Rocks, the most eastern point of the Jurassic Coast and about 3.5 miles (5.6 km) from Swanage in Dorset.
A commemorative blue plaque in his honour was installed by the Greater London Council at his home in Regent's Park in 1966.
Futurist
A futurist and “visionary”, Wells foresaw the advent of aircraft, tanks, space travel, nuclear weapons, satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. Asserting that "Wells' visions of the future remain unsurpassed", John Higgs, author of Stranger Than We Can Imagine: Making Sense of the Twentieth Century, states that in the late 19th century Wells “saw the coming century clearer than anyone else. He anticipated wars in the air, the sexual revolution, motorised transport causing the growth of suburbs and a proto-Wikipedia he called the "world brain". In his novel The World Set Free, he imagined an “atomic bomb” of terrifying power that would be dropped from aeroplanes. This was an extraordinary insight for an author writing in 1913, and it made a deep impression on Winston Churchill."
In 2011, Wells was among a group of science fiction writers featured in the Prophets of Science Fiction series, a show produced and hosted by film director Sir Ridley Scott, which depicts how predictions influenced the development of scientific advancements by inspiring many readers to assist in transforming those futuristic visions into everyday reality. In a 2013 review of The Time Machine for the New Yorker magazine, Brad Leithauser writes, "At the base of Wells's great visionary exploit is this rational, ultimately scientific attempt to tease out the potential future consequences of present conditions—not as they might arise in a few years, or even decades, but millennia hence, epochs hence. He is world literature's Great Extrapolator. Like no other fiction writer before him, he embraced "deep time."
Political views
Wells was a socialist and a member of the Fabian Society. Winston Churchill was an avid reader of Wells's books, and after they first met in 1902 they kept in touch until Wells died in 1946. As a junior minister Churchill borrowed lines from Wells for one of his most famous early landmark speeches in 1906, and as Prime Minister the phrase "the gathering storm"—used by Churchill to describe the rise of Nazi Germany—had been written by Wells in The War of the Worlds, which depicts an attack on Britain by Martians. Wells's extensive writings on equality and human rights, most notably his most influential work, The Rights of Man (1940), laid the groundwork for the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the United Nations shortly after his death.
His efforts regarding the League of Nations, on which he collaborated on the project with Leonard Woolf with the booklets The Idea of a League of Nations, Prolegomena to the Study of World Organization, and The Way of the League of Nations, became a disappointment as the organization turned out to be a weak one unable to prevent the Second World War, which itself occurred towards the very end of his life and only increased the pessimistic side of his nature. In his last book Mind at the End of Its Tether (1945), he considered the idea that humanity being replaced by another species might not be a bad idea. He referred to the era between the two World Wars as "The Age of Frustration".
Religious views
Wells's views on God and religion changed over his lifetime. Early in his life he distanced himself from Christianity, and later from theism, and finally, late in life, he was essentially atheistic. Martin Gardner summarises this progression:[The younger Wells] ... did not object to using the word "God" provided it did not imply anything resembling human personality. In his middle years Wells went through a phase of defending the concept of a "finite God," similar to the god of such process theologians as Samuel Alexander, Edgar Brightman, and Charles Hartshorne. (He even wrote a book about it called God the Invisible King.) Later Wells decided he was really an atheist.
In God the Invisible King (1917), Wells wrote that his idea of God did not draw upon the traditional religions of the world: This book sets out as forcibly and exactly as possible the religious belief of the writer. [Which] is a profound belief in a personal and intimate God. ... Putting the leading idea of this book very roughly, these two antagonistic typical conceptions of God may be best contrasted by speaking of one of them as God-as-Nature or the Creator, and of the other as God-as-Christ or the Redeemer. One is the great Outward God; the other is the Inmost God. The first idea was perhaps developed most highly and completely in the God of Spinoza. It is a conception of God tending to pantheism, to an idea of a comprehensive God as ruling with justice rather than affection, to a conception of aloofness and awestriking worshipfulness. The second idea, which is contradictory to this idea of an absolute God, is the God of the human heart. The writer suggested that the great outline of the theological struggles of that phase of civilisation and world unity which produced Christianity, was a persistent but unsuccessful attempt to get these two different ideas of God into one focus. Later in the work, he aligns himself with a "renascent or modern religion ... neither atheist nor Buddhist nor Mohammedan nor Christian ... [that] he has found growing up in himself".
Of Christianity, he said: "it is not now true for me. ... Every believing Christian is, I am sure, my spiritual brother ... but if systemically I called myself a Christian I feel that to most men I should imply too much and so tell a lie". Of other world religions, he writes: "All these religions are true for me as Canterbury Cathedral is a true thing and as a Swiss chalet is a true thing. There they are, and they have served a purpose, they have worked. Only they are not true for me to live in them. ... They do not work for me". In The Fate of Homo Sapiens (1939), Wells criticised almost all world religions and philosophies, stating "there is no creed, no way of living left in the world at all, that really meets the needs of the time… When we come to look at them coolly and dispassionately, all the main religions, patriotic, moral and customary systems in which human beings are sheltering today, appear to be in a state of jostling and mutually destructive movement, like the houses and palaces and other buildings of some vast, sprawling city overtaken by a landslide.
Wells's opposition to organised religion reached a fever pitch in 1943 with publication of his book Crux Ansata, subtitled "An Indictment of the Roman Catholic Church".
Literary influence and legacy
The science fiction historian John Clute describes Wells as "the most important writer the genre has yet seen", and notes his work has been central to both British and American science fiction. Science fiction author and critic Algis Budrys said Wells "remains the outstanding expositor of both the hope, and the despair, which are embodied in the technology and which are the major facts of life in our world". He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921, 1932, 1935, and 1946. Wells so influenced real exploration of space that an impact crater on Mars (and the Moon) was named after him.
In the United Kingdom, Wells's work was a key model for the British "scientific romance", and other writers in that mode, such as Olaf Stapledon, J. D. Beresford, S. Fowler Wright, and Naomi Mitchison, all drew on Wells's example. Wells was also an important influence on British science fiction of the period after the Second World War, with Arthur C. Clarke and Brian Aldiss expressing strong admiration for Wells's work. Among contemporary British science fiction writers, Stephen Baxter, Christopher Priest and Adam Roberts have all acknowledged Wells's influence on their writing; all three are Vice-Presidents of the H. G. Wells Society. He also had a strong influence on British scientist J. B. S. Haldane, who wrote Daedalus; or, Science and the Future (1924), "The Last Judgement" and "On Being the Right Size" from the essay collection Possible Worlds (1927), and Biological Possibilities for the Human Species in the Next Ten Thousand Years (1963), which are speculations about the future of human evolution and life on other planets. Haldane gave several lectures about these topics which in turn influenced other science fiction writers.
In the United States, Hugo Gernsback reprinted most of Wells's work in the pulp magazine Amazing Stories, regarding Wells's work as "texts of central importance to the self-conscious new genre". Later American writers such as Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Frank Herbert, Carl Sagan, and Ursula K. Le Guin all recalled being influenced by Wells.
Sinclair Lewis's early novels were strongly influenced by Wells's realistic social novels, such as The History of Mr Polly; Lewis also named his first son Wells after the author. Lewis nominated H. G. Wells for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1932.
In an interview with The Paris Review, Vladimir Nabokov described Wells as his favourite writer when he was a boy and "a great artist." He went on to cite The Passionate Friends, Ann Veronica, The Time Machine, and The Country of the Blind as superior to anything else written by Wells's British contemporaries. Nabokov said: "His sociological cogitations can be safely ignored, of course, but his romances and fantasies are superb."
Jorge Luis Borges wrote many short pieces on Wells in which he demonstrates a deep familiarity with much of Wells's work. While Borges wrote several critical reviews, including a mostly negative review of Wells's film Things to Come, he regularly treated Wells as a canonical figure of fantastic literature. Late in his life, Borges included The Invisible Man and The Time Machine in his Prologue to a Personal Library, a curated list of 100 great works of literature that he undertook at the behest of the Argentine publishing house Emecé. Canadian author Margaret Atwood read Wells's books, and he also inspired writers of European speculative fiction such as Karel Čapek and Yevgeny Zamyatin.
Representations
Literary
The superhuman protagonist of J. D. Beresford's 1911 novel, The Hampdenshire Wonder, Victor Stott, was based on Wells.
In M. P. Shiel's short story "The Primate of the Rose" (1928), there is an unpleasant womaniser named E. P. Crooks, who was written as a parody of Wells. Wells had attacked Shiel's Prince Zaleski when it was published in 1895, and this was Shiel's response. Wells praised Shiel's The Purple Cloud (1901); in turn Shiel expressed admiration for Wells, referring to him at a speech to the Horsham Rotary Club in 1933 as "my friend Mr. Wells".
In C. S. Lewis's novel That Hideous Strength (1945), the character Jules is a caricature of Wells, and much of Lewis's science fiction was written both under the influence of Wells and as an antithesis to his work (or, as he put it, an "exorcism" of the influence it had on him).
In Brian Aldiss's novella The Saliva Tree (1966), Wells has a small off-screen guest role.
In Saul Bellow's novel Mr. Sammler's Planet (1970), Wells is one of several historical figures the protagonist met when he was a young man.
In The Dancers at the End of Time by Michael Moorcock (1976) Wells has an important part.
In The Map of Time (2008) by Spanish author Félix J. Palma; Wells is one of several historical characters.
Wells is one of the two Georges in Paul Levinson's 2013 time-travel novelette, "Ian, George, and George," published in Analog magazine.
Dramatic
Rod Taylor portrays Wells in the 1960 science fiction film The Time Machine (based on the novel of the same name), in which Wells uses his time machine to try and find his Utopian society.
Malcolm McDowell portrays Wells in the 1979 science fiction film Time After Time, in which Wells uses a time machine to pursue Jack the Ripper to the present day. In the film, Wells meets "Amy" in the future who then returns to 1893 to become his second wife Amy Catherine Robbins.
Wells is portrayed in the 1985 story Timelash from the 22nd season of the BBC science-fiction television series Doctor Who. In this story, Herbert, an enthusiastic temporary companion to the Doctor, is revealed to be a young H. G. Wells. The plot is loosely based upon the themes and characters of The Time Machine with references to The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man and The Island of Doctor Moreau. The story jokingly suggests that Wells's inspiration for his later novels came from his adventure with the Sixth Doctor.
In the BBC2 anthology series Encounters about imagined meetings between historical figures, Beautiful Lies, by Paul Pender (15 August 1992) centred on an acrimonious dinner party attended by Wells (Richard Todd), George Orwell (Jon Finch), and William Empson (Patrick Ryecart).
The character of Wells also appeared in several episodes of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (1993–1997), usually pitted against the time-travelling villain known as Tempus (Lane Davies). Wells's younger self was played by Terry Kiser, and the older Wells was played by Hamilton Camp.
In the British TV mini-series The Infinite Worlds of H. G. Wells (2001), several of Wells's short stories are dramatised but are adapted using Wells himself (Tom Ward) as the main protagonist in each story.
In the Disney Channel Original Series Phil of the Future, which centres on time-travel, the present-day high school that the main characters attend is named "H. G. Wells".
In the 2006 television docudrama H. G. Wells: War with the World, Wells is played by Michael Sheen.
Television episode "World's End" of Cold Case (2007) is about the discovery of human remains in the bottom of a well leads to the reinvestigation of the case of a housewife who went missing during Orson Welles' radio broadcast of "War of the Worlds".
On the science fiction television series Warehouse 13 (2009–2014), there is a female version Helena G. Wells. When she appeared she explained that her brother was her front for her writing because a female science fiction author would not be accepted.
Comedian Paul F. Tompkins portrays a fictional Wells as the host of The Dead Authors Podcast, wherein Wells uses his time machine to bring dead authors (played by other comedians) to the present and interview them.
H. G. Wells as a young boy appears in the Legends of Tomorrow episode "The Magnificent Eight". In this story, the boy Wells is dying of consumption but is cured by a time-travelling Martin Stein.
In the four part series The Nightmare Worlds of H. G. Wells (2016), Wells is played by Ray Winstone.
In the 2017 television series version of Time After Time, based on the 1979 film, H. G. Wells is portrayed by Freddie Stroma.
In the 2019 television adaptation of The War of the Worlds, the character of 'George', played by Rafe Spall, demonstrates a number of elements of Wells's own life, including his estrangement from his wife and unmarried co-habitation with the character of 'Amy'.
Literary papers
In 1954, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign purchased the H. G. Wells literary papers and correspondence collection. The University's Rare Book & Manuscript Library holds the largest collection of Wells manuscripts, correspondence, first editions and publications in the United States. Among these is unpublished material and the manuscripts of such works as The War of the Worlds and The Time Machine. The collection includes first editions, revisions and translations. The letters contain general family correspondence, communications from publishers, material regarding the Fabian Society, and letters from politicians and public figures, most notably George Bernard Shaw and Joseph Conrad.
Bibliography
See also
References
Further reading
Dickson, Lovat. H. G. Wells: His Turbulent Life & Times. 1969.
Foot, Michael. H. G.: History of Mr. Wells. Doubleday, 1985 (), Black Swan, New edition, Oct 1996 (paperback, )
Gilmour, David. The Long Recessional: The Imperial Life of Rudyard Kipling. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002 (paperback, ); 2003 (paperback, ).
Gomme, A. W., Mr. Wells as Historian. Glasgow: MacLehose, Jackson, and Co., 1921.
Gosling, John. Waging the War of the Worlds. Jefferson, North Carolina, McFarland, 2009 (paperback, ).
Jasanoff, Maya, "The Future Was His" (review of Sarah Cole, Inventing Tomorrow: H.G. Wells and the Twentieth Century, Columbia University Press, 374 pp.), The New York Review of Books, vol. LXVII, no. 12 (23 July 2020), pp. 50–51. Writes Jasanoff (p. 51): "Although [Wells] was prophetically right, and right-minded, about some things... [n]owhere was he more disturbingly wrong than in his loathsome affinity for eugenics..."
Lynn, Andrea The secret love life of H.G. Wells
Mackenzie, Norman and Jean, The Time Traveller: the Life of H G Wells, London: Weidenfeld, 1973,
Mauthner, Martin. German Writers in French Exile, 1933–1940, London: Vallentine and Mitchell, 2007, .
McLean, Steven. 'The Early Fiction of H. G. Wells: Fantasies of Science'. Palgrave, 2009, .
Partington, John S. Building Cosmopolis: The Political Thought of H. G. Wells. Ashgate, 2003, .
Roberts, Adam. H G Wells A Literary Life. Springer International Publishing, 2019, ISBN 9783030264215.
Shadurski, Maxim. The Nationality of Utopia: H. G. Wells, England, and the World State. London: Routledge, 2020, .
Sherborne, Michael. H. G. Wells: Another Kind of Life. London: Peter Owen, 2010, .
Smith, David C., H. G. Wells: Desperately Mortal: A Biography. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986,
West, Anthony. H. G. Wells: Aspects of a Life. London: Hutchinson, 1984.
External links
Future Tense – The Story of H. G. Wells at BBC One – 150th anniversary documentary (2016)
"In the footsteps of H G Wells" at New Statesman – "The great author called for a Human Rights Act; 60 years later, we have it" (2000)
Sources—collections
*
Free H. G. Wells downloads for iPhone, iPad, Nook, Android, and Kindle in PDF and all popular eBook reader formats (AZW3, EPUB, MOBI) at ebooktakeaway.com
H G Wells at the British Library
H. G. Wells papers at University of Illinois
Ebooks by H. G. Wells at Global Grey Ebooks
Sources—letters, essays and interviews
Archive of Wells's BBC broadcasts
Film interview with H. G. Wells
"Stephen Crane. From an English Standpoint", by Wells, 1900.
Rabindranath Tagore: In conversation with H. G. Wells. Rabindranath Tagore and Wells conversing in Geneva in 1930.
"Introduction", to W. N. P. Barbellion's The Journal of a Disappointed Man, by Wells, 1919.
"Woman and Primitive Culture", by Wells, 1895.
Letter, to M. P. Shiel, by Wells, 1937.
Biography
"H. G. Wells". In Encyclopædia Britannica Online.
Critical essays
An introduction to The War of the Worlds by Iain Sinclair on the British Library's Discovering Literature website.
"An Appreciation of H. G. Wells", by Mary Austin, 1911.
"Socialism and the Family" (1906) by Belfort Bax, Part 1, Part 2.
"H. G. Wells warned us how it would feel to fight a War of the Worlds", by Niall Ferguson, in The Telegraph, 24 June 2005.
"H. G. Wells's Idea of a World Brain: A Critical Re-assessment", by W. Boyd Rayward, in Journal of the American Society for Information Science 50 (15 May 1999): 557–579
"Mr H. G. Wells and the Giants", by G. K. Chesterton, from his book Heretics (1908).
"The Internet: a world brain?", by Martin Gardner, in Skeptical Inquirer, Jan–Feb 1999.
"Science Fiction: The Shape of Things to Come", by Mark Bould, in The Socialist Review, May 2005.
"Who needs Utopia? A dialogue with my utopian self (with apologies, and thanks, to H. G. Wells)", by Gregory Claeys in Spaces of Utopia: An Electronic Journal, no 1, Spring 2006.
"When H. G. Wells Split the Atom: A 1914 Preview of 1945", by Freda Kirchwey, in The Nation, posted 4 September 2003 (original 18 August 1945 issue).
"Wells, Hitler and the World State", by George Orwell. First published: Horizon. GB, London. Aug 1941.
"War of the Worldviews", by John J. Miller, in The Wall Street Journal Opinion Journal, 21 June 2005.
"Wells's Autobiography", by John Hart, from New International, Vol.2 No.2, Mar 1935, pp. 75–76.
"History in the Science Fiction of H. G. Wells", by Patrick Parrinder, Cycnos, 22.2 (2006).
"From the World Brain to the Worldwide Web", by Martin Campbell-Kelly, Gresham College Lecture, 9 November 2006.
"The Beginning of Wisdom: On Reading H. G. Wells", by Vivian Gornick, Boston Review, 31.1 (2007).
John Hammond, The Complete List of Short Stories of H. G. Wells
"H. G. Wells Predictions Ring True, 143 Years Later" at National Geographic
"H. G. Wells, the man I knew" Obituary of Wells by George Bernard Shaw, at the New Statesman
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Writers about globalization
Writers about religion and science
Writers about the Soviet Union
Writers of fiction set in prehistoric times
Writers of Gothic fiction
Writers who illustrated their own writing
Writers with disabilities | false | [
"\"What Did I Do to You?\" is a song recorded by British singer Lisa Stansfield for her 1989 album, Affection. It was written by Stansfield, Ian Devaney and Andy Morris, and produced by Devaney and Morris. The song was released as the fourth European single on 30 April 1990. It included three previously unreleased songs written by Stansfield, Devaney and Morris: \"My Apple Heart,\" \"Lay Me Down\" and \"Something's Happenin'.\" \"What Did I Do to You?\" was remixed by Mark Saunders and by the Grammy Award-winning American house music DJ and producer, David Morales. The single became a top forty hit in the European countries reaching number eighteen in Finland, number twenty in Ireland and number twenty-five in the United Kingdom. \"What Did I Do to You?\" was also released in Japan.\n\nIn 2014, the remixes of \"What Did I Do to You?\" were included on the deluxe 2CD + DVD re-release of Affection and on People Hold On ... The Remix Anthology. They were also featured on The Collection 1989–2003 box set (2014), including previously unreleased Red Zone Mix by David Morales.\n\nCritical reception\nThe song received positive reviews from music critics. Matthew Hocter from Albumism viewed it as a \"upbeat offering\". David Giles from Music Week said it is \"beautifully performed\" by Stansfield. A reviewer from Reading Eagle wrote that \"What Did I Do to You?\" \"would be right at home on the \"Saturday Night Fever\" soundtrack.\"\n\nMusic video\nA music video was produced to promote the single, directed by Philip Richardson, who had previously directed the videos for \"All Around the World\" and \"Live Together\". It features Stansfield with her kiss curls, dressed in a white outfit and performing with her band on a stage in front of a jumping audience. The video was later published on Stansfield's official YouTube channel in November 2009. It has amassed more than 1,6 million views as of October 2021.\n\nTrack listings\n\n European/UK 7\" single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Mark Saunders Remix Edit) – 4:20\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:59\n\n European/UK/Japanese CD single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Mark Saunders Remix Edit) – 4:20\n\"My Apple Heart\" – 5:19\n\"Lay Me Down\" – 4:17\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:59\n\n UK 10\" single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Mark Saunders Remix) – 5:52\n\"My Apple Heart\" – 5:19\n\"Lay Me Down\" – 4:17\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:59\n\n European/UK 12\" single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Morales Mix) – 7:59\n\"My Apple Heart\" – 4:22\n\"Lay Me Down\" – 3:19\n\"Something's Happenin'\" – 3:15\n\n UK 12\" promotional single\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Morales Mix) – 7:59\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Anti Poll Tax Dub) – 6:31\n\n Other remixes\n\"What Did I Do to You?\" (Red Zone Mix) – 7:45\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\nLisa Stansfield songs\n1990 singles\nSongs written by Lisa Stansfield\n1989 songs\nArista Records singles\nSongs written by Ian Devaney\nSongs written by Andy Morris (musician)",
"Follow Me! is a series of television programmes produced by Bayerischer Rundfunk and the BBC in the late 1970s to provide a crash course in the English language. It became popular in many overseas countries as a first introduction to English; in 1983, one hundred million people watched the show in China alone, featuring Kathy Flower.\n\nThe British actor Francis Matthews hosted and narrated the series.\n\nThe course consists of sixty lessons. Each lesson lasts from 12 to 15 minutes and covers a specific lexis. The lessons follow a consistent group of actors, with the relationships between their characters developing during the course.\n\nFollow Me! actors\n Francis Matthews\n Raymond Mason\n David Savile\n Ian Bamforth\n Keith Alexander\n Diane Mercer\n Jane Argyle\n Diana King\n Veronica Leigh\n Elaine Wells\n Danielle Cohn\n Lashawnda Bell\n\nEpisodes \n \"What's your name\"\n \"How are you\"\n \"Can you help me\"\n \"Left, right, straight ahead\"\n \"Where are they\"\n \"What's the time\"\n \"What's this What's that\"\n \"I like it very much\"\n \"Have you got any wine\"\n \"What are they doing\"\n \"Can I have your name, please\"\n \"What does she look like\"\n \"No smoking\"\n \"It's on the first floor\"\n \"Where's he gone\"\n \"Going away\"\n \"Buying things\"\n \"Why do you like it\"\n \"What do you need\"\n \"I sometimes work late\"\n \"Welcome to Britain\"\n \"Who's that\"\n \"What would you like to do\"\n \"How can I get there?\"\n \"Where is it\"\n \"What's the date\"\n \"Whose is it\"\n \"I enjoy it\"\n \"How many and how much\"\n \"What have you done\"\n \"Haven't we met before\"\n \"What did you say\"\n \"Please stop\"\n \"How can I get to Brightly\"\n \"Where can I get it\"\n \"There's a concert on Wednesday\"\n \"What's it like\"\n \"What do you think of him\"\n \"I need someone\"\n \"What were you doing\"\n \"What do you do\"\n \"What do you know about him\"\n \"You shouldn't do that\"\n \"I hope you enjoy your holiday\"\n \"Where can I see a football match\"\n \"When will it be ready\"\n \"Where did you go\"\n \"I think it's awful\"\n \"A room with a view\"\n \"You'll be ill\"\n \"I don't believe in strikes\"\n \"They look tired\"\n \"Would you like to\"\n \"Holiday plans\"\n \"The second shelf on the left\"\n \"When you are ready\"\n \"Tell them about Britain\"\n \"I liked everything\"\n \"Classical or modern\"\n \"Finale\"\n\nReferences \n\n BBC article about the series in China\n\nExternal links \n Follow Me – Beginner level \n Follow Me – Elementary level\n Follow Me – Intermediate level\n Follow Me – Advanced level\n\nAdult education television series\nEnglish-language education television programming"
] |
[
"Steven Seagal",
"Martial arts"
] | C_9aa7eeb265cb4e8897009f1c9139a870_1 | When did Seagal get involved in martial arts? | 1 | When did Steven Seagal get involved in martial arts? | Steven Seagal | Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. The date of his journey has become a point of contention due to Seagal's statement that he studied with Morihei Uyeshiba, the founder of aikido, who died in 1969. Terry Dobson, a fifth-degree black belt who studied with the master from 1961 to 1969, dismissed this claim, saying, "That story is bull. [Back then] I never heard of Steven Seagal." By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman. Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. CANNOTANSWER | saying, | Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan, becoming the first foreigner to operate an aikido dojo in the country. He later moved to Los Angeles, California, where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in Above the Law. By 1991, he had starred in four films. In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in Under Siege. During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film The Patriot. Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including Steven Seagal: Lawman, which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.
Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, Songs from the Crystal Cave and Mojo Priest, and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has also been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. In addition, Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.
From 1996 to 2018, multiple women accused Seagal of sexual harassment or assault.
Early life
Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan on April 10, 1952, the son of medical technician Patricia (1930–2003) and high school mathematics teacher Samuel Seagal (1928–1991). His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told People magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. However, it was while working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove that he was encouraged to visit Japan.
Martial arts
Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.
Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.
Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011.
Career
1987–2002
In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, Above the Law (titled Nico in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of Under Siege (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.
Seagal hosted the April 20, 1991 episode of the late night variety show Saturday Night Live, which aired as the 18th episode of the 16th season. The series' long-time producer Lorne Michaels and the cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows regarded Seagal as the show's worst-ever host. Spade and Meadows cite Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the show's cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because that skit's title characters stated that they could beat up Seagal. Seagal was never invited back to the show following that episode. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied, "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."
Seagal directed and starred in On Deadly Ground (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. On Deadly Ground was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, Under Siege, titled Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995). In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film Executive Decision, portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama The Glimmer Man (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, Fire Down Below (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.
In 1998, Seagal made The Patriot, another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.
After producing Prince of Central Park, Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of Exit Wounds in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie Ticker, co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before Exit Wounds, and went straight to DVD. Half Past Dead, starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.
2003 to present day: direct-to-video films and television
Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's Machete, all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include Black Dawn, Belly of the Beast, Out of Reach, Submerged, Kill Switch, Urban Justice, Pistol Whipped, Against the Dark, Driven to Kill, A Dangerous Man, Born to Raise Hell, and The Keeper.
In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series Steven Seagal: Lawman, focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.
In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. Maximum Conviction, Force of Execution, Gutshot Straight, Code of Honor, Sniper: Special Ops, The Asian Connection, The Perfect Weapon, Cartels, and China Salesman all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.
In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled True Justice. The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, True Justice has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.
Themes and motifs
Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in Under Siege, a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in The Glimmer Man, an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in The Foreigner and Black Dawn, an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's Machete, which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.
In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published Seagalogy, a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.
Other ventures
Music
Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including Fire Down Below and Ticker. Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.
In 2005, he released his first album, Songs from the Crystal Cave, which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film Into the Sun features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled Mojo Priest, was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.
Law enforcement work
Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) was so impressed that he asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal allegedly graduated from a police academy in Los Angeles over twenty years prior and has a certificate from Peace Officer Standards & Training (POST), an organization that accredits California police officers. However, POST officials in California and Louisiana have no record of Seagal being certified, and Seagal's rank in Louisiana is therefore ceremonial.
Steven Seagal: Lawman, a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.
On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.
Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.
In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.
Business ventures
In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.
In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".
Personal life
Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.
Residences
Seagal owns a dude ranch in Colorado, a home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Los Angeles, and a home in Louisiana.
Religion
Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Seagal's recognition aroused controversy in the American Buddhist community, with Helen Tworkov commenting in Tricycle impugning the extent of Seagal's "spiritual wisdom" and suggesting that Seagal bought his Buddhahood by donations to Penor's Kunzang Palyul Choling center. Penor Rinpoche responded to the controversy by saying that Seagal, although acting in violent movies, had not actually killed people, and that Seagal was merely recognized, whereas enthronement as a tulku would require first a "lengthy process of study and practice".
Citizenship
Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses jus soli U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.
Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."
Relationships and family
While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.
During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".
Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.
Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.
Allegations and lawsuits
Early 1990s
In May 1991 (during the filming of Out for Justice), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".
In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for Under Siege 2.
1995 lawsuit
In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of On Deadly Ground. In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".
2010 lawsuit
On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.
2011 lawsuit
On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman. Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.
2017 allegations
In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants. On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.
2018 allegations and investigation
On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, Out for a Kill (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie On Deadly Ground.
2020 federal securities violation settlement
On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.
Victim of attempted extortion
Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with Marked for Death in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost. Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of Exit Wounds in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone bluntly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie. If Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him. Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.
On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003 and, in February 2004, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.
Conflicts with stuntmen
Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.
Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for Out for Justice, LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.
LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."
On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."
Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.
Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on Executive Decision, in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall.
Political views and activism
Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, Medicine Lake Video. The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.
In 1999, Seagal was awarded a PETA Humanitarian Award.
In a March 2014 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson, had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet stating, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law." In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by president Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him because he "committed socially dangerous actions".
Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
In 2017, Seagal collaborated with former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, Tom Morrissey, in writing a self-published conspiracy thriller novel, The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State And The Hijacking Of America, which featured a Tohono Shadow Wolf tracker working for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to foil a plot by Mexican drug cartels and the "deep state" to smuggle in Islamist terrorists to the United States through the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2021, Seagal gifted a katana sword to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry special envoy while visiting Canaima National Park. Maduro referred to Seagal as "my brother."
On May 30, 2021, the pro-Kremlin systemic opposition party A Just Russia — Patriots — For Truth announced that Seagal had received an official membership card to the party.
Stunts
Filmography
Films
Television
Awards and nominations
Discography
2005: Songs from the Crystal Cave
2006: Mojo Priest
References
External links
1952 births
Living people
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male actors
21st-century American male musicians
21st-century Russian male actors
21st-century Serbian male actors
Activists from California
American actor-politicians
American aikidoka
American blues singers
American country singers
American deputy sheriffs
American drink industry businesspeople
American emigrants to Russia
American environmentalists
American expatriates in Japan
American kendoka
American male film actors
American male guitarists
American male judoka
American male karateka
American male singers
American people of Irish descent
American people of Jewish descent
American stunt performers
Businesspeople from California
Businesspeople from Louisiana
Businesspeople from Michigan
Converts to Buddhism
Country musicians from Louisiana
Country musicians from Michigan
Country musicians from Tennessee
Golden Raspberry Award winners
Guitarists from Michigan
Male actors from Fullerton, California
Male actors from Lansing, Michigan
Naturalised citizens of Russia
Naturalized citizens of Serbia
Nyingma tulkus
Participants in American reality television series
People from Eltingville, Staten Island
People from Germantown, Tennessee
People from Jefferson Parish, Louisiana
People from Mandeville Canyon, Los Angeles
Russian businesspeople
Russian male film actors
Russian male judoka
Russian male karateka
Russian martial artists
Russian people of Irish descent
Russian people of Jewish descent
Russian stunt performers
Serbian businesspeople
Serbian male film actors
Serbian male judoka
Serbian male karateka
Serbian people of Irish descent
Serbian people of Jewish descent
Serbian stunt performers
Tibetan Buddhists from Russia
Tibetan Buddhists from the United States | false | [
"Robert Alan Wall (August 22, 1939 – January 30, 2022) was an American actor and martial artist.\n\nEarly life\nWall was born on August 22, 1939 in San Jose, California to Ray Wall, a construction worker and Reva (Wingo) Wall, a nurse. While in high school, he took up wrestling. Wall attended San Jose State University on a scholarship, and later moved to southern California.\n\nCareer\n\nTraining\nWall studied Okinawan martial arts under Gordon Doversola. In 1966, he, along with karate champion Joe Lewis, opened the Sherman Oaks Karate Studio in Sherman Oaks, California. In 1968, Lewis sold his share of the studio to Chuck Norris. Robert Wall featured in a number of films, most notably three appearances with Bruce Lee: the 1972 film Way of the Dragon, as O'Harra in Enter the Dragon in 1973, and Game of Death, Bruce Lee's incomplete film re-cut in 1978. He has small roles in Norris films, such as Code of Silence (1985), Firewalker (1986), and Hero and the Terror (1988).\n\nWall studied several arts under many notable masters. They included Judo under Gene LeBell, Okinawan Shorin-Ryu under Joe Lewis, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu under the Machado Brothers.\n\nConflict with Steven Seagal\nWall was particularly famous for his public rivalry with Steven Seagal, which provoked a series of challenges between the two between 1988 and 1992. It started when Seagal made disparaging commentaries about Bruce Lee, Chuck Norris, and other American martial artists in interviews, culminating in two articles in the Black Belt magazine where he claimed he would fight to the death anybody who believed they could defeat him.\n\nIndignant at Seagal's slights of Lee and American martial artists, as well as offended by his boasts, Wall gathered a group of martial artists willing to answer the challenge, who were nicknamed the \"Dirty Dozen\" in a reference to the 1967 war film The Dirty Dozen. The group included Benny Urquidez, Bill Wallace, Howard Jackson, Roger Carpenter, Allen Steen, Jim Harrison, Dennis Alexio, Richard Norton, Billy Robertson, Pat Burleson, and William \"Blinky\" Rodriguez, with Gene LeBell and Gerard Finot as potential members and Karyn Turner as a possible promoter for one or more matches.\n\nThe Dirty Dozen were controversial in the martial arts community, with some deriding them as an overreaction and a promotion of violence. LeBell later revealed the affair was hurting him professionally and forced him to withdraw, while Urquidez and Burleson became reportedly unhappy with the group's concept. However, several other members claimed to be content with the campaign alone, with Rodriguez declaring, \"just by not accepting the challenge, Seagal tells us where he's at.\"\n\nOther work\nIn 2009, Wall starred as a bodyguard in the film Blood and Bone.\n\nPersonal life and death\nWall was a 9th degree black belt under Chuck Norris and the co-founder and CEO of a martial arts organization known as World Black Belt Inc. In 1975, Wall authored the book Who's Who in the Martial Arts and Directory of Black Belts (Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 75-2280), the first book of its kind for martial artists.\n\nHe died in Los Angeles on January 30, 2022, at the age of 82.\n\nFilmography\n\nFilms\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nWorld Black Belt Inc.\n Bob Wall Interview at cityonfire.com\n\n1939 births\n2022 deaths\nSan Jose State University alumni\nAmerican chun kuk do practitioners\nAmerican male film actors\nAmerican male karateka\nAmerican tang soo do practitioners\nMale actors from Los Angeles\nMale actors from San Jose, California\nSportspeople from San Jose, California",
". Born in Osaka, Matsuoka was first introduced to martial arts through judo as part of his required physical education curriculum in high school. His father, Shiro Matsuoka, then enrolled Haruo in a summer camp where he would witness his first aikido demonstration.\n\nReturning home from summer camp, Haruo began taking aikido classes at a local dojo, but his teacher wasn't very good. In 1975, Steven Seagal began teaching aikido in Japan with his then wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido sensei and 2nd dan aikidoka herself, at her father's dojo.\n\nMatsuoka would remark to Black Belt Magazine in 2014, “When I first met Seagal sensei, his Japanese wasn't so fluent, but his technique was remarkable — unlike what I'd seen before. He was so fast, very fluid. Seeing him doing aikido changed my life.\" Matsuoka signed up on the spot.\n\nBy 1978, Matsuoka had earned his black belt ranking and began teaching classes in Japan with Seagal & Fujitani. In 1983, he would follow Seagal to Los Angeles to open their first dojo. The first years were difficult as Americans didn't understand what aikido was or had any concept what its benefits were, but that changed when Seagal's \"Above the Law\" was released in 1988, showcasing his modern style of aikido for a wider audience, creating a resurgence in popularity for aikido around the world.\n\nMatsuoka continued to serve as chief instructor at Seagal's dojo while Seagal's career took off, eventually leaving in 1997 to return to Japan and the roots of aikido he felt had diverged with Seagal. He would seek out Seiseki Abe, one of aikido founder Morihei Ueshiba's most revered students and also Ueshiba's teacher in Japanese calligraphy.\n\nMatsuoka would receive his 5th dan ranking from Abe and return to Los Angeles in 1999 to continue his mission of promoting Japanese culture through aikido, opening dojos in Culver City and Irvine. Matsuoka then founded the Aikido Doshinokai Association to tie together the many adherents of his particular style combining the original fluidity taught by Ueshiba with the harder style of Seagal.\n\nMatsuoka continues to seek further mastery in aikido, receiving his 6th dan from Moriteru Ueshiba, Morihei's grandson and current Doshu (hereditary head) of the aikikai in 2012, and has participated in exchange programs with martial arts masters of other disciplines such as Dan Inosanto (disciple of Bruce Lee), and Kenji Yamaki (1995 Kyokushin Karate World Champion). He continues to teach, participating in regular seminars for students around the world in Belgium, France, Poland, Spain, Italy, as well as at his own schools in Los Angeles.\n\nReferences\n\n1958 births\n\nLiving people\n\nJapanese aikidoka\n\nShihan\nStunt performers\nPeople from Osaka"
] |
[
"Steven Seagal",
"Martial arts",
"When did Seagal get involved in martial arts?",
"saying,"
] | C_9aa7eeb265cb4e8897009f1c9139a870_1 | What kind of martial arts was Seagal doing? | 2 | What kind of martial arts does Steven Seagal do? | Steven Seagal | Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. The date of his journey has become a point of contention due to Seagal's statement that he studied with Morihei Uyeshiba, the founder of aikido, who died in 1969. Terry Dobson, a fifth-degree black belt who studied with the master from 1961 to 1969, dismissed this claim, saying, "That story is bull. [Back then] I never heard of Steven Seagal." By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman. Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. CANNOTANSWER | By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master | Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan, becoming the first foreigner to operate an aikido dojo in the country. He later moved to Los Angeles, California, where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in Above the Law. By 1991, he had starred in four films. In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in Under Siege. During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film The Patriot. Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including Steven Seagal: Lawman, which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.
Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, Songs from the Crystal Cave and Mojo Priest, and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has also been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. In addition, Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.
From 1996 to 2018, multiple women accused Seagal of sexual harassment or assault.
Early life
Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan on April 10, 1952, the son of medical technician Patricia (1930–2003) and high school mathematics teacher Samuel Seagal (1928–1991). His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told People magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. However, it was while working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove that he was encouraged to visit Japan.
Martial arts
Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.
Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.
Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011.
Career
1987–2002
In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, Above the Law (titled Nico in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of Under Siege (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.
Seagal hosted the April 20, 1991 episode of the late night variety show Saturday Night Live, which aired as the 18th episode of the 16th season. The series' long-time producer Lorne Michaels and the cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows regarded Seagal as the show's worst-ever host. Spade and Meadows cite Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the show's cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because that skit's title characters stated that they could beat up Seagal. Seagal was never invited back to the show following that episode. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied, "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."
Seagal directed and starred in On Deadly Ground (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. On Deadly Ground was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, Under Siege, titled Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995). In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film Executive Decision, portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama The Glimmer Man (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, Fire Down Below (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.
In 1998, Seagal made The Patriot, another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.
After producing Prince of Central Park, Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of Exit Wounds in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie Ticker, co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before Exit Wounds, and went straight to DVD. Half Past Dead, starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.
2003 to present day: direct-to-video films and television
Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's Machete, all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include Black Dawn, Belly of the Beast, Out of Reach, Submerged, Kill Switch, Urban Justice, Pistol Whipped, Against the Dark, Driven to Kill, A Dangerous Man, Born to Raise Hell, and The Keeper.
In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series Steven Seagal: Lawman, focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.
In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. Maximum Conviction, Force of Execution, Gutshot Straight, Code of Honor, Sniper: Special Ops, The Asian Connection, The Perfect Weapon, Cartels, and China Salesman all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.
In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled True Justice. The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, True Justice has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.
Themes and motifs
Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in Under Siege, a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in The Glimmer Man, an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in The Foreigner and Black Dawn, an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's Machete, which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.
In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published Seagalogy, a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.
Other ventures
Music
Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including Fire Down Below and Ticker. Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.
In 2005, he released his first album, Songs from the Crystal Cave, which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film Into the Sun features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled Mojo Priest, was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.
Law enforcement work
Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) was so impressed that he asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal allegedly graduated from a police academy in Los Angeles over twenty years prior and has a certificate from Peace Officer Standards & Training (POST), an organization that accredits California police officers. However, POST officials in California and Louisiana have no record of Seagal being certified, and Seagal's rank in Louisiana is therefore ceremonial.
Steven Seagal: Lawman, a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.
On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.
Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.
In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.
Business ventures
In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.
In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".
Personal life
Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.
Residences
Seagal owns a dude ranch in Colorado, a home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Los Angeles, and a home in Louisiana.
Religion
Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Seagal's recognition aroused controversy in the American Buddhist community, with Helen Tworkov commenting in Tricycle impugning the extent of Seagal's "spiritual wisdom" and suggesting that Seagal bought his Buddhahood by donations to Penor's Kunzang Palyul Choling center. Penor Rinpoche responded to the controversy by saying that Seagal, although acting in violent movies, had not actually killed people, and that Seagal was merely recognized, whereas enthronement as a tulku would require first a "lengthy process of study and practice".
Citizenship
Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses jus soli U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.
Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."
Relationships and family
While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.
During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".
Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.
Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.
Allegations and lawsuits
Early 1990s
In May 1991 (during the filming of Out for Justice), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".
In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for Under Siege 2.
1995 lawsuit
In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of On Deadly Ground. In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".
2010 lawsuit
On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.
2011 lawsuit
On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman. Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.
2017 allegations
In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants. On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.
2018 allegations and investigation
On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, Out for a Kill (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie On Deadly Ground.
2020 federal securities violation settlement
On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.
Victim of attempted extortion
Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with Marked for Death in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost. Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of Exit Wounds in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone bluntly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie. If Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him. Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.
On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003 and, in February 2004, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.
Conflicts with stuntmen
Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.
Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for Out for Justice, LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.
LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."
On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."
Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.
Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on Executive Decision, in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall.
Political views and activism
Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, Medicine Lake Video. The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.
In 1999, Seagal was awarded a PETA Humanitarian Award.
In a March 2014 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson, had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet stating, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law." In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by president Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him because he "committed socially dangerous actions".
Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
In 2017, Seagal collaborated with former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, Tom Morrissey, in writing a self-published conspiracy thriller novel, The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State And The Hijacking Of America, which featured a Tohono Shadow Wolf tracker working for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to foil a plot by Mexican drug cartels and the "deep state" to smuggle in Islamist terrorists to the United States through the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2021, Seagal gifted a katana sword to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry special envoy while visiting Canaima National Park. Maduro referred to Seagal as "my brother."
On May 30, 2021, the pro-Kremlin systemic opposition party A Just Russia — Patriots — For Truth announced that Seagal had received an official membership card to the party.
Stunts
Filmography
Films
Television
Awards and nominations
Discography
2005: Songs from the Crystal Cave
2006: Mojo Priest
References
External links
1952 births
Living people
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male actors
21st-century American male musicians
21st-century Russian male actors
21st-century Serbian male actors
Activists from California
American actor-politicians
American aikidoka
American blues singers
American country singers
American deputy sheriffs
American drink industry businesspeople
American emigrants to Russia
American environmentalists
American expatriates in Japan
American kendoka
American male film actors
American male guitarists
American male judoka
American male karateka
American male singers
American people of Irish descent
American people of Jewish descent
American stunt performers
Businesspeople from California
Businesspeople from Louisiana
Businesspeople from Michigan
Converts to Buddhism
Country musicians from Louisiana
Country musicians from Michigan
Country musicians from Tennessee
Golden Raspberry Award winners
Guitarists from Michigan
Male actors from Fullerton, California
Male actors from Lansing, Michigan
Naturalised citizens of Russia
Naturalized citizens of Serbia
Nyingma tulkus
Participants in American reality television series
People from Eltingville, Staten Island
People from Germantown, Tennessee
People from Jefferson Parish, Louisiana
People from Mandeville Canyon, Los Angeles
Russian businesspeople
Russian male film actors
Russian male judoka
Russian male karateka
Russian martial artists
Russian people of Irish descent
Russian people of Jewish descent
Russian stunt performers
Serbian businesspeople
Serbian male film actors
Serbian male judoka
Serbian male karateka
Serbian people of Irish descent
Serbian people of Jewish descent
Serbian stunt performers
Tibetan Buddhists from Russia
Tibetan Buddhists from the United States | false | [
". Born in Osaka, Matsuoka was first introduced to martial arts through judo as part of his required physical education curriculum in high school. His father, Shiro Matsuoka, then enrolled Haruo in a summer camp where he would witness his first aikido demonstration.\n\nReturning home from summer camp, Haruo began taking aikido classes at a local dojo, but his teacher wasn't very good. In 1975, Steven Seagal began teaching aikido in Japan with his then wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido sensei and 2nd dan aikidoka herself, at her father's dojo.\n\nMatsuoka would remark to Black Belt Magazine in 2014, “When I first met Seagal sensei, his Japanese wasn't so fluent, but his technique was remarkable — unlike what I'd seen before. He was so fast, very fluid. Seeing him doing aikido changed my life.\" Matsuoka signed up on the spot.\n\nBy 1978, Matsuoka had earned his black belt ranking and began teaching classes in Japan with Seagal & Fujitani. In 1983, he would follow Seagal to Los Angeles to open their first dojo. The first years were difficult as Americans didn't understand what aikido was or had any concept what its benefits were, but that changed when Seagal's \"Above the Law\" was released in 1988, showcasing his modern style of aikido for a wider audience, creating a resurgence in popularity for aikido around the world.\n\nMatsuoka continued to serve as chief instructor at Seagal's dojo while Seagal's career took off, eventually leaving in 1997 to return to Japan and the roots of aikido he felt had diverged with Seagal. He would seek out Seiseki Abe, one of aikido founder Morihei Ueshiba's most revered students and also Ueshiba's teacher in Japanese calligraphy.\n\nMatsuoka would receive his 5th dan ranking from Abe and return to Los Angeles in 1999 to continue his mission of promoting Japanese culture through aikido, opening dojos in Culver City and Irvine. Matsuoka then founded the Aikido Doshinokai Association to tie together the many adherents of his particular style combining the original fluidity taught by Ueshiba with the harder style of Seagal.\n\nMatsuoka continues to seek further mastery in aikido, receiving his 6th dan from Moriteru Ueshiba, Morihei's grandson and current Doshu (hereditary head) of the aikikai in 2012, and has participated in exchange programs with martial arts masters of other disciplines such as Dan Inosanto (disciple of Bruce Lee), and Kenji Yamaki (1995 Kyokushin Karate World Champion). He continues to teach, participating in regular seminars for students around the world in Belgium, France, Poland, Spain, Italy, as well as at his own schools in Los Angeles.\n\nReferences\n\n1958 births\n\nLiving people\n\nJapanese aikidoka\n\nShihan\nStunt performers\nPeople from Osaka",
"Robert Alan Wall (August 22, 1939 – January 30, 2022) was an American actor and martial artist.\n\nEarly life\nWall was born on August 22, 1939 in San Jose, California to Ray Wall, a construction worker and Reva (Wingo) Wall, a nurse. While in high school, he took up wrestling. Wall attended San Jose State University on a scholarship, and later moved to southern California.\n\nCareer\n\nTraining\nWall studied Okinawan martial arts under Gordon Doversola. In 1966, he, along with karate champion Joe Lewis, opened the Sherman Oaks Karate Studio in Sherman Oaks, California. In 1968, Lewis sold his share of the studio to Chuck Norris. Robert Wall featured in a number of films, most notably three appearances with Bruce Lee: the 1972 film Way of the Dragon, as O'Harra in Enter the Dragon in 1973, and Game of Death, Bruce Lee's incomplete film re-cut in 1978. He has small roles in Norris films, such as Code of Silence (1985), Firewalker (1986), and Hero and the Terror (1988).\n\nWall studied several arts under many notable masters. They included Judo under Gene LeBell, Okinawan Shorin-Ryu under Joe Lewis, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu under the Machado Brothers.\n\nConflict with Steven Seagal\nWall was particularly famous for his public rivalry with Steven Seagal, which provoked a series of challenges between the two between 1988 and 1992. It started when Seagal made disparaging commentaries about Bruce Lee, Chuck Norris, and other American martial artists in interviews, culminating in two articles in the Black Belt magazine where he claimed he would fight to the death anybody who believed they could defeat him.\n\nIndignant at Seagal's slights of Lee and American martial artists, as well as offended by his boasts, Wall gathered a group of martial artists willing to answer the challenge, who were nicknamed the \"Dirty Dozen\" in a reference to the 1967 war film The Dirty Dozen. The group included Benny Urquidez, Bill Wallace, Howard Jackson, Roger Carpenter, Allen Steen, Jim Harrison, Dennis Alexio, Richard Norton, Billy Robertson, Pat Burleson, and William \"Blinky\" Rodriguez, with Gene LeBell and Gerard Finot as potential members and Karyn Turner as a possible promoter for one or more matches.\n\nThe Dirty Dozen were controversial in the martial arts community, with some deriding them as an overreaction and a promotion of violence. LeBell later revealed the affair was hurting him professionally and forced him to withdraw, while Urquidez and Burleson became reportedly unhappy with the group's concept. However, several other members claimed to be content with the campaign alone, with Rodriguez declaring, \"just by not accepting the challenge, Seagal tells us where he's at.\"\n\nOther work\nIn 2009, Wall starred as a bodyguard in the film Blood and Bone.\n\nPersonal life and death\nWall was a 9th degree black belt under Chuck Norris and the co-founder and CEO of a martial arts organization known as World Black Belt Inc. In 1975, Wall authored the book Who's Who in the Martial Arts and Directory of Black Belts (Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 75-2280), the first book of its kind for martial artists.\n\nHe died in Los Angeles on January 30, 2022, at the age of 82.\n\nFilmography\n\nFilms\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nWorld Black Belt Inc.\n Bob Wall Interview at cityonfire.com\n\n1939 births\n2022 deaths\nSan Jose State University alumni\nAmerican chun kuk do practitioners\nAmerican male film actors\nAmerican male karateka\nAmerican tang soo do practitioners\nMale actors from Los Angeles\nMale actors from San Jose, California\nSportspeople from San Jose, California"
] |
[
"Steven Seagal",
"Martial arts",
"When did Seagal get involved in martial arts?",
"saying,",
"What kind of martial arts was Seagal doing?",
"By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master"
] | C_9aa7eeb265cb4e8897009f1c9139a870_1 | Who did he train with? | 3 | Who did Steven Seagal train with for martial arts? | Steven Seagal | Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. The date of his journey has become a point of contention due to Seagal's statement that he studied with Morihei Uyeshiba, the founder of aikido, who died in 1969. Terry Dobson, a fifth-degree black belt who studied with the master from 1961 to 1969, dismissed this claim, saying, "That story is bull. [Back then] I never heard of Steven Seagal." By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman. Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. CANNOTANSWER | an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married | Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan, becoming the first foreigner to operate an aikido dojo in the country. He later moved to Los Angeles, California, where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in Above the Law. By 1991, he had starred in four films. In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in Under Siege. During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film The Patriot. Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including Steven Seagal: Lawman, which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.
Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, Songs from the Crystal Cave and Mojo Priest, and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has also been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. In addition, Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.
From 1996 to 2018, multiple women accused Seagal of sexual harassment or assault.
Early life
Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan on April 10, 1952, the son of medical technician Patricia (1930–2003) and high school mathematics teacher Samuel Seagal (1928–1991). His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told People magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. However, it was while working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove that he was encouraged to visit Japan.
Martial arts
Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.
Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.
Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011.
Career
1987–2002
In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, Above the Law (titled Nico in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of Under Siege (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.
Seagal hosted the April 20, 1991 episode of the late night variety show Saturday Night Live, which aired as the 18th episode of the 16th season. The series' long-time producer Lorne Michaels and the cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows regarded Seagal as the show's worst-ever host. Spade and Meadows cite Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the show's cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because that skit's title characters stated that they could beat up Seagal. Seagal was never invited back to the show following that episode. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied, "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."
Seagal directed and starred in On Deadly Ground (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. On Deadly Ground was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, Under Siege, titled Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995). In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film Executive Decision, portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama The Glimmer Man (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, Fire Down Below (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.
In 1998, Seagal made The Patriot, another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.
After producing Prince of Central Park, Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of Exit Wounds in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie Ticker, co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before Exit Wounds, and went straight to DVD. Half Past Dead, starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.
2003 to present day: direct-to-video films and television
Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's Machete, all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include Black Dawn, Belly of the Beast, Out of Reach, Submerged, Kill Switch, Urban Justice, Pistol Whipped, Against the Dark, Driven to Kill, A Dangerous Man, Born to Raise Hell, and The Keeper.
In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series Steven Seagal: Lawman, focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.
In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. Maximum Conviction, Force of Execution, Gutshot Straight, Code of Honor, Sniper: Special Ops, The Asian Connection, The Perfect Weapon, Cartels, and China Salesman all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.
In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled True Justice. The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, True Justice has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.
Themes and motifs
Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in Under Siege, a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in The Glimmer Man, an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in The Foreigner and Black Dawn, an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's Machete, which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.
In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published Seagalogy, a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.
Other ventures
Music
Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including Fire Down Below and Ticker. Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.
In 2005, he released his first album, Songs from the Crystal Cave, which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film Into the Sun features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled Mojo Priest, was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.
Law enforcement work
Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) was so impressed that he asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal allegedly graduated from a police academy in Los Angeles over twenty years prior and has a certificate from Peace Officer Standards & Training (POST), an organization that accredits California police officers. However, POST officials in California and Louisiana have no record of Seagal being certified, and Seagal's rank in Louisiana is therefore ceremonial.
Steven Seagal: Lawman, a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.
On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.
Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.
In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.
Business ventures
In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.
In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".
Personal life
Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.
Residences
Seagal owns a dude ranch in Colorado, a home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Los Angeles, and a home in Louisiana.
Religion
Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Seagal's recognition aroused controversy in the American Buddhist community, with Helen Tworkov commenting in Tricycle impugning the extent of Seagal's "spiritual wisdom" and suggesting that Seagal bought his Buddhahood by donations to Penor's Kunzang Palyul Choling center. Penor Rinpoche responded to the controversy by saying that Seagal, although acting in violent movies, had not actually killed people, and that Seagal was merely recognized, whereas enthronement as a tulku would require first a "lengthy process of study and practice".
Citizenship
Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses jus soli U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.
Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."
Relationships and family
While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.
During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".
Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.
Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.
Allegations and lawsuits
Early 1990s
In May 1991 (during the filming of Out for Justice), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".
In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for Under Siege 2.
1995 lawsuit
In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of On Deadly Ground. In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".
2010 lawsuit
On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.
2011 lawsuit
On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman. Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.
2017 allegations
In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants. On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.
2018 allegations and investigation
On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, Out for a Kill (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie On Deadly Ground.
2020 federal securities violation settlement
On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.
Victim of attempted extortion
Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with Marked for Death in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost. Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of Exit Wounds in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone bluntly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie. If Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him. Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.
On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003 and, in February 2004, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.
Conflicts with stuntmen
Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.
Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for Out for Justice, LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.
LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."
On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."
Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.
Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on Executive Decision, in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall.
Political views and activism
Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, Medicine Lake Video. The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.
In 1999, Seagal was awarded a PETA Humanitarian Award.
In a March 2014 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson, had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet stating, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law." In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by president Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him because he "committed socially dangerous actions".
Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
In 2017, Seagal collaborated with former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, Tom Morrissey, in writing a self-published conspiracy thriller novel, The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State And The Hijacking Of America, which featured a Tohono Shadow Wolf tracker working for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to foil a plot by Mexican drug cartels and the "deep state" to smuggle in Islamist terrorists to the United States through the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2021, Seagal gifted a katana sword to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry special envoy while visiting Canaima National Park. Maduro referred to Seagal as "my brother."
On May 30, 2021, the pro-Kremlin systemic opposition party A Just Russia — Patriots — For Truth announced that Seagal had received an official membership card to the party.
Stunts
Filmography
Films
Television
Awards and nominations
Discography
2005: Songs from the Crystal Cave
2006: Mojo Priest
References
External links
1952 births
Living people
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male actors
21st-century American male musicians
21st-century Russian male actors
21st-century Serbian male actors
Activists from California
American actor-politicians
American aikidoka
American blues singers
American country singers
American deputy sheriffs
American drink industry businesspeople
American emigrants to Russia
American environmentalists
American expatriates in Japan
American kendoka
American male film actors
American male guitarists
American male judoka
American male karateka
American male singers
American people of Irish descent
American people of Jewish descent
American stunt performers
Businesspeople from California
Businesspeople from Louisiana
Businesspeople from Michigan
Converts to Buddhism
Country musicians from Louisiana
Country musicians from Michigan
Country musicians from Tennessee
Golden Raspberry Award winners
Guitarists from Michigan
Male actors from Fullerton, California
Male actors from Lansing, Michigan
Naturalised citizens of Russia
Naturalized citizens of Serbia
Nyingma tulkus
Participants in American reality television series
People from Eltingville, Staten Island
People from Germantown, Tennessee
People from Jefferson Parish, Louisiana
People from Mandeville Canyon, Los Angeles
Russian businesspeople
Russian male film actors
Russian male judoka
Russian male karateka
Russian martial artists
Russian people of Irish descent
Russian people of Jewish descent
Russian stunt performers
Serbian businesspeople
Serbian male film actors
Serbian male judoka
Serbian male karateka
Serbian people of Irish descent
Serbian people of Jewish descent
Serbian stunt performers
Tibetan Buddhists from Russia
Tibetan Buddhists from the United States | true | [
"701 Franklin Ave. is the third solo studio album by James D-Train Williams, known also as part of the American urban/post-disco group D-Train. \nThe record was released in 2009 through Jungshin Inc. It is D-Train's first studio album in more than 20 years.\n\nBackground\nJames D-Train Williams first had an idea for a third solo studio album back in 2001; when he founded his own music label Jungshin Inc. He had originally intended for it to be released sometime between 2005 and 2006. While performing at Paris in 2003, D-Train did a special live version of his 1982 hit \"Keep On\", which would later be a bonus track on the album.\n\nIn 2006 he release the first single from album titled \"Ride With Me\". 701 Franklin Ave. was released in 2009. The album was completely produced and arranged by himself. The album contains 14 tracks, one of them being a third version of the \"D-Train Theme\" which he originally recorded while working with Hubert Eaves in 1982.\n\nD-Train's fourth studio album was stated for release in 2015, supposedly it was going to contain some of the recent collaborations with music mixer Lenny Fontana.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nDiscogs\n[ Allmusic]\n\n2009 albums\nD Train (entertainer) albums",
"The Return of Casey Jones is a 1933 American Pre-Code action adventure film directed by John P. McCarthy, written by Harry L. Fraser and starring Charles Starrett and Ruth Hall. The film is based on the story of the same name by John Johns, published in the April 1933 issue of Railroad Stories magazine (reprinted in 2019 by Bold Venture Press in their Railroad Stories reprint collection). The film was a Monogram Pictures Corporation production.\n\nSynopsis\nA young boy named Jimmy is devastated after learning of the death of famed train engineer Casey Jones with whom he was good friends. In the following years, he grows up to be a train engineer, too. One morning, as Jimmy is piloting his train the brakes lose their air pressure, and the train roars along unable to be slowed or stopped. Jimmy tells the mechanic to fix it, but knowing that there is a sharp curve coming up soon and that the train will go off the tracks the mechanic jumps off the train instead. Jimmy then grabs a wrench and climbs out onto the side of the engine to try to fix it himself, but while stretching to reach the loose hose connection he is jostled and falls off the train just moments before it goes off the tracks at the curve. Unfortunately, gossip around town is that Jimmy jumped off his train two and a half miles before the curve, which was untrue, and he is branded a coward. Worse, he did not let other trains know, and as a result he is let go as engineer. The fact that Jimmy did not sign up and volunteer for army duty, as many other boys did at the time, also rankled many and added heavily to the idea that he was a coward. Actually, he had planned to sign up but his mother had a heart attack and the doctor told him if he did his mother would likely have another heart attack and it would be fatal this time. One of Jimmy's closest coworkers, who trusts him implicitly and doesn't believe the gossip, convinces the railroad to rehire him, though they will not make him an engineer again. The best they offer is a position as fireman on the train engineered by his friend (who humbly denies to Jimmy that he had anything to do with getting him back in).\n\nOne dark night as their train is roaring along it loses its air pressure the same way Jimmy's had before. The engineer stoically – or more likely in shock – stands mute at the controls prepared to go all the way with the train, but Jimmy grabs a wrench and climbs out onto the engine to fix it. He succeeds and then carries the limp engineer off the train. After that he is re-branded as a hero and offered his old position as engineer again.\n\nCast\nCharles Starrett – Jim Martin\nRuth Hall – Nona Winters\nGeorge \"Gabby\" Hayes – Timothy Shine \nRobert Elliott – Casey Jones\nMargaret Seddon – Mrs. Mary Martin\nJackie Searl – Jimmy Martin as a Boy\nGeorge Walsh – Wild Bill Bronson\nGordon De Main – Ike MacFarland\n\nReferences\n\n1933 films\n1933 adventure films\nAmerican films\nAmerican black-and-white films\nEnglish-language films\nMonogram Pictures films\nAmerican adventure films\nFilms based on short fiction\nCultural depictions of Casey Jones\nFilms with screenplays by Harry L. Fraser\n\nExternal links"
] |
[
"Steven Seagal",
"Martial arts",
"When did Seagal get involved in martial arts?",
"saying,",
"What kind of martial arts was Seagal doing?",
"By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master",
"Who did he train with?",
"an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married"
] | C_9aa7eeb265cb4e8897009f1c9139a870_1 | Did he earn a black belt? | 4 | Did Steven Seagal earn a black belt? | Steven Seagal | Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. The date of his journey has become a point of contention due to Seagal's statement that he studied with Morihei Uyeshiba, the founder of aikido, who died in 1969. Terry Dobson, a fifth-degree black belt who studied with the master from 1961 to 1969, dismissed this claim, saying, "That story is bull. [Back then] I never heard of Steven Seagal." By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman. Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. CANNOTANSWER | He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). | Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan, becoming the first foreigner to operate an aikido dojo in the country. He later moved to Los Angeles, California, where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in Above the Law. By 1991, he had starred in four films. In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in Under Siege. During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film The Patriot. Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including Steven Seagal: Lawman, which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.
Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, Songs from the Crystal Cave and Mojo Priest, and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has also been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. In addition, Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.
From 1996 to 2018, multiple women accused Seagal of sexual harassment or assault.
Early life
Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan on April 10, 1952, the son of medical technician Patricia (1930–2003) and high school mathematics teacher Samuel Seagal (1928–1991). His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told People magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. However, it was while working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove that he was encouraged to visit Japan.
Martial arts
Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.
Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.
Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011.
Career
1987–2002
In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, Above the Law (titled Nico in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of Under Siege (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.
Seagal hosted the April 20, 1991 episode of the late night variety show Saturday Night Live, which aired as the 18th episode of the 16th season. The series' long-time producer Lorne Michaels and the cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows regarded Seagal as the show's worst-ever host. Spade and Meadows cite Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the show's cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because that skit's title characters stated that they could beat up Seagal. Seagal was never invited back to the show following that episode. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied, "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."
Seagal directed and starred in On Deadly Ground (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. On Deadly Ground was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, Under Siege, titled Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995). In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film Executive Decision, portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama The Glimmer Man (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, Fire Down Below (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.
In 1998, Seagal made The Patriot, another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.
After producing Prince of Central Park, Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of Exit Wounds in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie Ticker, co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before Exit Wounds, and went straight to DVD. Half Past Dead, starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.
2003 to present day: direct-to-video films and television
Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's Machete, all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include Black Dawn, Belly of the Beast, Out of Reach, Submerged, Kill Switch, Urban Justice, Pistol Whipped, Against the Dark, Driven to Kill, A Dangerous Man, Born to Raise Hell, and The Keeper.
In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series Steven Seagal: Lawman, focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.
In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. Maximum Conviction, Force of Execution, Gutshot Straight, Code of Honor, Sniper: Special Ops, The Asian Connection, The Perfect Weapon, Cartels, and China Salesman all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.
In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled True Justice. The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, True Justice has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.
Themes and motifs
Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in Under Siege, a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in The Glimmer Man, an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in The Foreigner and Black Dawn, an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's Machete, which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.
In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published Seagalogy, a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.
Other ventures
Music
Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including Fire Down Below and Ticker. Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.
In 2005, he released his first album, Songs from the Crystal Cave, which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film Into the Sun features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled Mojo Priest, was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.
Law enforcement work
Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) was so impressed that he asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal allegedly graduated from a police academy in Los Angeles over twenty years prior and has a certificate from Peace Officer Standards & Training (POST), an organization that accredits California police officers. However, POST officials in California and Louisiana have no record of Seagal being certified, and Seagal's rank in Louisiana is therefore ceremonial.
Steven Seagal: Lawman, a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.
On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.
Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.
In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.
Business ventures
In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.
In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".
Personal life
Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.
Residences
Seagal owns a dude ranch in Colorado, a home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Los Angeles, and a home in Louisiana.
Religion
Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Seagal's recognition aroused controversy in the American Buddhist community, with Helen Tworkov commenting in Tricycle impugning the extent of Seagal's "spiritual wisdom" and suggesting that Seagal bought his Buddhahood by donations to Penor's Kunzang Palyul Choling center. Penor Rinpoche responded to the controversy by saying that Seagal, although acting in violent movies, had not actually killed people, and that Seagal was merely recognized, whereas enthronement as a tulku would require first a "lengthy process of study and practice".
Citizenship
Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses jus soli U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.
Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."
Relationships and family
While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.
During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".
Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.
Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.
Allegations and lawsuits
Early 1990s
In May 1991 (during the filming of Out for Justice), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".
In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for Under Siege 2.
1995 lawsuit
In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of On Deadly Ground. In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".
2010 lawsuit
On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.
2011 lawsuit
On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman. Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.
2017 allegations
In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants. On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.
2018 allegations and investigation
On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, Out for a Kill (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie On Deadly Ground.
2020 federal securities violation settlement
On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.
Victim of attempted extortion
Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with Marked for Death in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost. Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of Exit Wounds in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone bluntly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie. If Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him. Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.
On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003 and, in February 2004, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.
Conflicts with stuntmen
Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.
Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for Out for Justice, LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.
LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."
On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."
Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.
Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on Executive Decision, in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall.
Political views and activism
Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, Medicine Lake Video. The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.
In 1999, Seagal was awarded a PETA Humanitarian Award.
In a March 2014 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson, had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet stating, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law." In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by president Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him because he "committed socially dangerous actions".
Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
In 2017, Seagal collaborated with former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, Tom Morrissey, in writing a self-published conspiracy thriller novel, The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State And The Hijacking Of America, which featured a Tohono Shadow Wolf tracker working for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to foil a plot by Mexican drug cartels and the "deep state" to smuggle in Islamist terrorists to the United States through the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2021, Seagal gifted a katana sword to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry special envoy while visiting Canaima National Park. Maduro referred to Seagal as "my brother."
On May 30, 2021, the pro-Kremlin systemic opposition party A Just Russia — Patriots — For Truth announced that Seagal had received an official membership card to the party.
Stunts
Filmography
Films
Television
Awards and nominations
Discography
2005: Songs from the Crystal Cave
2006: Mojo Priest
References
External links
1952 births
Living people
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male actors
21st-century American male musicians
21st-century Russian male actors
21st-century Serbian male actors
Activists from California
American actor-politicians
American aikidoka
American blues singers
American country singers
American deputy sheriffs
American drink industry businesspeople
American emigrants to Russia
American environmentalists
American expatriates in Japan
American kendoka
American male film actors
American male guitarists
American male judoka
American male karateka
American male singers
American people of Irish descent
American people of Jewish descent
American stunt performers
Businesspeople from California
Businesspeople from Louisiana
Businesspeople from Michigan
Converts to Buddhism
Country musicians from Louisiana
Country musicians from Michigan
Country musicians from Tennessee
Golden Raspberry Award winners
Guitarists from Michigan
Male actors from Fullerton, California
Male actors from Lansing, Michigan
Naturalised citizens of Russia
Naturalized citizens of Serbia
Nyingma tulkus
Participants in American reality television series
People from Eltingville, Staten Island
People from Germantown, Tennessee
People from Jefferson Parish, Louisiana
People from Mandeville Canyon, Los Angeles
Russian businesspeople
Russian male film actors
Russian male judoka
Russian male karateka
Russian martial artists
Russian people of Irish descent
Russian people of Jewish descent
Russian stunt performers
Serbian businesspeople
Serbian male film actors
Serbian male judoka
Serbian male karateka
Serbian people of Irish descent
Serbian people of Jewish descent
Serbian stunt performers
Tibetan Buddhists from Russia
Tibetan Buddhists from the United States | true | [
"Stephen Maxwell, better known as Steve Maxwell (December 3, 1952), is an American fitness coach, physical educator, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu instructor. Maxwell was named one of the top 100 trainers in the United States by Men's Journal.\n\nProfessional background \nMaxwell was the first man to teach kettlebell classes in the United States. He holds a master's degree in Exercise Science from West Chester University of Pennsylvania.\n\nMaxwell trains professional athletes including players for the Phillies, Dodgers, and Eagles. He also has worked with various US Government agencies, including the DEA, Secret Service, and FBI as well as many Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu academies throughout the country. Maxwell travels around the world leading seminars in strength conditioning, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, kettlebells, and joint mobility.\n\nMaxwell had owned and operated Maxercise Gym, in Philadelphia, PA for 16 years.\n\nGrappling \nMaxwell has a long history of competitive grappling. He wrestled competitively through high school and college, and then in the US Army. Maxwell became the first person certified to teach Gracie Jiu-Jitsu in the USA. He is the first American to earn a black belt from Relson Gracie.\n\nJiu-Jitsu accreditations \n\n 1997 National Purple Belt Champion GJJTA\n 1998 Runner-up Purple Belt GJJTA\n 1999 Purple Belt Pan American Champion\n 2000 Brown Belt Senior World Champion\n 2000 Brown Belt Senior Pan American Champion\n 2001 Brown Belt Senior World Champion\n 2002 Black Belt Senior Pan American Champion\n 2002 Black Belt Senior World Champion\n 2004 Black Belt Senior Pan American Champion\n 2006 Black Belt Senior Pan American Champion\n\nPersonal life \nMaxwell is the father of World Champion and four times Pan American Champion Zak Maxwell and his ex-wife DC Maxwell is also a black belt under Saulo Ribeiro with several tournament accomplishments.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n Official Steve Maxwell Website\n Steve Maxwell Founded Gym in Philadelphia\n Gracie Academy Philadelphia competition team\n\nLiving people\n1952 births\nAmerican exercise instructors\nAmerican practitioners of Brazilian jiu-jitsu\nWest Chester University alumni",
"Nicholas Meregali is a 2x Brazilian Jiu Jitsu (BJJ) World Champion. He is well known for winning a gold medal in his first year as a black belt at the 2017 World Jiu-Jitsu Championship by beating Leandro Lo, one of the greatest BJJ competitors of all time, in the final. The next year, Meregali won a gold medal in the Super Heavyweight category at Brazilian National Jiu-Jitsu Championship submitting his opponent from the back in the final. In 2019, he won the national title again and added the open weight class title to earn \"double gold.\"\n\nMeregali began training when he was 16 years old at the ACJJ academy in Santo Antônio. He was a prolific competitor at the coloured belts level winning the IBJJF worlds at both purple belt and brown belt.\n\nMeregali currently trains at the Alliance Jiu Jitsu academy in Porto Alegre under coach Mario Reis. In interviews he has described himself as a perfectionist. Nicholas has been described as having a \"complete game,\" and he is known for his outstanding guard, especially his innovative use of the De La Riva position, and chokes from the back.\n\nReferences\n\nBrazilian practitioners of Brazilian jiu-jitsu\nLiving people\n1994 births\nPeople awarded a black belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu\nWorld Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Championship medalists"
] |
[
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"saying,",
"What kind of martial arts was Seagal doing?",
"By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master",
"Who did he train with?",
"an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married",
"Did he earn a black belt?",
"He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan)."
] | C_9aa7eeb265cb4e8897009f1c9139a870_1 | What other accomplishments did he have in his martial arts training? | 5 | Aside from being the first non-asian to open a dojo in Japan, what other accomplishments did Steven Seagal have in his martial arts training? | Steven Seagal | Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. The date of his journey has become a point of contention due to Seagal's statement that he studied with Morihei Uyeshiba, the founder of aikido, who died in 1969. Terry Dobson, a fifth-degree black belt who studied with the master from 1961 to 1969, dismissed this claim, saying, "That story is bull. [Back then] I never heard of Steven Seagal." By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman. Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. CANNOTANSWER | Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, | Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan, becoming the first foreigner to operate an aikido dojo in the country. He later moved to Los Angeles, California, where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in Above the Law. By 1991, he had starred in four films. In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in Under Siege. During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film The Patriot. Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including Steven Seagal: Lawman, which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.
Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, Songs from the Crystal Cave and Mojo Priest, and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has also been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. In addition, Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.
From 1996 to 2018, multiple women accused Seagal of sexual harassment or assault.
Early life
Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan on April 10, 1952, the son of medical technician Patricia (1930–2003) and high school mathematics teacher Samuel Seagal (1928–1991). His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told People magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. However, it was while working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove that he was encouraged to visit Japan.
Martial arts
Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.
Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.
Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011.
Career
1987–2002
In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, Above the Law (titled Nico in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of Under Siege (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.
Seagal hosted the April 20, 1991 episode of the late night variety show Saturday Night Live, which aired as the 18th episode of the 16th season. The series' long-time producer Lorne Michaels and the cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows regarded Seagal as the show's worst-ever host. Spade and Meadows cite Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the show's cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because that skit's title characters stated that they could beat up Seagal. Seagal was never invited back to the show following that episode. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied, "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."
Seagal directed and starred in On Deadly Ground (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. On Deadly Ground was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, Under Siege, titled Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995). In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film Executive Decision, portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama The Glimmer Man (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, Fire Down Below (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.
In 1998, Seagal made The Patriot, another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.
After producing Prince of Central Park, Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of Exit Wounds in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie Ticker, co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before Exit Wounds, and went straight to DVD. Half Past Dead, starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.
2003 to present day: direct-to-video films and television
Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's Machete, all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include Black Dawn, Belly of the Beast, Out of Reach, Submerged, Kill Switch, Urban Justice, Pistol Whipped, Against the Dark, Driven to Kill, A Dangerous Man, Born to Raise Hell, and The Keeper.
In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series Steven Seagal: Lawman, focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.
In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. Maximum Conviction, Force of Execution, Gutshot Straight, Code of Honor, Sniper: Special Ops, The Asian Connection, The Perfect Weapon, Cartels, and China Salesman all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.
In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled True Justice. The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, True Justice has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.
Themes and motifs
Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in Under Siege, a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in The Glimmer Man, an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in The Foreigner and Black Dawn, an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's Machete, which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.
In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published Seagalogy, a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.
Other ventures
Music
Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including Fire Down Below and Ticker. Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.
In 2005, he released his first album, Songs from the Crystal Cave, which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film Into the Sun features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled Mojo Priest, was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.
Law enforcement work
Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) was so impressed that he asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal allegedly graduated from a police academy in Los Angeles over twenty years prior and has a certificate from Peace Officer Standards & Training (POST), an organization that accredits California police officers. However, POST officials in California and Louisiana have no record of Seagal being certified, and Seagal's rank in Louisiana is therefore ceremonial.
Steven Seagal: Lawman, a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.
On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.
Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.
In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.
Business ventures
In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.
In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".
Personal life
Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.
Residences
Seagal owns a dude ranch in Colorado, a home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Los Angeles, and a home in Louisiana.
Religion
Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Seagal's recognition aroused controversy in the American Buddhist community, with Helen Tworkov commenting in Tricycle impugning the extent of Seagal's "spiritual wisdom" and suggesting that Seagal bought his Buddhahood by donations to Penor's Kunzang Palyul Choling center. Penor Rinpoche responded to the controversy by saying that Seagal, although acting in violent movies, had not actually killed people, and that Seagal was merely recognized, whereas enthronement as a tulku would require first a "lengthy process of study and practice".
Citizenship
Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses jus soli U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.
Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."
Relationships and family
While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.
During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".
Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.
Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.
Allegations and lawsuits
Early 1990s
In May 1991 (during the filming of Out for Justice), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".
In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for Under Siege 2.
1995 lawsuit
In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of On Deadly Ground. In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".
2010 lawsuit
On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.
2011 lawsuit
On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman. Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.
2017 allegations
In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants. On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.
2018 allegations and investigation
On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, Out for a Kill (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie On Deadly Ground.
2020 federal securities violation settlement
On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.
Victim of attempted extortion
Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with Marked for Death in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost. Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of Exit Wounds in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone bluntly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie. If Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him. Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.
On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003 and, in February 2004, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.
Conflicts with stuntmen
Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.
Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for Out for Justice, LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.
LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."
On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."
Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.
Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on Executive Decision, in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall.
Political views and activism
Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, Medicine Lake Video. The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.
In 1999, Seagal was awarded a PETA Humanitarian Award.
In a March 2014 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson, had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet stating, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law." In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by president Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him because he "committed socially dangerous actions".
Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
In 2017, Seagal collaborated with former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, Tom Morrissey, in writing a self-published conspiracy thriller novel, The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State And The Hijacking Of America, which featured a Tohono Shadow Wolf tracker working for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to foil a plot by Mexican drug cartels and the "deep state" to smuggle in Islamist terrorists to the United States through the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2021, Seagal gifted a katana sword to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry special envoy while visiting Canaima National Park. Maduro referred to Seagal as "my brother."
On May 30, 2021, the pro-Kremlin systemic opposition party A Just Russia — Patriots — For Truth announced that Seagal had received an official membership card to the party.
Stunts
Filmography
Films
Television
Awards and nominations
Discography
2005: Songs from the Crystal Cave
2006: Mojo Priest
References
External links
1952 births
Living people
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male actors
21st-century American male musicians
21st-century Russian male actors
21st-century Serbian male actors
Activists from California
American actor-politicians
American aikidoka
American blues singers
American country singers
American deputy sheriffs
American drink industry businesspeople
American emigrants to Russia
American environmentalists
American expatriates in Japan
American kendoka
American male film actors
American male guitarists
American male judoka
American male karateka
American male singers
American people of Irish descent
American people of Jewish descent
American stunt performers
Businesspeople from California
Businesspeople from Louisiana
Businesspeople from Michigan
Converts to Buddhism
Country musicians from Louisiana
Country musicians from Michigan
Country musicians from Tennessee
Golden Raspberry Award winners
Guitarists from Michigan
Male actors from Fullerton, California
Male actors from Lansing, Michigan
Naturalised citizens of Russia
Naturalized citizens of Serbia
Nyingma tulkus
Participants in American reality television series
People from Eltingville, Staten Island
People from Germantown, Tennessee
People from Jefferson Parish, Louisiana
People from Mandeville Canyon, Los Angeles
Russian businesspeople
Russian male film actors
Russian male judoka
Russian male karateka
Russian martial artists
Russian people of Irish descent
Russian people of Jewish descent
Russian stunt performers
Serbian businesspeople
Serbian male film actors
Serbian male judoka
Serbian male karateka
Serbian people of Irish descent
Serbian people of Jewish descent
Serbian stunt performers
Tibetan Buddhists from Russia
Tibetan Buddhists from the United States | true | [
"Chris Casamassa (born January 17, 1965) is an American martial artist, actor and stuntman who is best known for his role as Scorpion in the movie Mortal Kombat and the related TV show, Mortal Kombat: Conquest. He is the son of martial arts guru and Red Dragon Karate founder Louis D. Casamassa. (Chris co-starred on the TV series WMAC Masters under the call-sign \"Red Dragon\".)\n\nKarate\nCasamassa is also the President of the successful Red Dragon Karate Schools, which were founded by his father. As a national competitor on the North American Sport Karate Association circuit (N.A.S.K.A) Casamassa was the #1 forms competitor in the country for four consecutive years.\n\nLife and career\nChris started his martial arts training in 1969 at the age of 4. He made his first degree Black belt at the age of 10. His professional tournament career started in 1982 and when he retired from professional competition in 1992 he had amassed a string of titles: He was a 4 time national open forms champion, along with 2 national weapons titles, and a top 5 rated middleweight fighter. He then began a career in film and television, his most recognizable role being Scorpion in Mortal Kombat. His accomplishments in martial arts training continued during this time; he was awarded his 8th degree Black Belt in Red Dragon Karate in 2004.\n\nFilmography\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n http://www.chriscasamassa.com\n \n\nAmerican stunt performers\nAmerican male film actors\nAmerican male television actors\n1965 births\nLiving people\nAmerican male karateka\nShōrin-ryū practitioners",
"Bob Breen is an author and professional martial artist who began martial arts training in 1966. He has trained under a significant number of senior martial arts experts and respected figures in the martial arts world. He has published 10 books since 1988.\n\nCareer \n\nHaving begun martial arts training in 1966 after what he described was an early life involving frequent fights brought about by circumstances rather than intent, Bob began studying Wado Ryu under Tatsuo Suzuki in the early part of 1967. He earned his black belt in Wado Karate in 1970. He then went on to pass his second degree in 1972. Bob continued to study Karate and associated arts, and moved to Japan in 1974 in order to train under a number of Senior Masters.\nHe competed for Great Britain in traditional Karate, captaining the Amateur Martial Arts Association (AMA) team who beat the Japanese in 1974, before discovering Jeet Kune Do and bringing it to Britain. Soon after Bob began boxing and groundwork, he became one of the pioneers of full contact in Europe; fighting and promoting. In 1978 he started Eskrima with Jay Dobrin. Since 1979 he has been studying Jeet Kune Do under master and worldwide respected figure Dan Inosanto, who himself trained under Bruce Lee, father of Jeet Kune Do. He is one of the foremost experts in knife-defense and close quarter combat, and was the team captain and a competitor at the 1989 World Stickfighting championships and Coach of the British Eskrima team that won 13 World Championship medals, including four gold medals in 1992.\n\nHe is now qualified as a Full Instructor in JKD and Kali.\nRegarded as the father of JKD/Kali and Filipino martial arts in the UK and Europe, he has released a range of self-defense books and DVDs and currently runs a martial arts academy in Hoxton, London.\n\nBob Breen has also worked in training film actors in martial arts and fighting techniques, including working on spear and sword fighting with Gerard Butler and other actors for the 2007 film 300.\n\nPublications \n Fighting \n Sparring\n\nSee also\n\nDan Inosanto \nJeet kune do\nEskrima\nBruce Lee\n\nNotes \n\nBritish male martial artists\nLiving people\nYear of birth missing (living people)\nWadō-ryū practitioners\nJeet Kune Do practitioners"
] |
[
"Steven Seagal",
"Martial arts",
"When did Seagal get involved in martial arts?",
"saying,",
"What kind of martial arts was Seagal doing?",
"By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master",
"Who did he train with?",
"an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married",
"Did he earn a black belt?",
"He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan).",
"What other accomplishments did he have in his martial arts training?",
"Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo,"
] | C_9aa7eeb265cb4e8897009f1c9139a870_1 | Was this successful? | 6 | Was Steven Seagal's Taos dojo successful? | Steven Seagal | Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. The date of his journey has become a point of contention due to Seagal's statement that he studied with Morihei Uyeshiba, the founder of aikido, who died in 1969. Terry Dobson, a fifth-degree black belt who studied with the master from 1961 to 1969, dismissed this claim, saying, "That story is bull. [Back then] I never heard of Steven Seagal." By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman. Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. CANNOTANSWER | although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 | Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan, becoming the first foreigner to operate an aikido dojo in the country. He later moved to Los Angeles, California, where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in Above the Law. By 1991, he had starred in four films. In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in Under Siege. During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film The Patriot. Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including Steven Seagal: Lawman, which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.
Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, Songs from the Crystal Cave and Mojo Priest, and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has also been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. In addition, Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.
From 1996 to 2018, multiple women accused Seagal of sexual harassment or assault.
Early life
Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan on April 10, 1952, the son of medical technician Patricia (1930–2003) and high school mathematics teacher Samuel Seagal (1928–1991). His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told People magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. However, it was while working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove that he was encouraged to visit Japan.
Martial arts
Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.
Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.
Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011.
Career
1987–2002
In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, Above the Law (titled Nico in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of Under Siege (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.
Seagal hosted the April 20, 1991 episode of the late night variety show Saturday Night Live, which aired as the 18th episode of the 16th season. The series' long-time producer Lorne Michaels and the cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows regarded Seagal as the show's worst-ever host. Spade and Meadows cite Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the show's cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because that skit's title characters stated that they could beat up Seagal. Seagal was never invited back to the show following that episode. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied, "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."
Seagal directed and starred in On Deadly Ground (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. On Deadly Ground was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, Under Siege, titled Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995). In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film Executive Decision, portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama The Glimmer Man (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, Fire Down Below (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.
In 1998, Seagal made The Patriot, another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.
After producing Prince of Central Park, Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of Exit Wounds in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie Ticker, co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before Exit Wounds, and went straight to DVD. Half Past Dead, starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.
2003 to present day: direct-to-video films and television
Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's Machete, all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include Black Dawn, Belly of the Beast, Out of Reach, Submerged, Kill Switch, Urban Justice, Pistol Whipped, Against the Dark, Driven to Kill, A Dangerous Man, Born to Raise Hell, and The Keeper.
In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series Steven Seagal: Lawman, focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.
In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. Maximum Conviction, Force of Execution, Gutshot Straight, Code of Honor, Sniper: Special Ops, The Asian Connection, The Perfect Weapon, Cartels, and China Salesman all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.
In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled True Justice. The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, True Justice has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.
Themes and motifs
Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in Under Siege, a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in The Glimmer Man, an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in The Foreigner and Black Dawn, an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's Machete, which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.
In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published Seagalogy, a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.
Other ventures
Music
Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including Fire Down Below and Ticker. Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.
In 2005, he released his first album, Songs from the Crystal Cave, which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film Into the Sun features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled Mojo Priest, was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.
Law enforcement work
Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) was so impressed that he asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal allegedly graduated from a police academy in Los Angeles over twenty years prior and has a certificate from Peace Officer Standards & Training (POST), an organization that accredits California police officers. However, POST officials in California and Louisiana have no record of Seagal being certified, and Seagal's rank in Louisiana is therefore ceremonial.
Steven Seagal: Lawman, a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.
On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.
Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.
In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.
Business ventures
In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.
In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".
Personal life
Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.
Residences
Seagal owns a dude ranch in Colorado, a home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Los Angeles, and a home in Louisiana.
Religion
Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Seagal's recognition aroused controversy in the American Buddhist community, with Helen Tworkov commenting in Tricycle impugning the extent of Seagal's "spiritual wisdom" and suggesting that Seagal bought his Buddhahood by donations to Penor's Kunzang Palyul Choling center. Penor Rinpoche responded to the controversy by saying that Seagal, although acting in violent movies, had not actually killed people, and that Seagal was merely recognized, whereas enthronement as a tulku would require first a "lengthy process of study and practice".
Citizenship
Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses jus soli U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.
Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."
Relationships and family
While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.
During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".
Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.
Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.
Allegations and lawsuits
Early 1990s
In May 1991 (during the filming of Out for Justice), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".
In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for Under Siege 2.
1995 lawsuit
In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of On Deadly Ground. In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".
2010 lawsuit
On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.
2011 lawsuit
On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman. Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.
2017 allegations
In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants. On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.
2018 allegations and investigation
On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, Out for a Kill (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie On Deadly Ground.
2020 federal securities violation settlement
On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.
Victim of attempted extortion
Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with Marked for Death in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost. Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of Exit Wounds in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone bluntly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie. If Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him. Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.
On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003 and, in February 2004, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.
Conflicts with stuntmen
Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.
Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for Out for Justice, LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.
LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."
On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."
Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.
Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on Executive Decision, in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall.
Political views and activism
Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, Medicine Lake Video. The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.
In 1999, Seagal was awarded a PETA Humanitarian Award.
In a March 2014 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson, had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet stating, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law." In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by president Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him because he "committed socially dangerous actions".
Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
In 2017, Seagal collaborated with former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, Tom Morrissey, in writing a self-published conspiracy thriller novel, The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State And The Hijacking Of America, which featured a Tohono Shadow Wolf tracker working for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to foil a plot by Mexican drug cartels and the "deep state" to smuggle in Islamist terrorists to the United States through the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2021, Seagal gifted a katana sword to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry special envoy while visiting Canaima National Park. Maduro referred to Seagal as "my brother."
On May 30, 2021, the pro-Kremlin systemic opposition party A Just Russia — Patriots — For Truth announced that Seagal had received an official membership card to the party.
Stunts
Filmography
Films
Television
Awards and nominations
Discography
2005: Songs from the Crystal Cave
2006: Mojo Priest
References
External links
1952 births
Living people
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male actors
21st-century American male musicians
21st-century Russian male actors
21st-century Serbian male actors
Activists from California
American actor-politicians
American aikidoka
American blues singers
American country singers
American deputy sheriffs
American drink industry businesspeople
American emigrants to Russia
American environmentalists
American expatriates in Japan
American kendoka
American male film actors
American male guitarists
American male judoka
American male karateka
American male singers
American people of Irish descent
American people of Jewish descent
American stunt performers
Businesspeople from California
Businesspeople from Louisiana
Businesspeople from Michigan
Converts to Buddhism
Country musicians from Louisiana
Country musicians from Michigan
Country musicians from Tennessee
Golden Raspberry Award winners
Guitarists from Michigan
Male actors from Fullerton, California
Male actors from Lansing, Michigan
Naturalised citizens of Russia
Naturalized citizens of Serbia
Nyingma tulkus
Participants in American reality television series
People from Eltingville, Staten Island
People from Germantown, Tennessee
People from Jefferson Parish, Louisiana
People from Mandeville Canyon, Los Angeles
Russian businesspeople
Russian male film actors
Russian male judoka
Russian male karateka
Russian martial artists
Russian people of Irish descent
Russian people of Jewish descent
Russian stunt performers
Serbian businesspeople
Serbian male film actors
Serbian male judoka
Serbian male karateka
Serbian people of Irish descent
Serbian people of Jewish descent
Serbian stunt performers
Tibetan Buddhists from Russia
Tibetan Buddhists from the United States | true | [
"\"Sin Despertar\" is a pop song performed by Chilean band Kudai. It was released as the first single of their debut album Vuelo. This single was also their first single as Kudai, after they gave up their old name band Ciao. This single was very successful in Chile and Argentina and later in the rest of Latin America, including Mexico.\n\nMusic video\nKudai's music video for their first single ever \"Sin Despertar\", was filmed in Santiago, Chile and the location used in this music videos was in O'Higgins Park, Movistar Arena Santiago, the video was premiered on 24 June 2004 on MTV, and this was very successful on Los 10+ Pedidos and Top 20.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \nKudai Official Site\nEMI Music Mexico\n\n2004 singles\nKudai songs\n2005 singles\n2006 singles\n2004 songs",
"Rough and Ready Volume 2 is a studio album released by Shabba Ranks. This album was not as successful as Volume 1 and it was going to be difficult to create an album as successful as its predecessor, X-tra Naked, which won a Grammy. Volume 2 was criticised for lacking variety.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences\n\n1993 albums\nShabba Ranks albums\nEpic Records albums"
] |
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"saying,",
"What kind of martial arts was Seagal doing?",
"By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master",
"Who did he train with?",
"an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married",
"Did he earn a black belt?",
"He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan).",
"What other accomplishments did he have in his martial arts training?",
"Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo,",
"Was this successful?",
"although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983"
] | C_9aa7eeb265cb4e8897009f1c9139a870_1 | Did he stay here? | 7 | Did Steven Seagal stay in the U.S. after 1983? | Steven Seagal | Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. The date of his journey has become a point of contention due to Seagal's statement that he studied with Morihei Uyeshiba, the founder of aikido, who died in 1969. Terry Dobson, a fifth-degree black belt who studied with the master from 1961 to 1969, dismissed this claim, saying, "That story is bull. [Back then] I never heard of Steven Seagal." By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman. Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. CANNOTANSWER | Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, | Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan, becoming the first foreigner to operate an aikido dojo in the country. He later moved to Los Angeles, California, where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in Above the Law. By 1991, he had starred in four films. In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in Under Siege. During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film The Patriot. Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including Steven Seagal: Lawman, which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.
Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, Songs from the Crystal Cave and Mojo Priest, and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has also been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. In addition, Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.
From 1996 to 2018, multiple women accused Seagal of sexual harassment or assault.
Early life
Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan on April 10, 1952, the son of medical technician Patricia (1930–2003) and high school mathematics teacher Samuel Seagal (1928–1991). His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told People magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. However, it was while working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove that he was encouraged to visit Japan.
Martial arts
Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.
Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.
Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011.
Career
1987–2002
In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, Above the Law (titled Nico in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of Under Siege (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.
Seagal hosted the April 20, 1991 episode of the late night variety show Saturday Night Live, which aired as the 18th episode of the 16th season. The series' long-time producer Lorne Michaels and the cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows regarded Seagal as the show's worst-ever host. Spade and Meadows cite Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the show's cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because that skit's title characters stated that they could beat up Seagal. Seagal was never invited back to the show following that episode. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied, "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."
Seagal directed and starred in On Deadly Ground (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. On Deadly Ground was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, Under Siege, titled Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995). In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film Executive Decision, portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama The Glimmer Man (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, Fire Down Below (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.
In 1998, Seagal made The Patriot, another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.
After producing Prince of Central Park, Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of Exit Wounds in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie Ticker, co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before Exit Wounds, and went straight to DVD. Half Past Dead, starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.
2003 to present day: direct-to-video films and television
Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's Machete, all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include Black Dawn, Belly of the Beast, Out of Reach, Submerged, Kill Switch, Urban Justice, Pistol Whipped, Against the Dark, Driven to Kill, A Dangerous Man, Born to Raise Hell, and The Keeper.
In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series Steven Seagal: Lawman, focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.
In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. Maximum Conviction, Force of Execution, Gutshot Straight, Code of Honor, Sniper: Special Ops, The Asian Connection, The Perfect Weapon, Cartels, and China Salesman all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.
In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled True Justice. The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, True Justice has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.
Themes and motifs
Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in Under Siege, a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in The Glimmer Man, an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in The Foreigner and Black Dawn, an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's Machete, which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.
In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published Seagalogy, a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.
Other ventures
Music
Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including Fire Down Below and Ticker. Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.
In 2005, he released his first album, Songs from the Crystal Cave, which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film Into the Sun features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled Mojo Priest, was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.
Law enforcement work
Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) was so impressed that he asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal allegedly graduated from a police academy in Los Angeles over twenty years prior and has a certificate from Peace Officer Standards & Training (POST), an organization that accredits California police officers. However, POST officials in California and Louisiana have no record of Seagal being certified, and Seagal's rank in Louisiana is therefore ceremonial.
Steven Seagal: Lawman, a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.
On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.
Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.
In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.
Business ventures
In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.
In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".
Personal life
Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.
Residences
Seagal owns a dude ranch in Colorado, a home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Los Angeles, and a home in Louisiana.
Religion
Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Seagal's recognition aroused controversy in the American Buddhist community, with Helen Tworkov commenting in Tricycle impugning the extent of Seagal's "spiritual wisdom" and suggesting that Seagal bought his Buddhahood by donations to Penor's Kunzang Palyul Choling center. Penor Rinpoche responded to the controversy by saying that Seagal, although acting in violent movies, had not actually killed people, and that Seagal was merely recognized, whereas enthronement as a tulku would require first a "lengthy process of study and practice".
Citizenship
Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses jus soli U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.
Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."
Relationships and family
While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.
During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".
Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.
Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.
Allegations and lawsuits
Early 1990s
In May 1991 (during the filming of Out for Justice), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".
In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for Under Siege 2.
1995 lawsuit
In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of On Deadly Ground. In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".
2010 lawsuit
On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.
2011 lawsuit
On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman. Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.
2017 allegations
In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants. On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.
2018 allegations and investigation
On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, Out for a Kill (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie On Deadly Ground.
2020 federal securities violation settlement
On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.
Victim of attempted extortion
Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with Marked for Death in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost. Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of Exit Wounds in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone bluntly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie. If Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him. Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.
On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003 and, in February 2004, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.
Conflicts with stuntmen
Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.
Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for Out for Justice, LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.
LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."
On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."
Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.
Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on Executive Decision, in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall.
Political views and activism
Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, Medicine Lake Video. The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.
In 1999, Seagal was awarded a PETA Humanitarian Award.
In a March 2014 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson, had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet stating, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law." In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by president Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him because he "committed socially dangerous actions".
Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
In 2017, Seagal collaborated with former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, Tom Morrissey, in writing a self-published conspiracy thriller novel, The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State And The Hijacking Of America, which featured a Tohono Shadow Wolf tracker working for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to foil a plot by Mexican drug cartels and the "deep state" to smuggle in Islamist terrorists to the United States through the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2021, Seagal gifted a katana sword to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry special envoy while visiting Canaima National Park. Maduro referred to Seagal as "my brother."
On May 30, 2021, the pro-Kremlin systemic opposition party A Just Russia — Patriots — For Truth announced that Seagal had received an official membership card to the party.
Stunts
Filmography
Films
Television
Awards and nominations
Discography
2005: Songs from the Crystal Cave
2006: Mojo Priest
References
External links
1952 births
Living people
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American male actors
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21st-century American male actors
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Activists from California
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American blues singers
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American deputy sheriffs
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American people of Irish descent
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American stunt performers
Businesspeople from California
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Converts to Buddhism
Country musicians from Louisiana
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Golden Raspberry Award winners
Guitarists from Michigan
Male actors from Fullerton, California
Male actors from Lansing, Michigan
Naturalised citizens of Russia
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Nyingma tulkus
Participants in American reality television series
People from Eltingville, Staten Island
People from Germantown, Tennessee
People from Jefferson Parish, Louisiana
People from Mandeville Canyon, Los Angeles
Russian businesspeople
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Serbian male judoka
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Serbian people of Irish descent
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Tibetan Buddhists from Russia
Tibetan Buddhists from the United States | true | [
"Here to Stay may refer to:\nHere to Stay (Freddie Hubbard album)\nHere to Stay (Schon & Hammer album)\nHere to Stay (Greg Sczebel album)\nHere to Stay (The Slickee Boys album)\nHere to Stay, song by Pat Metheny Group from the album We Live Here\n\"Here to Stay\" (Korn song), 2002\n\"Here to Stay\" (Christina Aguilera song)\n\"Here to Stay\" (New Order song), 2002\nHere to Stay (Deuteronomium album), an album by the band Deuteronomium\nHere to Stay (TV series), a Canadian dramatic television anthology miniseries",
"\"Love Is Here to Stay\" is a popular song and jazz standard composed by George Gershwin with lyrics by Ira Gershwin for the movie The Goldwyn Follies (1938).\n\nHistory \n\"Love Is Here to Stay\" was first performed by Kenny Baker in The Goldwyn Follies but became popular when it was sung by Gene Kelly to Leslie Caron in the film An American in Paris (1951). The song appeared in Forget Paris (1995) and Manhattan (1979). It can also be heard in the film When Harry Met Sally... (1989) sung by Harry Connick Jr.\n\nAn instrumental version of the song is heard in an episode of TV's The Honeymooners when Alice turns to Ralph and says: \"I loved you ever since the day I walked in your bus and you shortchanged me.\"\n\nThe song is also used in the musical The 1940's Radio Hour; however, it was not included in the 2015 Broadway musical An American in Paris.\n\nComposition \n\"Love Is Here to Stay\" was the last musical composition George Gershwin completed before his death on July 11, 1937. Ira Gershwin wrote the lyrics after George's death as a tribute to his brother. Although George had not written a verse for the song, he did have an idea for it that both Ira and pianist Oscar Levant had heard before his death. When a verse was needed, Ira and Levant recalled what George had in mind. Composer Vernon Duke reconstructed the music for the verse at the beginning of the song. Originally titled \"It's Here to Stay\" and then \"Our Love Is Here to Stay,\" the song was finally published as \"Love Is Here to Stay.\" Ira Gershwin said that for years he wanted to change the song's name back to \"Our Love Is Here to Stay,\" but he felt it wouldn't be right since the song had already become a standard.\n\nThe Goldwyn Follies \nIra Gershwin recalled, \"So little footage was given to 'Love Is Here to Stay' — I think only one refrain — that it meant little in The Goldwyn Follies.\" Oscar Levant remembers the producer for the film calling Gershwin into a conference one afternoon and insisting that he play the entire score for a panel of attendees. The experience infuriated George, who thought that he had progressed past this stage in his career as a composer. S. N. Behrman visited Gershwin a few days before he died and wrote that George told him, \"I had to live for this — that Sam Goldwyn should say to me, 'Why don't you write hits like Irving Berlin?'\"\n\nOther versions\n Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong – Ella and Louis Again (1957)\n Ella Fitzgerald – Ella Fitzgerald Sings the George and Ira Gershwin Songbook (1959)\n Billie Holiday – All or Nothing at All (1959)\n Susannah McCorkle – Hearts and Minds (2000)\n Red Norvo with Mildred Bailey – (1938)\n Dinah Washington – In the Land of Hi-Fi (1956)\n Bradley Walsh – Chasing Dreams (2016)\n Pat Boone and Shirley Boone – I Love You Truly (1962)\n Nat 'King' Cole – Sings For Two In Love (1953)\n Alan Sherman did a parody of the song as \"Your Mother's Here to Stay\" from the album \"For Swing'in Livers Only\".(1964)\n\nSee also\nList of 1930s jazz standards\n\nReferences \n\n1938 songs\n1930s jazz standards\nSongs with music by George Gershwin\nSongs with lyrics by Ira Gershwin\nJazz compositions in E-flat major\nChris Montez songs\nPop standards\nSongs written for films"
] |
[
"Steven Seagal",
"Martial arts",
"When did Seagal get involved in martial arts?",
"saying,",
"What kind of martial arts was Seagal doing?",
"By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master",
"Who did he train with?",
"an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married",
"Did he earn a black belt?",
"He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan).",
"What other accomplishments did he have in his martial arts training?",
"Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo,",
"Was this successful?",
"although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983",
"Did he stay here?",
"Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood,"
] | C_9aa7eeb265cb4e8897009f1c9139a870_1 | Did the dojo move somewhere else? | 8 | Did Steven Seagal's North Hollywood dojo move somewhere else, besides Hollywood? | Steven Seagal | Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. The date of his journey has become a point of contention due to Seagal's statement that he studied with Morihei Uyeshiba, the founder of aikido, who died in 1969. Terry Dobson, a fifth-degree black belt who studied with the master from 1961 to 1969, dismissed this claim, saying, "That story is bull. [Back then] I never heard of Steven Seagal." By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman. Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. CANNOTANSWER | but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. | Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan, becoming the first foreigner to operate an aikido dojo in the country. He later moved to Los Angeles, California, where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in Above the Law. By 1991, he had starred in four films. In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in Under Siege. During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film The Patriot. Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including Steven Seagal: Lawman, which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.
Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, Songs from the Crystal Cave and Mojo Priest, and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has also been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. In addition, Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.
From 1996 to 2018, multiple women accused Seagal of sexual harassment or assault.
Early life
Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan on April 10, 1952, the son of medical technician Patricia (1930–2003) and high school mathematics teacher Samuel Seagal (1928–1991). His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told People magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. However, it was while working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove that he was encouraged to visit Japan.
Martial arts
Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.
Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.
Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011.
Career
1987–2002
In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, Above the Law (titled Nico in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of Under Siege (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.
Seagal hosted the April 20, 1991 episode of the late night variety show Saturday Night Live, which aired as the 18th episode of the 16th season. The series' long-time producer Lorne Michaels and the cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows regarded Seagal as the show's worst-ever host. Spade and Meadows cite Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the show's cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because that skit's title characters stated that they could beat up Seagal. Seagal was never invited back to the show following that episode. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied, "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."
Seagal directed and starred in On Deadly Ground (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. On Deadly Ground was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, Under Siege, titled Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995). In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film Executive Decision, portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama The Glimmer Man (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, Fire Down Below (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.
In 1998, Seagal made The Patriot, another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.
After producing Prince of Central Park, Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of Exit Wounds in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie Ticker, co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before Exit Wounds, and went straight to DVD. Half Past Dead, starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.
2003 to present day: direct-to-video films and television
Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's Machete, all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include Black Dawn, Belly of the Beast, Out of Reach, Submerged, Kill Switch, Urban Justice, Pistol Whipped, Against the Dark, Driven to Kill, A Dangerous Man, Born to Raise Hell, and The Keeper.
In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series Steven Seagal: Lawman, focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.
In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. Maximum Conviction, Force of Execution, Gutshot Straight, Code of Honor, Sniper: Special Ops, The Asian Connection, The Perfect Weapon, Cartels, and China Salesman all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.
In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled True Justice. The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, True Justice has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.
Themes and motifs
Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in Under Siege, a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in The Glimmer Man, an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in The Foreigner and Black Dawn, an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's Machete, which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.
In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published Seagalogy, a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.
Other ventures
Music
Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including Fire Down Below and Ticker. Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.
In 2005, he released his first album, Songs from the Crystal Cave, which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film Into the Sun features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled Mojo Priest, was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.
Law enforcement work
Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) was so impressed that he asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal allegedly graduated from a police academy in Los Angeles over twenty years prior and has a certificate from Peace Officer Standards & Training (POST), an organization that accredits California police officers. However, POST officials in California and Louisiana have no record of Seagal being certified, and Seagal's rank in Louisiana is therefore ceremonial.
Steven Seagal: Lawman, a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.
On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.
Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.
In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.
Business ventures
In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.
In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".
Personal life
Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.
Residences
Seagal owns a dude ranch in Colorado, a home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Los Angeles, and a home in Louisiana.
Religion
Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Seagal's recognition aroused controversy in the American Buddhist community, with Helen Tworkov commenting in Tricycle impugning the extent of Seagal's "spiritual wisdom" and suggesting that Seagal bought his Buddhahood by donations to Penor's Kunzang Palyul Choling center. Penor Rinpoche responded to the controversy by saying that Seagal, although acting in violent movies, had not actually killed people, and that Seagal was merely recognized, whereas enthronement as a tulku would require first a "lengthy process of study and practice".
Citizenship
Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses jus soli U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.
Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."
Relationships and family
While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.
During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".
Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.
Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.
Allegations and lawsuits
Early 1990s
In May 1991 (during the filming of Out for Justice), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".
In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for Under Siege 2.
1995 lawsuit
In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of On Deadly Ground. In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".
2010 lawsuit
On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.
2011 lawsuit
On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman. Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.
2017 allegations
In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants. On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.
2018 allegations and investigation
On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, Out for a Kill (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie On Deadly Ground.
2020 federal securities violation settlement
On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.
Victim of attempted extortion
Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with Marked for Death in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost. Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of Exit Wounds in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone bluntly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie. If Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him. Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.
On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003 and, in February 2004, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.
Conflicts with stuntmen
Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.
Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for Out for Justice, LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.
LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."
On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."
Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.
Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on Executive Decision, in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall.
Political views and activism
Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, Medicine Lake Video. The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.
In 1999, Seagal was awarded a PETA Humanitarian Award.
In a March 2014 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson, had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet stating, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law." In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by president Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him because he "committed socially dangerous actions".
Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
In 2017, Seagal collaborated with former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, Tom Morrissey, in writing a self-published conspiracy thriller novel, The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State And The Hijacking Of America, which featured a Tohono Shadow Wolf tracker working for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to foil a plot by Mexican drug cartels and the "deep state" to smuggle in Islamist terrorists to the United States through the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2021, Seagal gifted a katana sword to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry special envoy while visiting Canaima National Park. Maduro referred to Seagal as "my brother."
On May 30, 2021, the pro-Kremlin systemic opposition party A Just Russia — Patriots — For Truth announced that Seagal had received an official membership card to the party.
Stunts
Filmography
Films
Television
Awards and nominations
Discography
2005: Songs from the Crystal Cave
2006: Mojo Priest
References
External links
1952 births
Living people
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male actors
21st-century American male musicians
21st-century Russian male actors
21st-century Serbian male actors
Activists from California
American actor-politicians
American aikidoka
American blues singers
American country singers
American deputy sheriffs
American drink industry businesspeople
American emigrants to Russia
American environmentalists
American expatriates in Japan
American kendoka
American male film actors
American male guitarists
American male judoka
American male karateka
American male singers
American people of Irish descent
American people of Jewish descent
American stunt performers
Businesspeople from California
Businesspeople from Louisiana
Businesspeople from Michigan
Converts to Buddhism
Country musicians from Louisiana
Country musicians from Michigan
Country musicians from Tennessee
Golden Raspberry Award winners
Guitarists from Michigan
Male actors from Fullerton, California
Male actors from Lansing, Michigan
Naturalised citizens of Russia
Naturalized citizens of Serbia
Nyingma tulkus
Participants in American reality television series
People from Eltingville, Staten Island
People from Germantown, Tennessee
People from Jefferson Parish, Louisiana
People from Mandeville Canyon, Los Angeles
Russian businesspeople
Russian male film actors
Russian male judoka
Russian male karateka
Russian martial artists
Russian people of Irish descent
Russian people of Jewish descent
Russian stunt performers
Serbian businesspeople
Serbian male film actors
Serbian male judoka
Serbian male karateka
Serbian people of Irish descent
Serbian people of Jewish descent
Serbian stunt performers
Tibetan Buddhists from Russia
Tibetan Buddhists from the United States | false | [
"Somewhere Else may refer to:\n\nAlbums \n Somewhere Else (Lydia Loveless album), 2014\n Somewhere Else (Eva Avila album), 2006\n Somewhere Else (Marillion album), 2007\n Somewhere Else (Sun Ra album), 1993\n Somewhere Else (Barry Altschul album), 1979\n Somewhere Else (Sally Shapiro album), 2013\n\nSongs \n \"Somewhere Else\", a 1997 song by China Drum\n \"Somewhere Else\", a 2003 song by rock band Travis from their album 12 Memories\n \"Somewhere Else\" (Razorlight song), a 2005 song by Razorlight from their debut album Up All Night\n \"Somewhere Else\", a 2008 song by VenetianPrincess\n \"Somewhere Else\" (Toby Keith song), the third and final single by Toby Keith from his 2010 album Bullets in the Gun, released in 2011\n\nOther uses \n \"Somewhere Else\" (The Good Place), an episode of the American comedy television series\n\nSee also\n Elsewhere (disambiguation)",
"Hacker Dojo is a community center and hackerspace that is based in Mountain View, California. Predominantly an open working space for software projects, the Dojo hosts a range of events from technology classes to biology, computer hardware, and manufacturing and is open to all types of hackers.\n\nOrganization \nThe Dojo is run mostly democratically by its membership under the oversight of five elected directors. Anybody can become a member, and hardship, worktrade and family rates are available. Member votes rarely deal with specific instances, and more work with general policy on how the Dojo should run. The Dojo is primarily financed through membership dues ($125/mo), but has historically accepted 3rd party sponsorships from Microsoft, Google, isocket, Twilio, AMS Dataserfs, and Palantir Technologies to fund expansions and renovations.\n\nCulture \nThe Dojo is entirely communal space from the tools in the electronics lab to the desks. Anything left there is considered fair game for anybody to play with. Very few restrictions are placed upon people provided they do not detract from the experience of members or consume resources they do not replace. Any member may run an event, and event organizers are permitted to charge non-members for attendance to their event. Members are always permitted to go everywhere they wish, provided they do not consume somebody else's finite resources (such as an event's food).\n\nPhysical Space \n\nThe Hacker Dojo was originally located at 140 South Whisman Road in Mountain View, CA. The facility started as being only 140A but the space expanded to include 140B in October 2009, and further expanded in October 2011 to lease units C and D, thus taking over the entirety of 140 S. Whisman. The expansion party was attended by several hundred individuals, including Steven Levy.\n\nBecause of zoning violations, the City of Mountain View blocked the use of units C and D, and restricted the use of units A and B to events no larger than 49 occupants., 140A was formerly an industrial artistic glassworking facility, though the community has put the space through a significant series of renovations.\n\nIn order to raise money to help meet building code requirements, the Dojo staged an \"underwear run,\" on Saint Patrick's Day as a fund raiser.\n\nConstruction bids to bring the 140 South Whisman space up to building code requirements came in much higher than expected, and on Monday, October 15, 2012, the Dojo signed a lease to rent a building at 599 Fairchild Drive, also in Mountain View. Move-in occurred on February 13, 2013, and a ribbon-cutting ceremony was held on February 27, 2013 \n\nThe lease on the building at 599 Fairchild Drive ran through May 31, 2016, at which time the Dojo moved to its third home, located at 3350 Thomas Road in Santa Clara.\n\nHacker Dojo and its fourth iteration returns back to its founding city in 2022.\n\nControversies\n\nDistributed denial of service attack\nMembers at Hacker Dojo could not access the Internet during several outages occurring between June 22 and July 14, 2013. The problem was eventually traced to an amplified distributed denial-of-service attack (DDoS) attack. In this case, the perpetrator was sending forged Domain Name Service (DNS) requests to multiple domain name servers, causing the servers to send large amounts data records to the Hacker Dojo, thereby overloading the system and preventing legitimate use of the network.\n\nDojo managers made several attempts to stop the attacks, but were unsuccessful. Eventually, they requested help from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which determined the outages were the result of a criminal act by Jason David Miller, a former Dojo member.\n\nAccording to the indictment, Miller had become a member on May 19, 2013, using the first name \"ad\" and the last name \"min,\" such that his username became \"ad.min\" and his email address \"[email protected].\" Dojo management forbids misleading usernames, and terminated his email account. On June 1, 2013, Miller re-registered as \"Dallas Smith,\" and began attacking the Dojo's internet service a few weeks later, starting on June 22, 2013. He is charged with violation of Title 18 U.S.C. §§ 1030(a)(5)(A) and (c)(4)(B)(i)—Intentionally Causing Damage to a Protected Computer. Miller was indicted in May 2014.\n\nMiller claims he only intended to engage in a harmless prank. He had been a teaching assistant, researcher, and Eagle Scout. He was scheduled to be sentenced on October 3, 2016, in the courtroom of Judge Edward J. Davila in San Jose.\n\nEmbezzlement\nIn March, 2016, a local newspaper published an article saying the Dojo was facing a leadership crisis and that an employee had been accused of embezzlement.\nSince 2016, The organization has had a major overhaul in leadership with new Board Members bringing back some of the Founding Team of Super Happy Dev House. The organization currently holds a Platinum badge of Transparency with Guidestar. https://www.guidestar.org/profile/26-4812213\n\nUses \nThe three primary uses of Hacker Dojo are for events, as a coworking space, and for social purposes.\n\nEvents \nThe 140B building has been turned into a place where events such as Random Hacks of Kindness, Startup Weekend, and BayThreat among others have been hosted. It also has invented and run its own events such as a reverse job fair call the Hacker Fair where candidates present booths of their previous independent or open source work to company engineers who are accompanied by technical recruiters and the Startup Fair, where young companies have booths for investors to consider. Members can hold events at the Dojo free of charge, subject to approval from the Dojo events committee.\n\nCoworking \nA large number of Silicon Valley startups work daily out of the Hacker Dojo as their primary location, and Founders Institute, which is located nearby, encourages its members to work out of the Dojo\n\nNotable Startups With Hacker Dojo History \n Pinterest—the two founders met and built the first iteration of the product at Hacker Dojo\n Word Lens—acquired by Google\n Pebble Watches\n Infometers.com—acquired by Validic.com\n Skydera\n NetworkedBlogs\n Game Closure\n Chivaz Socks\n MicroMobs, now Wedding Party\n Cirroscope (then CirroSecure), acquired by Palo Alto Networks\n\nSocial \nThe Dojo used to have movie nights and a weekly Happy Hour.\n\nDojo in 2022\n\nOriginal Dojo\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n\n \"The official Hacker Dojo Google Group\"\n \"Peninsula hackers find a place to collaborate in Mountain View\". Mercury News. August 28, 2009\n \"Hacker Dojo in Mountain View sparks ideas and tinkering\". Mercury News. October 16, 2009\n \"A case for Hacker Dojo\". 248Creative.com. February 2010.\n \"Techies Get to Work at Hacker Dojo\" Wall Street Journal. 3/9/2011.\n \"At Hacker Dojo, Silicon Valley techies build toward success\". CNet News.com. April 4, 2011.\n \"The Stanford Igniters meetup once a month at Hacker Dojo\"\n\nHacker groups\nComputer clubs\nHackerspaces\nHackerspaces in the San Francisco Bay Area\nBuildings and structures in Santa Clara, California\nCulture in the San Francisco Bay Area\n2009 establishments in California"
] |
[
"Steven Seagal",
"Martial arts",
"When did Seagal get involved in martial arts?",
"saying,",
"What kind of martial arts was Seagal doing?",
"By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master",
"Who did he train with?",
"an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married",
"Did he earn a black belt?",
"He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan).",
"What other accomplishments did he have in his martial arts training?",
"Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo,",
"Was this successful?",
"although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983",
"Did he stay here?",
"Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood,",
"Did the dojo move somewhere else?",
"but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997."
] | C_9aa7eeb265cb4e8897009f1c9139a870_1 | What else is notable about this part of his life? | 9 | Along with returning to the U.S. from Japan in 1983, what else is notable about 1983 in Steven Seagal's life? | Steven Seagal | Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. The date of his journey has become a point of contention due to Seagal's statement that he studied with Morihei Uyeshiba, the founder of aikido, who died in 1969. Terry Dobson, a fifth-degree black belt who studied with the master from 1961 to 1969, dismissed this claim, saying, "That story is bull. [Back then] I never heard of Steven Seagal." By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman. Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. CANNOTANSWER | Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for | Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan, becoming the first foreigner to operate an aikido dojo in the country. He later moved to Los Angeles, California, where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in Above the Law. By 1991, he had starred in four films. In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in Under Siege. During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film The Patriot. Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including Steven Seagal: Lawman, which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.
Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, Songs from the Crystal Cave and Mojo Priest, and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has also been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. In addition, Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.
From 1996 to 2018, multiple women accused Seagal of sexual harassment or assault.
Early life
Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan on April 10, 1952, the son of medical technician Patricia (1930–2003) and high school mathematics teacher Samuel Seagal (1928–1991). His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told People magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. However, it was while working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove that he was encouraged to visit Japan.
Martial arts
Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.
Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.
Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011.
Career
1987–2002
In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, Above the Law (titled Nico in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of Under Siege (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.
Seagal hosted the April 20, 1991 episode of the late night variety show Saturday Night Live, which aired as the 18th episode of the 16th season. The series' long-time producer Lorne Michaels and the cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows regarded Seagal as the show's worst-ever host. Spade and Meadows cite Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the show's cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because that skit's title characters stated that they could beat up Seagal. Seagal was never invited back to the show following that episode. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied, "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."
Seagal directed and starred in On Deadly Ground (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. On Deadly Ground was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, Under Siege, titled Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995). In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film Executive Decision, portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama The Glimmer Man (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, Fire Down Below (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.
In 1998, Seagal made The Patriot, another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.
After producing Prince of Central Park, Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of Exit Wounds in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie Ticker, co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before Exit Wounds, and went straight to DVD. Half Past Dead, starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.
2003 to present day: direct-to-video films and television
Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's Machete, all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include Black Dawn, Belly of the Beast, Out of Reach, Submerged, Kill Switch, Urban Justice, Pistol Whipped, Against the Dark, Driven to Kill, A Dangerous Man, Born to Raise Hell, and The Keeper.
In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series Steven Seagal: Lawman, focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.
In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. Maximum Conviction, Force of Execution, Gutshot Straight, Code of Honor, Sniper: Special Ops, The Asian Connection, The Perfect Weapon, Cartels, and China Salesman all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.
In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled True Justice. The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, True Justice has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.
Themes and motifs
Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in Under Siege, a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in The Glimmer Man, an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in The Foreigner and Black Dawn, an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's Machete, which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.
In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published Seagalogy, a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.
Other ventures
Music
Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including Fire Down Below and Ticker. Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.
In 2005, he released his first album, Songs from the Crystal Cave, which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film Into the Sun features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled Mojo Priest, was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.
Law enforcement work
Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) was so impressed that he asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal allegedly graduated from a police academy in Los Angeles over twenty years prior and has a certificate from Peace Officer Standards & Training (POST), an organization that accredits California police officers. However, POST officials in California and Louisiana have no record of Seagal being certified, and Seagal's rank in Louisiana is therefore ceremonial.
Steven Seagal: Lawman, a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.
On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.
Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.
In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.
Business ventures
In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.
In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".
Personal life
Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.
Residences
Seagal owns a dude ranch in Colorado, a home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Los Angeles, and a home in Louisiana.
Religion
Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Seagal's recognition aroused controversy in the American Buddhist community, with Helen Tworkov commenting in Tricycle impugning the extent of Seagal's "spiritual wisdom" and suggesting that Seagal bought his Buddhahood by donations to Penor's Kunzang Palyul Choling center. Penor Rinpoche responded to the controversy by saying that Seagal, although acting in violent movies, had not actually killed people, and that Seagal was merely recognized, whereas enthronement as a tulku would require first a "lengthy process of study and practice".
Citizenship
Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses jus soli U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.
Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."
Relationships and family
While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.
During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".
Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.
Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.
Allegations and lawsuits
Early 1990s
In May 1991 (during the filming of Out for Justice), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".
In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for Under Siege 2.
1995 lawsuit
In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of On Deadly Ground. In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".
2010 lawsuit
On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.
2011 lawsuit
On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman. Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.
2017 allegations
In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants. On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.
2018 allegations and investigation
On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, Out for a Kill (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie On Deadly Ground.
2020 federal securities violation settlement
On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.
Victim of attempted extortion
Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with Marked for Death in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost. Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of Exit Wounds in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone bluntly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie. If Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him. Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.
On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003 and, in February 2004, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.
Conflicts with stuntmen
Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.
Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for Out for Justice, LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.
LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."
On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."
Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.
Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on Executive Decision, in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall.
Political views and activism
Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, Medicine Lake Video. The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.
In 1999, Seagal was awarded a PETA Humanitarian Award.
In a March 2014 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson, had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet stating, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law." In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by president Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him because he "committed socially dangerous actions".
Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
In 2017, Seagal collaborated with former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, Tom Morrissey, in writing a self-published conspiracy thriller novel, The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State And The Hijacking Of America, which featured a Tohono Shadow Wolf tracker working for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to foil a plot by Mexican drug cartels and the "deep state" to smuggle in Islamist terrorists to the United States through the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2021, Seagal gifted a katana sword to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry special envoy while visiting Canaima National Park. Maduro referred to Seagal as "my brother."
On May 30, 2021, the pro-Kremlin systemic opposition party A Just Russia — Patriots — For Truth announced that Seagal had received an official membership card to the party.
Stunts
Filmography
Films
Television
Awards and nominations
Discography
2005: Songs from the Crystal Cave
2006: Mojo Priest
References
External links
1952 births
Living people
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male actors
21st-century American male musicians
21st-century Russian male actors
21st-century Serbian male actors
Activists from California
American actor-politicians
American aikidoka
American blues singers
American country singers
American deputy sheriffs
American drink industry businesspeople
American emigrants to Russia
American environmentalists
American expatriates in Japan
American kendoka
American male film actors
American male guitarists
American male judoka
American male karateka
American male singers
American people of Irish descent
American people of Jewish descent
American stunt performers
Businesspeople from California
Businesspeople from Louisiana
Businesspeople from Michigan
Converts to Buddhism
Country musicians from Louisiana
Country musicians from Michigan
Country musicians from Tennessee
Golden Raspberry Award winners
Guitarists from Michigan
Male actors from Fullerton, California
Male actors from Lansing, Michigan
Naturalised citizens of Russia
Naturalized citizens of Serbia
Nyingma tulkus
Participants in American reality television series
People from Eltingville, Staten Island
People from Germantown, Tennessee
People from Jefferson Parish, Louisiana
People from Mandeville Canyon, Los Angeles
Russian businesspeople
Russian male film actors
Russian male judoka
Russian male karateka
Russian martial artists
Russian people of Irish descent
Russian people of Jewish descent
Russian stunt performers
Serbian businesspeople
Serbian male film actors
Serbian male judoka
Serbian male karateka
Serbian people of Irish descent
Serbian people of Jewish descent
Serbian stunt performers
Tibetan Buddhists from Russia
Tibetan Buddhists from the United States | true | [
"\"What Else Is There?\" is the third single from the Norwegian duo Röyksopp's second album The Understanding. It features the vocals of Karin Dreijer from the Swedish electronica duo The Knife. The album was released in the UK with the help of Astralwerks.\n\nThe single was used in an O2 television advertisement in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia during 2008. It was also used in the 2006 film Cashback and the 2007 film, Meet Bill. Trentemøller's remix of \"What Else is There?\" was featured in an episode of the HBO show Entourage.\n\nThe song was covered by extreme metal band Enslaved as a bonus track for their album E.\n\nThe song was listed as the 375th best song of the 2000s by Pitchfork Media.\n\nOfficial versions\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Album Version) – 5:17\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Radio Edit) – 3:38\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Jacques Lu Cont Radio Mix) – 3:46\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Vocal Version) – 8:03\n\"What Else Is There?\" (The Emperor Machine Dub Version) – 7:51\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Mix) – 8:25\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Edit) – 4:50\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Thin White Duke Remix) (Radio Edit) – 3:06\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Trentemøller Remix) – 7:42\n\"What Else Is There?\" (Vitalic Remix) – 5:14\n\nResponse\nThe single was officially released on 5 December 2005 in the UK. The single had a limited release on 21 November 2005 to promote the upcoming album. On the UK Singles Chart, it peaked at number 32, while on the UK Dance Chart, it reached number one.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video was directed by Martin de Thurah. It features Norwegian model Marianne Schröder who is shown lip-syncing Dreijer's voice. Schröder is depicted as a floating woman traveling across stormy landscapes and within empty houses. Dreijer makes a cameo appearance as a woman wearing an Elizabethan ruff while dining alone at a festive table.\n\nMovie spots\n\nThe song is also featured in the movie Meet Bill as characters played by Jessica Alba and Aaron Eckhart smoke marijuana while listening to it. It is also part of the end credits music of the film Cashback.\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2005 singles\nRöyksopp songs\nAstralwerks singles\nSongs written by Svein Berge\nSongs written by Torbjørn Brundtland\n2004 songs\nSongs written by Roger Greenaway\nSongs written by Olof Dreijer\nSongs written by Karin Dreijer",
"Synoplotherium (synonym Dromocyon) is an extinct genus of relatively small, wolf-like mesonychids that lived 50 million years ago, in what is now Wyoming.\n\n \nSynoplotherium coexisted with its larger relative, Mesonyx. Very little else remains known about this mesonychid since its discovery in 1875.\n\nPathology \nThe specimen of Synoplotherium on display at the Peabody Museum of Natural History has a fractured lower jaw. The jaw is cracked right at the midpoint and shows signs of healing. Evidence in the form of its worn down teeth show the animal survived to old age.\n\nReferences\n\nMesonychids\nEocene mammals of North America\nEocene life\nFossil taxa described in 1872\nPrehistoric placental genera"
] |
[
"Steven Seagal",
"Martial arts",
"When did Seagal get involved in martial arts?",
"saying,",
"What kind of martial arts was Seagal doing?",
"By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master",
"Who did he train with?",
"an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married",
"Did he earn a black belt?",
"He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan).",
"What other accomplishments did he have in his martial arts training?",
"Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo,",
"Was this successful?",
"although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983",
"Did he stay here?",
"Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood,",
"Did the dojo move somewhere else?",
"but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997.",
"What else is notable about this part of his life?",
"Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for"
] | C_9aa7eeb265cb4e8897009f1c9139a870_1 | What did Machida attribute to Seagal? | 10 | What did Brazilian Martial Artist Lyoto Machida attribute to Steven Seagal? | Steven Seagal | Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. The date of his journey has become a point of contention due to Seagal's statement that he studied with Morihei Uyeshiba, the founder of aikido, who died in 1969. Terry Dobson, a fifth-degree black belt who studied with the master from 1961 to 1969, dismissed this claim, saying, "That story is bull. [Back then] I never heard of Steven Seagal." By 1974 Seagal had returned California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman. Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which he ran until the two parted ways in 1997. Seagal helped train Brazilian Mixed Martial Artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. CANNOTANSWER | Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011. | Steven Frederic Seagal (; born April 10, 1952) is an American actor, screenwriter and martial artist. Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan. A 7th-dan black belt in aikido, he began his adult life as a martial arts instructor in Japan, becoming the first foreigner to operate an aikido dojo in the country. He later moved to Los Angeles, California, where he had the same profession. In 1988, Seagal made his acting debut in Above the Law. By 1991, he had starred in four films. In 1992, he played Navy SEAL counter-terrorist expert Casey Ryback in Under Siege. During the latter half of the 1990s, Seagal starred in three more feature films and the direct-to-video film The Patriot. Subsequently, his career shifted to mostly direct-to-video productions. He has since appeared in films and reality shows, including Steven Seagal: Lawman, which depicted Seagal performing his duties as a reserve deputy sheriff.
Seagal is a guitarist and has released two studio albums, Songs from the Crystal Cave and Mojo Priest, and performed on the scores of several of his films. He has worked with Stevie Wonder and Tony Rebel, who both performed on his debut album. He has also been involved in a line of "therapeutic oil" products and energy drinks. In addition, Seagal is an environmentalist, animal rights activist, and supporter of 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso. He is a supporter of Vladimir Putin, to whom he once referred as "one of the great living world leaders". He was granted both Russian and Serbian citizenship in 2016. In 2018, he was appointed Russia's special envoy to the U.S.
From 1996 to 2018, multiple women accused Seagal of sexual harassment or assault.
Early life
Steven Frederic Seagal was born in Lansing, Michigan on April 10, 1952, the son of medical technician Patricia (1930–2003) and high school mathematics teacher Samuel Seagal (1928–1991). His mother was of Irish descent, while his father was Jewish. When he was five years old, he moved with his parents to Fullerton, California. His mother later told People magazine that prior to the move Seagal was frail and suffered from asthma: "He was a puny kid back then. But he really thrived after the move [from Michigan]." Seagal attended Buena Park High School in Buena Park, California, and Fullerton College between 1970 and 1971. As a teen, he spent much time in his garage listening to loud rock music. However, it was while working with a friendly old Japanese man at a dojo in Garden Grove that he was encouraged to visit Japan.
Martial arts
Seagal moved to Japan at some point between 1971 and 1973. By 1974, he had returned to California. That year he met Miyako Fujitani, a second-degree black belt and daughter of an Osaka aikido master who had come to Los Angeles to teach aikido. When Miyako returned to Osaka, Seagal went with her. The following year they married and had a son, Kentaro, and a daughter, Ayako. He taught at the school owned by Miyako's family (though he is often stated to have been the first non-Asian to open a dojo in Japan). As of 1990, Miyako and her brother still taught there, and her mother was the chairwoman.
Seagal initially returned to Taos, New Mexico, with his student (and later film stuntman) Craig Dunn, where they opened a dojo, although Seagal spent much of his time pursuing other ventures. After another period in Japan, Seagal returned to the U.S. in 1983 with senior student Haruo Matsuoka. They opened an aikido dojo, initially in North Hollywood, California, but later moved it to the city of West Hollywood. Seagal left Matsuoka in charge of the dojo, which the latter ran until the two parted ways in 1997.
Seagal helped train Brazilian mixed martial artist Lyoto Machida, who credited Seagal for helping him perfect the front kick that he used to knock out Randy Couture at UFC 129 in May 2011.
Career
1987–2002
In 1987, Seagal began work on his first film, Above the Law (titled Nico in Europe), with director Andrew Davis. Following its success, Seagal's subsequent movies were Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice; all were box office hits, making him an action hero. Later, he achieved wider, mainstream success in 1992 with the release of Under Siege (1992), which reunited Seagal with director Andrew Davis.
Seagal hosted the April 20, 1991 episode of the late night variety show Saturday Night Live, which aired as the 18th episode of the 16th season. The series' long-time producer Lorne Michaels and the cast-members David Spade and Tim Meadows regarded Seagal as the show's worst-ever host. Spade and Meadows cite Seagal's humorlessness, his ill-treatment of the show's cast and writers, and his refusal to do a "Hans and Franz" sketch because that skit's title characters stated that they could beat up Seagal. Seagal was never invited back to the show following that episode. Meadows commented, "He didn't realize that you can't tell somebody they're stupid on Wednesday and expect them to continue writing for you on Saturday." The cast and crew's difficulties with Seagal were later echoed on-air by Michaels during guest host Nicolas Cage's monologue in the September 26, 1992 Season 18 premiere. When Cage worried that he would do so poorly that the audience would regard him as "the biggest jerk who's ever been on the show", Michaels replied, "No, no. That would be Steven Seagal."
Seagal directed and starred in On Deadly Ground (1994), featuring Michael Caine, R. Lee Ermey, and Billy Bob Thornton in minor supporting roles. The film emphasized environmental and spiritual themes, signaling a break with his previous persona as a genre-ready inner-city cop. On Deadly Ground was poorly received by critics, especially denouncing Seagal's long environmental speech in the film. Regardless, Seagal considers it one of the most important and relevant moments in his career. Seagal followed this with a sequel to one of his most successful films, Under Siege, titled Under Siege 2: Dark Territory (1995). In 1996, he had a role in the Kurt Russell film Executive Decision, portraying a special ops soldier who only appears in the film's first 45 minutes. The same year, he filmed a police drama The Glimmer Man (1996). In another environmentally conscious and commercially unsuccessful film, Fire Down Below (1997), he played an EPA Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance agent fighting industrialists dumping toxic waste in the Kentucky hills.
In 1998, Seagal made The Patriot, another environmental thriller which was his first direct-to-video release in the United States (though it was released theatrically in most of the world). Seagal produced this film with his own money, and the film was shot on-location on and near his farm in Montana.
After producing Prince of Central Park, Seagal returned to cinema screens with the release of Exit Wounds in March 2001. The film had fewer martial arts scenes than Seagal's previous films, but it was a commercial success, taking almost $80 million worldwide. However, he was unable to capitalize on this success and his next two projects were both critical and commercial failures. The movie Ticker, co-starring Tom Sizemore and Dennis Hopper, was filmed in San Francisco before Exit Wounds, and went straight to DVD. Half Past Dead, starring hip hop star Ja Rule, made less than $20 million worldwide.
2003 to present day: direct-to-video films and television
Other than his role as a villain in Robert Rodriguez's Machete, all of the films Seagal has made since the latter half of 2001 have been released direct-to-video (DTV) in North America, with some theatrical releases to other countries around the world. Seagal is credited as a producer and sometimes a writer on many of these DTV movies, which include Black Dawn, Belly of the Beast, Out of Reach, Submerged, Kill Switch, Urban Justice, Pistol Whipped, Against the Dark, Driven to Kill, A Dangerous Man, Born to Raise Hell, and The Keeper.
In 2009, A&E Network premiered the reality television series Steven Seagal: Lawman, focusing on Seagal as a deputy in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.
In the 2010s, Seagal's direct-to-video films increasingly started to become ensemble pieces, with Seagal playing minor or supporting roles, despite the fact that he often received top billing. Maximum Conviction, Force of Execution, Gutshot Straight, Code of Honor, Sniper: Special Ops, The Asian Connection, The Perfect Weapon, Cartels, and China Salesman all exemplify this trend. This has led some commentators to criticize Seagal for his low-effort participation in movies which heavily promote his involvement.
In 2011, Seagal produced and starred in an American television action series entitled True Justice. The series first aired on Nitro, a TV station in Spain, on May 12, 2011. It premiered in the UK on 5 USA, with the first episode broadcast July 20, 2011. April 26, 2012 the series was renewed for a second season airing on ReelzChannel July 4, 2012. In the UK, True Justice has been repackaged as a series of DVD "movies," with each disc editing together two episodes.
Themes and motifs
Many of Seagal's films share unique elements which have become characteristic of his body of work. His characters often have an elite past affiliation with the CIA, Special Forces, or Black Ops (for example, Casey Ryback in Under Siege, a former Navy SEAL, Jack Cole in The Glimmer Man, an ex-CIA police detective, or Jonathan Cold in The Foreigner and Black Dawn, an ex-CIA Black Ops freelancer). His characters differ from those of other action movie icons by virtue of their near-invulnerability; they almost never face any significant physical threat, easily overpowering any opposition and never facing bodily harm or even temporary defeat. A notable exception is 2010's Machete, which features Seagal in a rare villainous role.
In 2008, author and critic Vern (no last name) published Seagalogy, a work which examines Seagal's filmography using the framework of auteur theory. The book divides Seagal's filmography into different chronological "eras" with distinct thematic elements. The book was updated in 2012 to include more recent films and Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.
Other ventures
Music
Seagal plays the guitar. His songs have been featured in several of his movies, including Fire Down Below and Ticker. Among his extensive collection are guitars previously owned by "the Kings"; Albert, BB, and Freddie, as well as Bo Diddley, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Buddy Guy, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, and Jimi Hendrix.
In 2005, he released his first album, Songs from the Crystal Cave, which has a mix of pop, world, country, and blues music. It features duets with Tony Rebel, Lt. Stichie, Lady Saw, and Stevie Wonder. The soundtrack to Seagal's 2005 film Into the Sun features several songs from the album. One of his album tracks, "Girl It's Alright", was also released as a single in several countries alongside an accompanying music video. Seagal's second album, titled Mojo Priest, was released in April 2006. Subsequently, he spent the summer of 2006 touring the United States and Europe with his band, Thunderbox, in support of the album.
Law enforcement work
Seagal has been a Reserve Deputy Chief in the Jefferson Parish, Louisiana Sheriff's Office. In the late 1980s, after teaching the deputies martial arts, unarmed combat, and marksmanship, then-sheriff Harry Lee (1932–2007) was so impressed that he asked Seagal to join the force. Seagal allegedly graduated from a police academy in Los Angeles over twenty years prior and has a certificate from Peace Officer Standards & Training (POST), an organization that accredits California police officers. However, POST officials in California and Louisiana have no record of Seagal being certified, and Seagal's rank in Louisiana is therefore ceremonial.
Steven Seagal: Lawman, a series which follows his work in the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office, premiered on A&E on December 2, 2009. Seagal stated that "I've decided to work with A&E on this series now because I believe it's important to show the nation all the positive work being accomplished here in Louisiana—to see the passion and commitment that comes from the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office in this post-Katrina environment." The series premiere drew 3.6 million viewers, ranking as best season opener for any original A&E series ever.
On April 14, 2010, the series was suspended by Jefferson Parish Sheriff Newell Normand due to a sexual trafficking lawsuit filed against Seagal. The suit was later dropped. A&E resumed the show for the second season, which began on October 6, 2010.
Production on Season 3 started in February 2011, with a change of location from Louisiana to Maricopa County, Arizona. Two episodes were scheduled to be aired, beginning on January 4, 2012. Shortly before the episodes were to be aired, Season 3 was suspended, with no explanations given. Season 3 premiered on January 2, 2014, but the show was not renewed for a fourth season.
In October 2011, Seagal was sworn-in as the Sheriff department’s deputy sheriff of Hudspeth County, Texas, a law department responsible for patrolling a 98-mile stretch of the Texas-Mexico border.
Business ventures
In 2005, Seagal Enterprises began to market an energy drink known as "Steven Seagal's Lightning Bolt", but it has since been discontinued. Seagal has also marketed an aftershave called "Scent of Action", and a range of knives and weapons.
In 2013, Seagal joined newly formed Russian firearms manufacturer ORSIS, representing the company in both a promotional capacity as well as lobbying for the easement of US import restrictions on Russian sporting firearms. It was also announced he would work with the company to develop a signature long-range rifle known provisionally as "ORSIS by Steven Seagal".
Personal life
Seagal has an extensive sword collection, and at one time had a custom gun made for him once a month.
Residences
Seagal owns a dude ranch in Colorado, a home in the Mandeville Canyon section of Los Angeles, and a home in Louisiana.
Religion
Seagal is a Buddhist. In February 1997, Lama Penor Rinpoche from Palyul monastery announced that Seagal was a tulku, and specifically the reincarnation of Chungdrag Dorje, a 17th-century terton (treasure revealer) of the Nyingma, the oldest sect of Tibetan Buddhism. Seagal's recognition aroused controversy in the American Buddhist community, with Helen Tworkov commenting in Tricycle impugning the extent of Seagal's "spiritual wisdom" and suggesting that Seagal bought his Buddhahood by donations to Penor's Kunzang Palyul Choling center. Penor Rinpoche responded to the controversy by saying that Seagal, although acting in violent movies, had not actually killed people, and that Seagal was merely recognized, whereas enthronement as a tulku would require first a "lengthy process of study and practice".
Citizenship
Seagal reportedly holds citizenships in three countries: the United States, Serbia, and Russia. Born in the United States, he possesses jus soli U.S. citizenship. He was granted Serbian citizenship on January 11, 2016, following several visits to the country, and has been asked to teach aikido to the Serbian Special Forces.
Seagal was granted Russian citizenship on November 3, 2016; according to government spokesman Dmitry Peskov, "He was asking quite insistently and over a lengthy period to be granted citizenship." While various media have cited Seagal and President Vladimir Putin as friends and Seagal stated that he "would like to consider [Putin] as a brother", Putin has distanced himself from Seagal; Peskov is reported to have said: "I wouldn't necessarily say he's a huge fan, but he's definitely seen some of his movies."
Relationships and family
While in Japan, Seagal married his first wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido instructor. With Fujitani, he had a son, actor and model Kentaro Seagal, and a daughter, writer and actress Ayako Fujitani. Seagal left Miyako to move back to the United States.
During this time, he met actress and model Kelly LeBrock, with whom he began an affair that led to Fujitani granting him a divorce. Seagal was briefly married to actress Adrienne La Russa in 1984, but that marriage was annulled the same year over concerns that his divorce had not yet been finalized. LeBrock gave birth to Seagal's daughter Annaliza in early 1987. Seagal and LeBrock married in September 1987 and their son Dominic was born in June 1990. Their daughter Arissa was born in 1993. The following year, LeBrock filed for divorce citing "irreconcilable differences".
Seagal is married to Mongolian Erdenetuya Batsukh (), better known as "Elle". They have one son together, Kunzang. From an early age, Elle trained as a dancer at the Children's Palace in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. After her graduation from high school and the Children's Palace, she pursued a career as a professional dancer. She won a number of dancing contests and was considered the top female dancer in Mongolia, excelling at ballroom dancing in particular. Elle first met Seagal in 2001, when she worked as his interpreter during his visit to Mongolia.
Seagal has seven children from four relationships, two grandchildren by his eldest son, Kentaro and one granddaughter by his daughter Ayako Fujitani. In addition to his biological offspring, Seagal is the guardian of Yabshi Pan Rinzinwangmo, the only child of the 10th Panchen Lama of Tibet. When she studied in the United States, Seagal was her minder and bodyguard.
Allegations and lawsuits
Early 1990s
In May 1991 (during the filming of Out for Justice), Warner Bros. employees Raenne Malone, Nicole Selinger, and Christine Keeve accused Seagal of sexual harassment. In return for remaining silent, Malone and another woman received around $50,000 each in an out-of-court settlement. Around the same time, at least four actresses claimed that Seagal had made sexual advances, typically during late-night "casting sessions".
In another incident, Jenny McCarthy claimed that Seagal asked her to undress during an audition for Under Siege 2.
1995 lawsuit
In 1995, Seagal was charged with employment discrimination, sexual harassment, and breach of contract. Cheryl Shuman filed a case against Seagal, accusing him of threatening and beating her during the filming of On Deadly Ground. In August 1995, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki dismissed the case, calling the claims "repetitive and unintelligible".
2010 lawsuit
On April 12, 2010, 23-year-old Kayden Nguyen filed a lawsuit against Seagal in a Los Angeles County Superior Court, requesting more than one million dollars in damages. In her suit, Nguyen alleged Seagal engaged in sexual harassment, the illegal trafficking of females for sex, failure to prevent sexual harassment, and wrongful termination. Seagal denied the allegations, but his reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman was suspended while his attorneys resolved the case. On July 14, 2010, three months after Nguyen filed her suit, she withdrew her claim without explanation.
2011 lawsuit
On August 30, 2011, Jesus Sanchez Llovera filed a lawsuit against Seagal over his part in a Maricopa county police raid with heavy weapons (notably including an army surplus tank) of Llovera's residence for suspicion of cockfighting. The incident was taped for Seagal's A&E reality show Steven Seagal: Lawman. Llovera was seeking $100,000 for damages caused during the raid and a letter of apology from Seagal to Llovera's children for the death of their family pet. Llovera claimed that his 11-month-old puppy was shot and killed during the raid. Llovera failed to file court-ordered paperwork after his attorney withdrew from the case and the lawsuit was dismissed in January 2013.
2017 allegations
In 2017, actress Portia de Rossi accused Seagal of sexually harassing her during a movie audition. De Rossi alleged that during an audition in Seagal's office, he told her "how important it was to have chemistry off-screen" before unzipping his pants. On November 9, 2017, Dutch model Faviola Dadis posted a statement on her Instagram account stating that she also had been sexually assaulted by Seagal years earlier.
2018 allegations and investigation
On January 15, 2018, actress Rachel Grant publicly accused Seagal of sexually assaulting her in 2002, during pre-production on his direct-to-video film, Out for a Kill (2003), stating that she lost her job on the film after the incident. In February 2018, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's office acknowledged that it was reviewing a potential sex abuse case involving Seagal. In March 2018, Regina Simons publicly claimed that in 1993, when she was 18, Seagal raped her at his home when she arrived for what she thought was a wrap party for the movie On Deadly Ground.
2020 federal securities violation settlement
On February 27, 2020, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled charges against Seagal for failing to disclose payments he received for promoting an investment in an initial coin offering (ICO) conducted by Bitcoiin2Gen (B2G). Seagal was promised $250,000 in cash and $750,000 worth of B2G tokens in exchange for his social media promotions and a press release in which he "wholeheartedly" endorsed the ICO, which violated the anti-touting provisions of federal securities laws. Without admitting or denying the SEC's findings, Seagal agreed to pay $157,000 in disgorgement, representing the actual payments he received for his promotions, plus prejudgment interest and a $157,000 penalty. Seagal also agreed not to promote any securities, digital or otherwise, for three years.
Victim of attempted extortion
Steven Seagal became embroiled in a legal case involving film producer Julius R. Nasso after Nasso attempted to extort Seagal. Nasso produced seven of Seagal's films beginning with Marked for Death in 1990. The two "became best friends", according to Seagal, and formed Seagal/Nasso Productions together. Their relationship became strained, however, and their partnership ended in 2000. Believing that Seagal owed him $3 million in compensation for backing out of a four-film deal, Nasso enlisted members of the Gambino crime family to threaten Seagal in an attempt to recoup money Nasso allegedly lost. Gambino family captain Anthony Ciccone first visited Seagal in Toronto during the filming of Exit Wounds in October 2000. In January 2001, Primo Cassarino and other gangsters picked up Seagal by car to bring him to a meeting with Ciccone at a Brooklyn restaurant. At the meeting, Ciccone bluntly told Seagal that he had a choice of making four promised movies with Nasso or paying Nasso a penalty of $150,000 per movie. If Seagal refused, Ciccone would kill him. Seagal, who later claimed that he brought a handgun to the meeting, was able to stall Ciccone and escape the meeting unharmed. Ciccone and Cassarino again visited Seagal at his home in Los Angeles the following month. In the spring of 2001, Seagal sought out another mobster, Genovese crime family captain Angelo Prisco, to act as a "peacemaker". He visited Prisco in prison at Rahway, New Jersey and paid Prisco's lawyer $10,000.
On March 17, 2003, Cassarino, Ciccone and others were convicted of labor racketeering, extortion, and 63 other counts under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Seagal testified for the prosecution about the mobsters' extortion attempt. Nasso pleaded guilty to the charge of extortion conspiracy in August 2003 and, in February 2004, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison, fined $75,000 and ordered to take mental health counselling on release from jail. In January 2008, Nasso agreed to drop a $60 million lawsuit against Seagal for an alleged breach of contract when the two settled out of court.
Conflicts with stuntmen
Seagal has been accused by former stunt performers who have worked with him, including Kane Hodder, Stephen Quadros, and Gene LeBell, of intentionally hitting stuntmen during scenes.
Additionally, while serving as stunt coordinator for Out for Justice, LeBell allegedly got into an on-set altercation with Seagal over his mistreatment of some of the film's stunt performers. After the actor claimed that, due to his aikido training, he was "immune" to being choked unconscious, LeBell offered Seagal the opportunity to prove it. LeBell is said to have placed his arms around Seagal's neck, and once Seagal said "go", proceeded to choke him unconscious, with Seagal losing control of his bowels.
LeBell was requested to confirm the on-set incident publicly in an interview with Ariel Helwani in 2012, but he avoided answering the question, albeit implying that it was true. He was quoted as "When we had a little altercation or difference of opinion, there were thirty stuntmen and cameramen that were watching. Sometimes Steven has a tendency to cheese off the wrong people, and you can get hurt doing that."
On the other hand, when Seagal was asked about the incident, he directly denied the allegations, calling LeBell a "sick, pathological scumbag liar", and offered the name of a witness who could prove Lebell had fabricated the entire story. The claim garnered a heated response from LeBell's trainee Ronda Rousey, who said that Seagal was the one lying, and declared "If [Seagal] says anything bad about Gene to my face, I'd make him crap his pants a second time."
Authentic or not, the reports of this incident led LeBell to be counted in 1992 as an additional member of Robert Wall's "Dirty Dozen", a group of martial artists willing to answer to a public challenge made by Seagal. LeBell however declined to participate, revealing the feud with Seagal was hurting him professionally. He did however criticize Seagal for his treatment of stuntmen, and left open the possibility of a professional fight if Seagal wanted to do it.
Allegations of mistreatment towards stuntmen have continued throughout Seagal's later career, with both stuntman Peter Harris Kent (Arnold Schwarzenegger's stunt double) and Mike Leeder publicly criticizing his on-set antics. Actor John Leguizamo also claimed that during rehearsals on Executive Decision, in retaliation for laughing at him, Seagal caught him off guard and knocked him into a brick wall.
Political views and activism
Seagal lent his voice as a narrator for an activist film project, Medicine Lake Video. The project seeks to protect sacred tribal ground near Seagal's ranch in Siskiyou County. He also wrote an open letter to the leadership of Thailand in 2003, urging them to enact a law to prevent the torture of baby elephants.
In 1999, Seagal was awarded a PETA Humanitarian Award.
In a March 2014 interview with Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Seagal described Vladimir Putin as "one of the great living world leaders". He expressed support for the annexation of Crimea by Russia. In July 2014, following calls for a boycott, Seagal was dropped from the lineup of the August Blues Festival in Haapsalu, Estonia. Estonian musician Tõnis Mägi, the minister of Foreign Affairs, Urmas Paet, and Parliament's Foreign Affairs chairman Marko Mihkelson, had all condemned inviting Seagal into the country, with Paet stating, "Steven Seagal has tried to actively participate in politics during the past few months and has done it in a way which is unacceptable to the majority of the world that respects democracy and the rule of law." In August 2014, Seagal appeared at a Night Wolves-organized show in Sevastopol, Crimea, supporting the Crimean annexation and depicting Ukraine as a country controlled by fascists. On November 3, Seagal was granted Russian citizenship by president Putin. His views on Ukraine and Russian citizenship caused Ukraine to ban him because he "committed socially dangerous actions".
Seagal spoke out against the protests during the United States national anthem by professional athletes, stating, "I believe in free speech, I believe that everyone's entitled to their own opinion, but I don't agree that they should hold the United States of America or the world hostage by taking a venue where people are tuning in to watch a football game and imposing their political views." He also expressed skepticism of alleged Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections.
In 2017, Seagal collaborated with former chair of the Arizona Republican Party, Tom Morrissey, in writing a self-published conspiracy thriller novel, The Way of the Shadow Wolves: The Deep State And The Hijacking Of America, which featured a Tohono Shadow Wolf tracker working for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement to foil a plot by Mexican drug cartels and the "deep state" to smuggle in Islamist terrorists to the United States through the U.S.-Mexico border.
In 2021, Seagal gifted a katana sword to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry special envoy while visiting Canaima National Park. Maduro referred to Seagal as "my brother."
On May 30, 2021, the pro-Kremlin systemic opposition party A Just Russia — Patriots — For Truth announced that Seagal had received an official membership card to the party.
Stunts
Filmography
Films
Television
Awards and nominations
Discography
2005: Songs from the Crystal Cave
2006: Mojo Priest
References
External links
1952 births
Living people
20th-century American guitarists
20th-century American male actors
20th-century American male musicians
21st-century American male actors
21st-century American male musicians
21st-century Russian male actors
21st-century Serbian male actors
Activists from California
American actor-politicians
American aikidoka
American blues singers
American country singers
American deputy sheriffs
American drink industry businesspeople
American emigrants to Russia
American environmentalists
American expatriates in Japan
American kendoka
American male film actors
American male guitarists
American male judoka
American male karateka
American male singers
American people of Irish descent
American people of Jewish descent
American stunt performers
Businesspeople from California
Businesspeople from Louisiana
Businesspeople from Michigan
Converts to Buddhism
Country musicians from Louisiana
Country musicians from Michigan
Country musicians from Tennessee
Golden Raspberry Award winners
Guitarists from Michigan
Male actors from Fullerton, California
Male actors from Lansing, Michigan
Naturalised citizens of Russia
Naturalized citizens of Serbia
Nyingma tulkus
Participants in American reality television series
People from Eltingville, Staten Island
People from Germantown, Tennessee
People from Jefferson Parish, Louisiana
People from Mandeville Canyon, Los Angeles
Russian businesspeople
Russian male film actors
Russian male judoka
Russian male karateka
Russian martial artists
Russian people of Irish descent
Russian people of Jewish descent
Russian stunt performers
Serbian businesspeople
Serbian male film actors
Serbian male judoka
Serbian male karateka
Serbian people of Irish descent
Serbian people of Jewish descent
Serbian stunt performers
Tibetan Buddhists from Russia
Tibetan Buddhists from the United States | true | [
". Born in Osaka, Matsuoka was first introduced to martial arts through judo as part of his required physical education curriculum in high school. His father, Shiro Matsuoka, then enrolled Haruo in a summer camp where he would witness his first aikido demonstration.\n\nReturning home from summer camp, Haruo began taking aikido classes at a local dojo, but his teacher wasn't very good. In 1975, Steven Seagal began teaching aikido in Japan with his then wife, Miyako Fujitani, the daughter of an aikido sensei and 2nd dan aikidoka herself, at her father's dojo.\n\nMatsuoka would remark to Black Belt Magazine in 2014, “When I first met Seagal sensei, his Japanese wasn't so fluent, but his technique was remarkable — unlike what I'd seen before. He was so fast, very fluid. Seeing him doing aikido changed my life.\" Matsuoka signed up on the spot.\n\nBy 1978, Matsuoka had earned his black belt ranking and began teaching classes in Japan with Seagal & Fujitani. In 1983, he would follow Seagal to Los Angeles to open their first dojo. The first years were difficult as Americans didn't understand what aikido was or had any concept what its benefits were, but that changed when Seagal's \"Above the Law\" was released in 1988, showcasing his modern style of aikido for a wider audience, creating a resurgence in popularity for aikido around the world.\n\nMatsuoka continued to serve as chief instructor at Seagal's dojo while Seagal's career took off, eventually leaving in 1997 to return to Japan and the roots of aikido he felt had diverged with Seagal. He would seek out Seiseki Abe, one of aikido founder Morihei Ueshiba's most revered students and also Ueshiba's teacher in Japanese calligraphy.\n\nMatsuoka would receive his 5th dan ranking from Abe and return to Los Angeles in 1999 to continue his mission of promoting Japanese culture through aikido, opening dojos in Culver City and Irvine. Matsuoka then founded the Aikido Doshinokai Association to tie together the many adherents of his particular style combining the original fluidity taught by Ueshiba with the harder style of Seagal.\n\nMatsuoka continues to seek further mastery in aikido, receiving his 6th dan from Moriteru Ueshiba, Morihei's grandson and current Doshu (hereditary head) of the aikikai in 2012, and has participated in exchange programs with martial arts masters of other disciplines such as Dan Inosanto (disciple of Bruce Lee), and Kenji Yamaki (1995 Kyokushin Karate World Champion). He continues to teach, participating in regular seminars for students around the world in Belgium, France, Poland, Spain, Italy, as well as at his own schools in Los Angeles.\n\nReferences\n\n1958 births\n\nLiving people\n\nJapanese aikidoka\n\nShihan\nStunt performers\nPeople from Osaka",
"Seagalogy: A Study of the Ass-Kicking Films of Steven Seagal is a book released in 2008 by Titan Books, . It was written by Vern (no last name). It is the first in-depth study to be published on the complete creative output of Steven Seagal. The book makes a careful examination of every Steven Seagal film from 1988's Above the Law to 2008's Pistol Whipped, as well as providing reviews of some of Seagal's other output: his music, his appearances in commercials, and even his energy drink. In 2012, an updated edition of the book was published, incorporating reviews from the intervening years including Seagal's work on the reality TV show Steven Seagal: Lawman.\n\nThe book makes the argument that certain specific themes and motifs remain present throughout Seagal's filmography, laying the groundwork for an examination of the films using the auteur theory. Since auteur theory usually cites the film director as the source of a film's particular vision, Vern argues that Seagal's filmography represents an example of what he describes as the \"badass auteur\": typically an action star whose persona and interests recur throughout their filmography, regardless of director or other creative collaborators. Vern describes themes of government corruption (particularly involving the CIA), environmentalism, and adoption of foreign cultures as being examples of recurrent motifs in Seagal's films, among a variety of others. The first edition also breaks Seagal's career into four chronological \"eras\", marked by specific differences in style and content; the 2012 updated edition adds a fifth era.\n\nThese chronological \"eras\" describe different phases of Seagal's career, and include the \"Golden Era\" (1988-1991), the period of Seagal's first successes, the \"Silver Era\" (1992-1997), during which Seagal saw the peak of his fame and made high-profile blockbusters, a \"Transitional Period\" (1998-2002) during which he made lower-profile or ensemble films, a lengthy \"direct-to-video\" period (his most prolific to date, 2003–2008) and, in the 2012 updated addition, a \"Chief Seagal\" period (2009–Present) during which Seagal moved into television and began reflecting elements of his Steven Seagal:Lawman persona in his films\n\nThe book is notable for generally avoiding discussion of Seagal's personal life or career, and instead focusing almost exclusively on his artistic output. Biographical details (for instance, his legal issues with producer Julius R. Nasso) appear only in the context of discussing their possible impact on his artistic choices.\n\nReferences\n\n2008 non-fiction books"
] |
[
"Nicklas Lidström",
"Playing career"
] | C_276d1808eff343c6b87224b9513cbd4e_1 | When did his playing career start? | 1 | When did Nicklas Lidström's playing career start? | Nicklas Lidström | Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidstrom was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidstrom was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004-05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In 14 consecutive seasons (since 1995-96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting. Lidstrom played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08. With the exception of the cancelled 2004-05 season lockout year, Lidstrom played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honor he shares with Larry Robinson). Known for his durability, Lidstrom consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005-06 season, a career high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies, from 2001 to 2003, becoming the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003-04 season, he played in his 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994-95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute). In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidstrom was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | Erik Nicklas Lidström (; born 28 April 1970) is a Swedish former professional ice hockey defenceman and current vice president of hockey operations for the Detroit Red Wings. He played 20 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the Detroit Red Wings, which he captained for the final six seasons of his career. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest defencemen in NHL history.
Over his 20 NHL seasons, Lidström won four Stanley Cup championships, seven James Norris Memorial Trophies (awarded to the NHL's top defenceman), one Conn Smythe Trophy as the playoff MVP, and was voted into 12 NHL All-Star Games. The Red Wings never missed the playoffs during his career, the longest in league history for a player never missing the playoffs. Lidström was the first European-born-and-trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team, as well as the first European player named playoff MVP. Lidström is also the all-time leader in games played with a single NHL team by a European-born player. Lidström was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame on 9 November 2015. In 2017, Lidström was named one of the "100 Greatest NHL Players" in history.
Playing career
Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidström was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidström was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004–05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In his final 16 seasons (beginning in 1995–96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting.
Lidström played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams, in 1996–97, 1997–98, 2001–02 and 2007–08. Save for the cancelled 2004–05 season lockout year, Lidström played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honour he shares with Larry Robinson).
Known for his durability, Lidström consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005–06 season, a career-high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies from 2001 to 2003 to become the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003–04 season, he played in the 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994–95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute).
In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidström was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy.
Early career
Lidström began his career in Avesta, Sweden, playing with Skogsbo SK, before moving on to play with VIK Västerås HK of the Swedish Elitserien. In three seasons with the team, he played in 103 games, scoring 12 goals and 30 assists. Drafted by the Detroit Red Wings 53rd overall in the 1989 NHL Entry Draft, Lidström joined the team in the 1991–92 season, though he returned to play for Västerås IK for a brief period during the 1994–95 NHL lockout. Lidström scored 60 points in his rookie season, finishing second to Pavel Bure in voting for that year's Calder Trophy. He was selected to the 1992 NHL All-Rookie Team, along with fellow Red Wings defenceman Vladimir Konstantinov.
NHL career (1991–2012)
Swedish national team
Representing Sweden, Lidström won the World Championship in 1991. At the 2006 Winter Olympics, Lidström was a major factor in Sweden's win over Finland in the finals, scoring the gold medal-clinching goal, thus earning him a spot on the Olympic All-Star Team. He also became the 17th member of the Triple Gold Club. The Hockey News selected Lidström as the "Best European-trained player ever in the NHL." The Sporting News and Sports Illustrated selected Lidström as the "NHL Player of the Decade."
Post-lockout career
Lidström was set to make $10 million during the 2005–06 season. However, due to the new terms of the NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement that was implemented during the 2004–05 season, salaries on pre-existing contracts were reduced by 24%, which lowered his compensation to $7.6 million. That season, he posted a career-high 64 assists and 16 goals to for 80 points.
On 30 June 2006, it was announced that Lidström had signed a two-year, $15.2 million contract extension with the Red Wings. Instead of seeking more money elsewhere, Lidström decided to remain with Detroit for the same annual salary as he earned during the 2005–06 season.
Lidström was an alternate captain of the Red Wings since the 1997–98 season, but was awarded the captaincy after the 2006 retirement of long-time Red Wings captain Steve Yzerman. It was an honour made more special by the fact that he became the first European captain in franchise history. In his first year of captaincy, Lidström led the Red Wings to the Western Conference Finals, but lost to eventual Stanley Cup champions, the Anaheim Ducks. In the off-season, Lidström joined an elite group by capturing the Norris Trophy as the NHL's outstanding defenceman for the fifth time. Lidström became the fourth defenceman in NHL history with as many as five Norris Trophy wins, joining Hockey Hall of Famers Bobby Orr (eight), Doug Harvey (seven) and Ray Bourque (five).
Near the beginning of the 2007–08 season, in an 8 October win against the Edmonton Oilers, Lidström registered two assists to surpass Peter Forsberg as the second-highest scoring Swedish-born NHL player of all-time. Accordingly, he trails only Mats Sundin (as of the end of the 2011–12 season, Lidström has 1,142 points to Sundin's 1,349). Later in the season, on 26 December, Lidström signed a contract extension through the 2009–10 season. Several months later, on 3 April 2008, he assisted on a goal by Johan Franzén to tie Luc Robitaille at 42nd in the all-time NHL assists, with 726.
Entering the playoffs as Presidents' Trophy winners for the highest team point total during the regular season, the Red Wings met the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals. Despite a Game 5, triple-overtime victory by the Penguins to stave off elimination, Lidström and the Red Wings defeated Pittsburgh in Game 6 to capture the Stanley Cup. In doing so, Lidström became the first European-born-and-trained captain to win the Stanley Cup. In 1934, Charlie Gardiner, a goaltender born in Scotland, had captained the Chicago Black Hawks to win the Stanley Cup and in 1938, Johnny Gottselig, a left-winger born in Russia, also captained Chicago to a championship, but both players were trained in Canada.
Just over one week after winning his fourth Stanley Cup in 11 seasons, on 12 June, Lidström won the Norris Trophy for the third-straight season and the sixth time in seven seasons.
As the Red Wings opened the 2008–09 pre-season against the Montreal Canadiens, Lidström suffered a broken nose as a shot from Canadiens forward Chris Higgins ricocheted and hit him in the face. From then on, he began wearing a visor. He returned in time for the regular season and was selected to the 2009 NHL All-Star Game in Montreal. However, in the midst of dealing with tendinitis that had been bothering him all season, Lidström chose to sit out All-Star weekend, along with teammate Pavel Datsyuk. Consequently, Lidström and Datsyuk were both suspended one game by the NHL due to League policy for missing the All-Star Game without significant injury.
The Red Wings opened the 2009–10 season in Stockholm, Sweden. During the team's trip in Sweden, Lidström was honored by his home county, Dalarna, as an Ambassador of Honor. On 15 October 2009, in a game against the Los Angeles Kings, Lidström became the first European-born defenceman to reach 1,000 points after recording two assists in the game. He is the fourth player to score 1,000 points as a Red Wing (after Gordie Howe, Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman), and the eighth defenceman to do so in the history of the NHL. On 5 March 2010, Lidström earned his 800th career assist. Also during the 2009–10 season, Lidström played in his 1,395th game (finishing the season with 1,412), setting an all-time record for NHL games played by a player born in Europe; earlier in the season, Lidström had passed Teppo Numminen for games played by a player trained in Europe. Lidström is also second all-time in games played in a Red Wing uniform, behind only Howe.
On 23 April 2010, Lidström played in his 237th career playoff game, moving past Mark Messier into sole possession of third place on the NHL's all-time list (Chris Chelios, 266; Patrick Roy, 247). In the same game, he had an assist to tie Al MacInnis (121) for the third-most assists in the post-season by a defenceman (Ray Bourque 139; Paul Coffey 137).
On 27 April 2010, a day before his 40th birthday, Lidström had three points in a Game 7 win over the Phoenix Coyotes in the first round of the 2010 playoffs, pushing his active playoff points lead to 171 points, and tying him for 17th on the all-time playoff points list with fellow countryman Peter Forsberg.
As of the end of the 2009–10 season, Lidström has missed only 28 of a possible 1,440 regular-season team games (one due to suspension).
After contemplating retirement, Lidström agreed on a one-year contract with the Red Wings on 1 June 2010; the contract paid him slightly over $6 million.
On 15 December 2010, Lidström recorded his first career hat-trick, at 40 years of age, against the St. Louis Blues, sealing a 5–2 Detroit victory. After the game, he was asked how it feels to score his first hat-trick, responding, "It feels great, I've never in my life been able to notch three goals in a game." The hat-trick made him the oldest player in NHL history to record his first hat-trick (previously held by Scott Mellanby at 36 years of age), and the oldest defenceman in NHL history to record a hat-trick (previously held by Mathieu Schneider at 37 years of age).
On 18 January 2011, Lidström was named a team captain in the 2011 NHL All-Star Game in Raleigh, North Carolina. His team won by a final score of 11–10 over Team Staal, captained by Eric Staal of the Carolina Hurricanes. Lidström finished +7 with one assist.
On 20 June 2011, after briefly contemplating retirement yet again, Lidström signed a one-year contract worth $6.2 million with Detroit, the same amount he had been paid the previous season. On 23 June 2011, he won his seventh Norris Trophy even though his plus/minus rating for the year was −2, tying with Doug Harvey and remaining one behind Bobby Orr for most Norris Trophies. This was only the third time in history that a player with a negative plus/minus rating won the Norris Trophy.
On 22 October 2011, in a game against the Washington Capitals, Lidström became the 14th player in the history of the NHL to play 1,500 games. He is the first player not being born in North America, and therefore the first Swedish and European player, as well as the first player to accomplish this in his 20th NHL season. Lidström played in his 1,550th game on 12 February 2012, against the Philadelphia Flyers, surpassing Alex Delvecchio's previous Red Wing record of 1,549 games. This also makes him the NHL player who has played the most games while always playing for the same NHL team (Gordie Howe played more games, 1,687, with the Red Wings, but also played for the Hartford Whalers for one season). In this regard, Lidström joins former Red Wings Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman as the only three players with over 1,500 games having played exclusively for just one team throughout their careers.
Retirement
On 31 May 2012, Lidström announced his retirement from the NHL via a press conference with Red Wings Owner Mike Ilitch and General Manager Ken Holland present. The night before, he told the Swedish tabloid Expressen, "I came to the decision last week and I informed our general manager, Ken Holland." Discussing Lidström's retirement, former teammate Steve Yzerman described Lidström as "one of the all-time best defencemen to ever play." Former teammate and fellow Norris Trophy winning defenseman Paul Coffey said, "He was an incredible player" while Chris Chelios said, "There's been guys who are great players, but no one's better than Nick. As good? Yes. But this is as big as it gets. He's one of the best athletes ever and...if you're going to talk about someone who's perfect, Nick's pretty darn close to being perfect." Washington Capitals defenceman John Carlson described Lidström as "one of the game's all-time greats on and off the ice." Ken Holland stated his belief that Lidström was "the most valuable player of his era."
The following weekend, on 3 June 2012, Lidström and his wife took out a full-page ad giving thanks to the city of Detroit for making his family feel at home for the past 21 years. On 8 July 2012, Lidström was named a scout for the Red Wings.
On 28 February 2014, Lidström was inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame.
During the 2013–14 season, Lidström had his number 5 jersey retired by the Red Wings. Initially, ceremonies were planned for the previous season, on 5 February 2013 — however, the lockout had made it hard to determine when Lidström would be able to attend the ceremony. The Red Wings officially retired his number on 6 March 2014, in a pre-game ceremony at Joe Louis Arena.
International play
Prior to his NHL career, Lidström competed in one European Junior Championships in 1988, one World Junior Championship in 1990 and one Canada Cup in 1991 for Sweden.
Prior to his rookie season with the Red Wings, he earned his first gold medal with Sweden at the 1991 World Championships. Three years later, he competed in the 1994 World Championships in Italy and won a bronze medal. Two years later, he participated in the inaugural 1996 World Cup of Hockey (successor of the Canada Cup) and contributed three points in four games. He made his Olympic debut with Sweden at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.
Four years later was his next international appearance, playing in his second Olympics at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, where Sweden was upset by Belarus in the quarter-final after being heavy favourites in the round-robin. Lidström made his third World Championships appearance in 2004, but only appeared in two games. That summer, he also competed in the 2004 World Cup of Hockey, where he scored one goal.
In the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, Lidström helped Sweden avenge their quarter-final upset to Belarus in Salt Lake City, scoring the game winning goal in the gold medal game against Finland. In doing so, Lidström became a member of the Triple Gold Club, adding an Olympic gold medal to go with his previous Stanley Cups with Detroit and his World Championship gold medal in 1991. Lidström was also selected to the 2010 Olympic All-Star Team.
Lidström also played for Sweden in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, serving as team captain in what would be his final Olympic appearance. Lidström announced his retirement from Olympic competition following Sweden's loss to Slovakia.
Personal life
Lidström is married to Annika, with whom he has four children. All four sons play high-level hockey: Kevin (born 1994), is currently a defenceman for Swedish Division 1 team SK Lejon; Adam (born 1996) also plays in Division 1 with Enköpings SK; Samuel (born in 2000) plays on J20 SuperElit team VIK Västerås HK; and Lucas (born in 2003) also plays for VIK Västerås HK on its U16 team.
Lidström was featured on an episode of NHL 36.
In October 2019, Lidström released his authorized biography in North America titled Nicklas Lidstrom: The Pursuit of Perfection.
Career statistics
Regular season and playoffs
International
Awards
World Championship gold medal winner (Sweden, 1991).
NHL All-Rookie Team (1992).
4x Stanley Cup winner (1997, 1998, 2002, and 2008).
12x NHL All-Star Game (1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2008, 2009*, 2011).
10x NHL First All-Star Team member (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
2x NHL Second All-Star Team member (2009, 2010).
7x Norris Trophy winner (2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2002).
Olympic gold medal winner (Sweden, 2006)
Olympic All-Star Team (2006).
Member of the Triple Gold Club.
2x Viking Award winner (2000 and 2006).
Inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame – 2014
Detroit Red Wings #5 retired on 6 March 2014
Inducted into the IIHF Hall of Fame – 2014
Inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame – 2015
Introduced into the IIHF All-Time Sweden Team - 2020
*did not attend
Records
All records are as of the end of the regular season unless otherwise noted.
NHL
First European-born and trained Norris Trophy winner (2000–01).
First European-born and trained Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2001–02).
Fourth defenceman (and first European-born and trained defenceman) in NHL to win James Norris Memorial Trophy three years running (2001–2003, 2006–2008), and third seven-time Norris Trophy winner.
First European-born and trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team (2008).
First European-born and trained defenceman to reach 1,000 points.
Most regular-season games played by a player born in Europe, any position (1,564).
Most regular-season games played by a player in a career spent with only one team (1,564).
Most regular-season wins played in (900).
Most postseason games played with single franchise, career (263)
Most postseason assists by defenceman with single franchise, career (129)
Most postseason points by defenceman with single franchise, career (183)
Highest postseason plus/minus, career (+61)
Most postseason power-play goals by defenceman, career (30)
Most postseason shots on goal with single franchise, career (656)
Oldest player to record his first hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest defenceman to record a hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest Norris Trophy winner (41 years, 57 days) (2010–2011)
Oldest defenceman to score in a Game 7 (39 years, 364 days)
Detroit Red Wings
Points by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 80).
Assists by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 64).
Postseason goals by a defenceman, career (54).
Post-season power-play goals, career (30).
Power play goals by a defenceman, career (132).
Postseason points by a defenceman, career (183).
Postseason assists, career (129).
Postseason games played, career (263).
Games played by a defenceman, career (1,564).
Goals, assists, and points by a defenceman, career (264, 878, and 1142).
Goals in a single postseason by a defenceman (1998, 6).
Best postseason plus/minus, career (+61).
Best regular season plus/minus, career (+450).
See also
List of NHL players with 1000 points
List of NHL players with 1000 games played
List of Detroit Red Wings award winners
List of Detroit Red Wings draft picks
List of Detroit Red Wings records
References
External links
1970 births
Conn Smythe Trophy winners
Detroit Red Wings captains
Detroit Red Wings draft picks
Detroit Red Wings players
Detroit Red Wings scouts
Hockey Hall of Fame inductees
Ice hockey players at the 1998 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2002 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2006 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2010 Winter Olympics
IIHF Hall of Fame inductees
James Norris Memorial Trophy winners
Living people
Medalists at the 2006 Winter Olympics
National Hockey League All-Stars
National Hockey League players with retired numbers
Olympic gold medalists for Sweden
Olympic ice hockey players of Sweden
Olympic medalists in ice hockey
Sportspeople from Västerås
Stanley Cup champions
Swedish expatriate sportspeople in the United States
Swedish ice hockey defencemen
Triple Gold Club
VIK Västerås HK players
Swedish expatriate ice hockey people | false | [
"Miguel Start (born 30 November 1987) is a former Samoa international rugby league footballer who played as a .\n\nBackground\nStart was born in Auckland, New Zealand.\n\nPlaying career\nStart was educated at Mount Albert Grammar School, and played for the Pakuranga Jaguars in the Auckland Rugby League competition.\n\nIn 2005 Start represented the Junior Kiwis in 2005. He played for both the New Zealand Residents and Samoa in 2006.\n\nStart was signed with the New Zealand Warriors in the National Rugby League competition for 2007. Start did not make his NRL debut but did appear in the NSWRL Premier League for the Auckland Lions.\n\nReferences\n\nNew Zealand rugby league players\n1987 births\nLiving people\nPakuranga Jaguars players\nAuckland rugby league team players\nNew Zealand people of Samoan descent\nSamoa national rugby league team players\nJunior Kiwis players\nRugby league centres",
"James Waugh (12 August 1898 – 26 March 1968) was a footballer who played as a Centre half. Born in the village of Chopwell in County Durham, Waugh began his career as an amateur with Durham City before spending a brief spell representing his home town club of Chopwell Colliery at the start of 1921.\n\nIt was while at Chopwell that Waugh was spotted by Football League club Sheffield United who signed both Waugh and fellow defender Bill Sampy for a joint fee of £250 in April 1921. Waugh made a slow start to his career with the Blades and did not begin to feature regularly until November 1922, from which point he missed only one of the following 103 first team matches. Waugh was considered to lack pace and this caused him problems from 1925 when the offside rule was changed. A neck injury prevented Waugh from playing in the 1925 FA Cup Final and after a run of games at the start of the 1925–26 season he lost his place in the side to Seth King. Despite being selected for the FA tour of Canada in the summer of 1926, Waugh was unable to reclaim his place in United's starting eleven and was eventually transferred to Darlington in January 1927 after having made 143 appearances for the Blades and scored three goals.\n\nA success at his new club, Waugh was a regular member of the match day team until 1933, including being ever present during the 1929–30 season. Waugh was part of the coaching staff at Darlington for much of his time there and took up a full-time coaching position once he retired from playing. With his career nearing an end, Sheffield United played a benefit match for Waugh in April 1932 and he later returned to the club to act as a scout from 1934.\n\nReferences\n\n1898 births\n1968 deaths\nFootballers from Tyne and Wear\nEnglish footballers\nAssociation football defenders\nDurham City A.F.C. players\nChopwell Colliery F.C. players\nSheffield United F.C. players\nDarlington F.C. players\nEnglish Football League players\nDarlington F.C. non-playing staff\nSheffield United F.C. non-playing staff"
] |
[
"Nicklas Lidström",
"Playing career",
"When did his playing career start?",
"I don't know."
] | C_276d1808eff343c6b87224b9513cbd4e_1 | What teams did he play for? | 2 | What teams did Nicklas Lidström play for? | Nicklas Lidström | Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidstrom was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidstrom was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004-05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In 14 consecutive seasons (since 1995-96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting. Lidstrom played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08. With the exception of the cancelled 2004-05 season lockout year, Lidstrom played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honor he shares with Larry Robinson). Known for his durability, Lidstrom consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005-06 season, a career high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies, from 2001 to 2003, becoming the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003-04 season, he played in his 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994-95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute). In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidstrom was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy. CANNOTANSWER | Detroit Red Wings, | Erik Nicklas Lidström (; born 28 April 1970) is a Swedish former professional ice hockey defenceman and current vice president of hockey operations for the Detroit Red Wings. He played 20 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the Detroit Red Wings, which he captained for the final six seasons of his career. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest defencemen in NHL history.
Over his 20 NHL seasons, Lidström won four Stanley Cup championships, seven James Norris Memorial Trophies (awarded to the NHL's top defenceman), one Conn Smythe Trophy as the playoff MVP, and was voted into 12 NHL All-Star Games. The Red Wings never missed the playoffs during his career, the longest in league history for a player never missing the playoffs. Lidström was the first European-born-and-trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team, as well as the first European player named playoff MVP. Lidström is also the all-time leader in games played with a single NHL team by a European-born player. Lidström was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame on 9 November 2015. In 2017, Lidström was named one of the "100 Greatest NHL Players" in history.
Playing career
Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidström was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidström was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004–05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In his final 16 seasons (beginning in 1995–96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting.
Lidström played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams, in 1996–97, 1997–98, 2001–02 and 2007–08. Save for the cancelled 2004–05 season lockout year, Lidström played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honour he shares with Larry Robinson).
Known for his durability, Lidström consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005–06 season, a career-high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies from 2001 to 2003 to become the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003–04 season, he played in the 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994–95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute).
In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidström was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy.
Early career
Lidström began his career in Avesta, Sweden, playing with Skogsbo SK, before moving on to play with VIK Västerås HK of the Swedish Elitserien. In three seasons with the team, he played in 103 games, scoring 12 goals and 30 assists. Drafted by the Detroit Red Wings 53rd overall in the 1989 NHL Entry Draft, Lidström joined the team in the 1991–92 season, though he returned to play for Västerås IK for a brief period during the 1994–95 NHL lockout. Lidström scored 60 points in his rookie season, finishing second to Pavel Bure in voting for that year's Calder Trophy. He was selected to the 1992 NHL All-Rookie Team, along with fellow Red Wings defenceman Vladimir Konstantinov.
NHL career (1991–2012)
Swedish national team
Representing Sweden, Lidström won the World Championship in 1991. At the 2006 Winter Olympics, Lidström was a major factor in Sweden's win over Finland in the finals, scoring the gold medal-clinching goal, thus earning him a spot on the Olympic All-Star Team. He also became the 17th member of the Triple Gold Club. The Hockey News selected Lidström as the "Best European-trained player ever in the NHL." The Sporting News and Sports Illustrated selected Lidström as the "NHL Player of the Decade."
Post-lockout career
Lidström was set to make $10 million during the 2005–06 season. However, due to the new terms of the NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement that was implemented during the 2004–05 season, salaries on pre-existing contracts were reduced by 24%, which lowered his compensation to $7.6 million. That season, he posted a career-high 64 assists and 16 goals to for 80 points.
On 30 June 2006, it was announced that Lidström had signed a two-year, $15.2 million contract extension with the Red Wings. Instead of seeking more money elsewhere, Lidström decided to remain with Detroit for the same annual salary as he earned during the 2005–06 season.
Lidström was an alternate captain of the Red Wings since the 1997–98 season, but was awarded the captaincy after the 2006 retirement of long-time Red Wings captain Steve Yzerman. It was an honour made more special by the fact that he became the first European captain in franchise history. In his first year of captaincy, Lidström led the Red Wings to the Western Conference Finals, but lost to eventual Stanley Cup champions, the Anaheim Ducks. In the off-season, Lidström joined an elite group by capturing the Norris Trophy as the NHL's outstanding defenceman for the fifth time. Lidström became the fourth defenceman in NHL history with as many as five Norris Trophy wins, joining Hockey Hall of Famers Bobby Orr (eight), Doug Harvey (seven) and Ray Bourque (five).
Near the beginning of the 2007–08 season, in an 8 October win against the Edmonton Oilers, Lidström registered two assists to surpass Peter Forsberg as the second-highest scoring Swedish-born NHL player of all-time. Accordingly, he trails only Mats Sundin (as of the end of the 2011–12 season, Lidström has 1,142 points to Sundin's 1,349). Later in the season, on 26 December, Lidström signed a contract extension through the 2009–10 season. Several months later, on 3 April 2008, he assisted on a goal by Johan Franzén to tie Luc Robitaille at 42nd in the all-time NHL assists, with 726.
Entering the playoffs as Presidents' Trophy winners for the highest team point total during the regular season, the Red Wings met the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals. Despite a Game 5, triple-overtime victory by the Penguins to stave off elimination, Lidström and the Red Wings defeated Pittsburgh in Game 6 to capture the Stanley Cup. In doing so, Lidström became the first European-born-and-trained captain to win the Stanley Cup. In 1934, Charlie Gardiner, a goaltender born in Scotland, had captained the Chicago Black Hawks to win the Stanley Cup and in 1938, Johnny Gottselig, a left-winger born in Russia, also captained Chicago to a championship, but both players were trained in Canada.
Just over one week after winning his fourth Stanley Cup in 11 seasons, on 12 June, Lidström won the Norris Trophy for the third-straight season and the sixth time in seven seasons.
As the Red Wings opened the 2008–09 pre-season against the Montreal Canadiens, Lidström suffered a broken nose as a shot from Canadiens forward Chris Higgins ricocheted and hit him in the face. From then on, he began wearing a visor. He returned in time for the regular season and was selected to the 2009 NHL All-Star Game in Montreal. However, in the midst of dealing with tendinitis that had been bothering him all season, Lidström chose to sit out All-Star weekend, along with teammate Pavel Datsyuk. Consequently, Lidström and Datsyuk were both suspended one game by the NHL due to League policy for missing the All-Star Game without significant injury.
The Red Wings opened the 2009–10 season in Stockholm, Sweden. During the team's trip in Sweden, Lidström was honored by his home county, Dalarna, as an Ambassador of Honor. On 15 October 2009, in a game against the Los Angeles Kings, Lidström became the first European-born defenceman to reach 1,000 points after recording two assists in the game. He is the fourth player to score 1,000 points as a Red Wing (after Gordie Howe, Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman), and the eighth defenceman to do so in the history of the NHL. On 5 March 2010, Lidström earned his 800th career assist. Also during the 2009–10 season, Lidström played in his 1,395th game (finishing the season with 1,412), setting an all-time record for NHL games played by a player born in Europe; earlier in the season, Lidström had passed Teppo Numminen for games played by a player trained in Europe. Lidström is also second all-time in games played in a Red Wing uniform, behind only Howe.
On 23 April 2010, Lidström played in his 237th career playoff game, moving past Mark Messier into sole possession of third place on the NHL's all-time list (Chris Chelios, 266; Patrick Roy, 247). In the same game, he had an assist to tie Al MacInnis (121) for the third-most assists in the post-season by a defenceman (Ray Bourque 139; Paul Coffey 137).
On 27 April 2010, a day before his 40th birthday, Lidström had three points in a Game 7 win over the Phoenix Coyotes in the first round of the 2010 playoffs, pushing his active playoff points lead to 171 points, and tying him for 17th on the all-time playoff points list with fellow countryman Peter Forsberg.
As of the end of the 2009–10 season, Lidström has missed only 28 of a possible 1,440 regular-season team games (one due to suspension).
After contemplating retirement, Lidström agreed on a one-year contract with the Red Wings on 1 June 2010; the contract paid him slightly over $6 million.
On 15 December 2010, Lidström recorded his first career hat-trick, at 40 years of age, against the St. Louis Blues, sealing a 5–2 Detroit victory. After the game, he was asked how it feels to score his first hat-trick, responding, "It feels great, I've never in my life been able to notch three goals in a game." The hat-trick made him the oldest player in NHL history to record his first hat-trick (previously held by Scott Mellanby at 36 years of age), and the oldest defenceman in NHL history to record a hat-trick (previously held by Mathieu Schneider at 37 years of age).
On 18 January 2011, Lidström was named a team captain in the 2011 NHL All-Star Game in Raleigh, North Carolina. His team won by a final score of 11–10 over Team Staal, captained by Eric Staal of the Carolina Hurricanes. Lidström finished +7 with one assist.
On 20 June 2011, after briefly contemplating retirement yet again, Lidström signed a one-year contract worth $6.2 million with Detroit, the same amount he had been paid the previous season. On 23 June 2011, he won his seventh Norris Trophy even though his plus/minus rating for the year was −2, tying with Doug Harvey and remaining one behind Bobby Orr for most Norris Trophies. This was only the third time in history that a player with a negative plus/minus rating won the Norris Trophy.
On 22 October 2011, in a game against the Washington Capitals, Lidström became the 14th player in the history of the NHL to play 1,500 games. He is the first player not being born in North America, and therefore the first Swedish and European player, as well as the first player to accomplish this in his 20th NHL season. Lidström played in his 1,550th game on 12 February 2012, against the Philadelphia Flyers, surpassing Alex Delvecchio's previous Red Wing record of 1,549 games. This also makes him the NHL player who has played the most games while always playing for the same NHL team (Gordie Howe played more games, 1,687, with the Red Wings, but also played for the Hartford Whalers for one season). In this regard, Lidström joins former Red Wings Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman as the only three players with over 1,500 games having played exclusively for just one team throughout their careers.
Retirement
On 31 May 2012, Lidström announced his retirement from the NHL via a press conference with Red Wings Owner Mike Ilitch and General Manager Ken Holland present. The night before, he told the Swedish tabloid Expressen, "I came to the decision last week and I informed our general manager, Ken Holland." Discussing Lidström's retirement, former teammate Steve Yzerman described Lidström as "one of the all-time best defencemen to ever play." Former teammate and fellow Norris Trophy winning defenseman Paul Coffey said, "He was an incredible player" while Chris Chelios said, "There's been guys who are great players, but no one's better than Nick. As good? Yes. But this is as big as it gets. He's one of the best athletes ever and...if you're going to talk about someone who's perfect, Nick's pretty darn close to being perfect." Washington Capitals defenceman John Carlson described Lidström as "one of the game's all-time greats on and off the ice." Ken Holland stated his belief that Lidström was "the most valuable player of his era."
The following weekend, on 3 June 2012, Lidström and his wife took out a full-page ad giving thanks to the city of Detroit for making his family feel at home for the past 21 years. On 8 July 2012, Lidström was named a scout for the Red Wings.
On 28 February 2014, Lidström was inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame.
During the 2013–14 season, Lidström had his number 5 jersey retired by the Red Wings. Initially, ceremonies were planned for the previous season, on 5 February 2013 — however, the lockout had made it hard to determine when Lidström would be able to attend the ceremony. The Red Wings officially retired his number on 6 March 2014, in a pre-game ceremony at Joe Louis Arena.
International play
Prior to his NHL career, Lidström competed in one European Junior Championships in 1988, one World Junior Championship in 1990 and one Canada Cup in 1991 for Sweden.
Prior to his rookie season with the Red Wings, he earned his first gold medal with Sweden at the 1991 World Championships. Three years later, he competed in the 1994 World Championships in Italy and won a bronze medal. Two years later, he participated in the inaugural 1996 World Cup of Hockey (successor of the Canada Cup) and contributed three points in four games. He made his Olympic debut with Sweden at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.
Four years later was his next international appearance, playing in his second Olympics at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, where Sweden was upset by Belarus in the quarter-final after being heavy favourites in the round-robin. Lidström made his third World Championships appearance in 2004, but only appeared in two games. That summer, he also competed in the 2004 World Cup of Hockey, where he scored one goal.
In the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, Lidström helped Sweden avenge their quarter-final upset to Belarus in Salt Lake City, scoring the game winning goal in the gold medal game against Finland. In doing so, Lidström became a member of the Triple Gold Club, adding an Olympic gold medal to go with his previous Stanley Cups with Detroit and his World Championship gold medal in 1991. Lidström was also selected to the 2010 Olympic All-Star Team.
Lidström also played for Sweden in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, serving as team captain in what would be his final Olympic appearance. Lidström announced his retirement from Olympic competition following Sweden's loss to Slovakia.
Personal life
Lidström is married to Annika, with whom he has four children. All four sons play high-level hockey: Kevin (born 1994), is currently a defenceman for Swedish Division 1 team SK Lejon; Adam (born 1996) also plays in Division 1 with Enköpings SK; Samuel (born in 2000) plays on J20 SuperElit team VIK Västerås HK; and Lucas (born in 2003) also plays for VIK Västerås HK on its U16 team.
Lidström was featured on an episode of NHL 36.
In October 2019, Lidström released his authorized biography in North America titled Nicklas Lidstrom: The Pursuit of Perfection.
Career statistics
Regular season and playoffs
International
Awards
World Championship gold medal winner (Sweden, 1991).
NHL All-Rookie Team (1992).
4x Stanley Cup winner (1997, 1998, 2002, and 2008).
12x NHL All-Star Game (1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2008, 2009*, 2011).
10x NHL First All-Star Team member (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
2x NHL Second All-Star Team member (2009, 2010).
7x Norris Trophy winner (2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2002).
Olympic gold medal winner (Sweden, 2006)
Olympic All-Star Team (2006).
Member of the Triple Gold Club.
2x Viking Award winner (2000 and 2006).
Inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame – 2014
Detroit Red Wings #5 retired on 6 March 2014
Inducted into the IIHF Hall of Fame – 2014
Inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame – 2015
Introduced into the IIHF All-Time Sweden Team - 2020
*did not attend
Records
All records are as of the end of the regular season unless otherwise noted.
NHL
First European-born and trained Norris Trophy winner (2000–01).
First European-born and trained Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2001–02).
Fourth defenceman (and first European-born and trained defenceman) in NHL to win James Norris Memorial Trophy three years running (2001–2003, 2006–2008), and third seven-time Norris Trophy winner.
First European-born and trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team (2008).
First European-born and trained defenceman to reach 1,000 points.
Most regular-season games played by a player born in Europe, any position (1,564).
Most regular-season games played by a player in a career spent with only one team (1,564).
Most regular-season wins played in (900).
Most postseason games played with single franchise, career (263)
Most postseason assists by defenceman with single franchise, career (129)
Most postseason points by defenceman with single franchise, career (183)
Highest postseason plus/minus, career (+61)
Most postseason power-play goals by defenceman, career (30)
Most postseason shots on goal with single franchise, career (656)
Oldest player to record his first hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest defenceman to record a hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest Norris Trophy winner (41 years, 57 days) (2010–2011)
Oldest defenceman to score in a Game 7 (39 years, 364 days)
Detroit Red Wings
Points by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 80).
Assists by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 64).
Postseason goals by a defenceman, career (54).
Post-season power-play goals, career (30).
Power play goals by a defenceman, career (132).
Postseason points by a defenceman, career (183).
Postseason assists, career (129).
Postseason games played, career (263).
Games played by a defenceman, career (1,564).
Goals, assists, and points by a defenceman, career (264, 878, and 1142).
Goals in a single postseason by a defenceman (1998, 6).
Best postseason plus/minus, career (+61).
Best regular season plus/minus, career (+450).
See also
List of NHL players with 1000 points
List of NHL players with 1000 games played
List of Detroit Red Wings award winners
List of Detroit Red Wings draft picks
List of Detroit Red Wings records
References
External links
1970 births
Conn Smythe Trophy winners
Detroit Red Wings captains
Detroit Red Wings draft picks
Detroit Red Wings players
Detroit Red Wings scouts
Hockey Hall of Fame inductees
Ice hockey players at the 1998 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2002 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2006 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2010 Winter Olympics
IIHF Hall of Fame inductees
James Norris Memorial Trophy winners
Living people
Medalists at the 2006 Winter Olympics
National Hockey League All-Stars
National Hockey League players with retired numbers
Olympic gold medalists for Sweden
Olympic ice hockey players of Sweden
Olympic medalists in ice hockey
Sportspeople from Västerås
Stanley Cup champions
Swedish expatriate sportspeople in the United States
Swedish ice hockey defencemen
Triple Gold Club
VIK Västerås HK players
Swedish expatriate ice hockey people | true | [
"The 2016–17 Belgian Second Amateur Division is the inaugural season of the division in its current format, as it replaces the former Belgian Third Division and is now placed at the fourth-tier of football in Belgium.\n\nThe division consists of three separate leagues, each containing 16 teams. Leagues A and B consist of teams with a license from the Voetbalfederatie Vlaanderen (VFV, the Dutch speaking wing of the Belgian FA), while league C contains teams with a license from the Association des Clubs Francophones de Football (ACFF, the French speaking wing of the RBFA). The champions from each of the three leagues will promote to the 2017–18 Belgian First Amateur Division. The fixtures were announced on 5 July 2016.\n\nFor the inaugural season the following teams will participate:\n The 14 teams in each of the groups A and B of the 2015–16 Belgian Third Division that either did not apply for a Belgian remunerated football license, did not qualify in the top two for direct promotion or did not win promotion through the promotion play-offs.\n 20 teams promoted from the 2015–16 Belgian Fourth Division.\n\nBelgian Second Amateur Division A\n\nLeague table\n\nBelgian Second Amateur Division B\n\nLeague table\n\nBelgian Second Amateur Division C\n\nLeague table\n\nPromotion play-offs\n\nPromotion play-offs VFV\nThe teams finishing in second place in the Second Amateur Division A and Second Amateur Division B will take part in a promotion playoff first round together with three period winners from both divisions. These 8 teams from the VFV will play the first round of a promotion-playoff, with two teams qualifying for the Promotion play-offs Final. In division A, the first period was won by Petegem, while the second and third periods were won by Knokke. In division B, Tessenderlo won the first period, while periods two and three were won by Berchem Sport.\n\nIn division A, with the promotion of Knokke and the fact that Petegem did not apply for a remunerated license, the four participants were simply the highest finishers in the standings that had applied for a license: Aalst (3rd), Sint-Eloois-Winkel (5th), Brakel (6th) and Gent-Zeehaven (8th). In division B, no teams outside the top two applied for a license except for Rupel Boom. As a result only Tessenderlo and Rupel Boom took place in the play-offs while the two other places were not used. Therefore in the draw for round one of these play-offs, two teams received a bye.\n\nVFV Round 1\nAs a result of the draw, both Brakel and Gent-Zeehaven received byes into round 2.\n\nVFV Round 2\n\nAalst and Brakel qualified for the Promotion play-offs Final.\n\nPromotion play-offs ACFF\nThe team finishing in second place in the Second Amateur Division C will take part in the promotion playoff first round together with three period winners. These 4 teams will play the first round of a promotion-playoff, with the winner qualifying for the Promotion play-offs Final. The period winners were RFC Liège (periods 1 and 3) and overall champions Châtelet.\n\nAs only Olympic Charleroi and La Louvière-Centre had received a remunerated license, only three teams played the play-offs instead of four, resulting in one team receiving a bye into round 2.\n\nACFF Round 1\nAs a result of the draw, RFC Liège received a bye into round 2.\n\nACFF Round 2\n\nRFC Liège qualified for the Promotion play-offs Final.\n\nPromotion play-offs Final\nThe two winners of the Promotion play-offs on the VFV side (Aalst and Brakel) and the winning team from the ACFF Promotion play-offs (RFC Liège) will play a final tournament together with the team that finished in 13th place in the 2016–17 Belgian First Amateur Division, Hasselt. The winner of this play-off promotes to (or remains in) the 2017–18 Belgian First Amateur Division.\n\nFinal Round 1\n\nAalst and RFC Liège qualified for the Promotion play-offs Final. By not progressing, Hasselt relegated from the Belgian First Amateur Division.\n\nFinal Round 2\n\n2–2 on aggregate. Aalst promoted to the 2017–18 Belgian First Amateur Division on the away goals rule.\n\nRelegation play-offs\n\nBefore the match, it was not known whether an extra VFV team would be relegated, which depended on the result of the promotion play-offs. If an ACFF team won the promotion play-offs, then an extra VFV team would be relegated. By winning the match, Tienen-Hageland was sure of avoiding relegation, while losing team Bornem were now dependent on the result of the only ACFF team in contention for promotion, RFC Liège. On 28 May 2017, RFC Liège lost the final match of the promotion play-off, resulting in Bornem being saved and avoiding relegation to the Belgian Third Amateur Division.\n\nReferences\n\nBelgian Second Amateur Division\nBel\n4",
"The 2017–18 Swiss Basketball League (SBL) season was the 87th season of the top tier basketball league in Switzerland.\n\nCompetition format\nAll teams will play two times against each other for completing 22 games per team.\n\nThe six first qualified teams will join the group for places 1 to 6 while the other six teams will play the group for places 7 to 12. These two groups will be played with a one-legged round-robin format, where all teams from group 1 to 6 and the two first qualified teams from the group for the seventh position will be qualified for the playoffs. In this intermediate stage, teams start with the points accumulated by the winnings achieved in the first stage.\n\nThe quarterfinals and the semifinals will be played as a best-of-five series while the final in a best-of-seven series.\n\nTeams \n\nBBC Lausanne did not continue playing in the SBL and was replaced by Pully and Vevey Riviera.\n\nRegular season\n\nSecond stage\n\nGroup 1–6\n\nGroup 7–12\n\nPlay-offs\nSeeded teams played at home games 1, 2, 5 and, in the finals, 7.\n\nSource:\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links \n \n\nChampionnat LNA seasons\nSwiss\nbasketball\nbasketball"
] |
[
"Nicklas Lidström",
"Playing career",
"When did his playing career start?",
"I don't know.",
"What teams did he play for?",
"Detroit Red Wings,"
] | C_276d1808eff343c6b87224b9513cbd4e_1 | What position did he play for the Detroit Red Wings? | 3 | What position did Nicklas Lidström play for the Detroit Red Wings? | Nicklas Lidström | Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidstrom was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidstrom was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004-05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In 14 consecutive seasons (since 1995-96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting. Lidstrom played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08. With the exception of the cancelled 2004-05 season lockout year, Lidstrom played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honor he shares with Larry Robinson). Known for his durability, Lidstrom consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005-06 season, a career high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies, from 2001 to 2003, becoming the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003-04 season, he played in his 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994-95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute). In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidstrom was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy. CANNOTANSWER | Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, | Erik Nicklas Lidström (; born 28 April 1970) is a Swedish former professional ice hockey defenceman and current vice president of hockey operations for the Detroit Red Wings. He played 20 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the Detroit Red Wings, which he captained for the final six seasons of his career. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest defencemen in NHL history.
Over his 20 NHL seasons, Lidström won four Stanley Cup championships, seven James Norris Memorial Trophies (awarded to the NHL's top defenceman), one Conn Smythe Trophy as the playoff MVP, and was voted into 12 NHL All-Star Games. The Red Wings never missed the playoffs during his career, the longest in league history for a player never missing the playoffs. Lidström was the first European-born-and-trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team, as well as the first European player named playoff MVP. Lidström is also the all-time leader in games played with a single NHL team by a European-born player. Lidström was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame on 9 November 2015. In 2017, Lidström was named one of the "100 Greatest NHL Players" in history.
Playing career
Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidström was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidström was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004–05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In his final 16 seasons (beginning in 1995–96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting.
Lidström played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams, in 1996–97, 1997–98, 2001–02 and 2007–08. Save for the cancelled 2004–05 season lockout year, Lidström played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honour he shares with Larry Robinson).
Known for his durability, Lidström consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005–06 season, a career-high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies from 2001 to 2003 to become the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003–04 season, he played in the 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994–95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute).
In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidström was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy.
Early career
Lidström began his career in Avesta, Sweden, playing with Skogsbo SK, before moving on to play with VIK Västerås HK of the Swedish Elitserien. In three seasons with the team, he played in 103 games, scoring 12 goals and 30 assists. Drafted by the Detroit Red Wings 53rd overall in the 1989 NHL Entry Draft, Lidström joined the team in the 1991–92 season, though he returned to play for Västerås IK for a brief period during the 1994–95 NHL lockout. Lidström scored 60 points in his rookie season, finishing second to Pavel Bure in voting for that year's Calder Trophy. He was selected to the 1992 NHL All-Rookie Team, along with fellow Red Wings defenceman Vladimir Konstantinov.
NHL career (1991–2012)
Swedish national team
Representing Sweden, Lidström won the World Championship in 1991. At the 2006 Winter Olympics, Lidström was a major factor in Sweden's win over Finland in the finals, scoring the gold medal-clinching goal, thus earning him a spot on the Olympic All-Star Team. He also became the 17th member of the Triple Gold Club. The Hockey News selected Lidström as the "Best European-trained player ever in the NHL." The Sporting News and Sports Illustrated selected Lidström as the "NHL Player of the Decade."
Post-lockout career
Lidström was set to make $10 million during the 2005–06 season. However, due to the new terms of the NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement that was implemented during the 2004–05 season, salaries on pre-existing contracts were reduced by 24%, which lowered his compensation to $7.6 million. That season, he posted a career-high 64 assists and 16 goals to for 80 points.
On 30 June 2006, it was announced that Lidström had signed a two-year, $15.2 million contract extension with the Red Wings. Instead of seeking more money elsewhere, Lidström decided to remain with Detroit for the same annual salary as he earned during the 2005–06 season.
Lidström was an alternate captain of the Red Wings since the 1997–98 season, but was awarded the captaincy after the 2006 retirement of long-time Red Wings captain Steve Yzerman. It was an honour made more special by the fact that he became the first European captain in franchise history. In his first year of captaincy, Lidström led the Red Wings to the Western Conference Finals, but lost to eventual Stanley Cup champions, the Anaheim Ducks. In the off-season, Lidström joined an elite group by capturing the Norris Trophy as the NHL's outstanding defenceman for the fifth time. Lidström became the fourth defenceman in NHL history with as many as five Norris Trophy wins, joining Hockey Hall of Famers Bobby Orr (eight), Doug Harvey (seven) and Ray Bourque (five).
Near the beginning of the 2007–08 season, in an 8 October win against the Edmonton Oilers, Lidström registered two assists to surpass Peter Forsberg as the second-highest scoring Swedish-born NHL player of all-time. Accordingly, he trails only Mats Sundin (as of the end of the 2011–12 season, Lidström has 1,142 points to Sundin's 1,349). Later in the season, on 26 December, Lidström signed a contract extension through the 2009–10 season. Several months later, on 3 April 2008, he assisted on a goal by Johan Franzén to tie Luc Robitaille at 42nd in the all-time NHL assists, with 726.
Entering the playoffs as Presidents' Trophy winners for the highest team point total during the regular season, the Red Wings met the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals. Despite a Game 5, triple-overtime victory by the Penguins to stave off elimination, Lidström and the Red Wings defeated Pittsburgh in Game 6 to capture the Stanley Cup. In doing so, Lidström became the first European-born-and-trained captain to win the Stanley Cup. In 1934, Charlie Gardiner, a goaltender born in Scotland, had captained the Chicago Black Hawks to win the Stanley Cup and in 1938, Johnny Gottselig, a left-winger born in Russia, also captained Chicago to a championship, but both players were trained in Canada.
Just over one week after winning his fourth Stanley Cup in 11 seasons, on 12 June, Lidström won the Norris Trophy for the third-straight season and the sixth time in seven seasons.
As the Red Wings opened the 2008–09 pre-season against the Montreal Canadiens, Lidström suffered a broken nose as a shot from Canadiens forward Chris Higgins ricocheted and hit him in the face. From then on, he began wearing a visor. He returned in time for the regular season and was selected to the 2009 NHL All-Star Game in Montreal. However, in the midst of dealing with tendinitis that had been bothering him all season, Lidström chose to sit out All-Star weekend, along with teammate Pavel Datsyuk. Consequently, Lidström and Datsyuk were both suspended one game by the NHL due to League policy for missing the All-Star Game without significant injury.
The Red Wings opened the 2009–10 season in Stockholm, Sweden. During the team's trip in Sweden, Lidström was honored by his home county, Dalarna, as an Ambassador of Honor. On 15 October 2009, in a game against the Los Angeles Kings, Lidström became the first European-born defenceman to reach 1,000 points after recording two assists in the game. He is the fourth player to score 1,000 points as a Red Wing (after Gordie Howe, Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman), and the eighth defenceman to do so in the history of the NHL. On 5 March 2010, Lidström earned his 800th career assist. Also during the 2009–10 season, Lidström played in his 1,395th game (finishing the season with 1,412), setting an all-time record for NHL games played by a player born in Europe; earlier in the season, Lidström had passed Teppo Numminen for games played by a player trained in Europe. Lidström is also second all-time in games played in a Red Wing uniform, behind only Howe.
On 23 April 2010, Lidström played in his 237th career playoff game, moving past Mark Messier into sole possession of third place on the NHL's all-time list (Chris Chelios, 266; Patrick Roy, 247). In the same game, he had an assist to tie Al MacInnis (121) for the third-most assists in the post-season by a defenceman (Ray Bourque 139; Paul Coffey 137).
On 27 April 2010, a day before his 40th birthday, Lidström had three points in a Game 7 win over the Phoenix Coyotes in the first round of the 2010 playoffs, pushing his active playoff points lead to 171 points, and tying him for 17th on the all-time playoff points list with fellow countryman Peter Forsberg.
As of the end of the 2009–10 season, Lidström has missed only 28 of a possible 1,440 regular-season team games (one due to suspension).
After contemplating retirement, Lidström agreed on a one-year contract with the Red Wings on 1 June 2010; the contract paid him slightly over $6 million.
On 15 December 2010, Lidström recorded his first career hat-trick, at 40 years of age, against the St. Louis Blues, sealing a 5–2 Detroit victory. After the game, he was asked how it feels to score his first hat-trick, responding, "It feels great, I've never in my life been able to notch three goals in a game." The hat-trick made him the oldest player in NHL history to record his first hat-trick (previously held by Scott Mellanby at 36 years of age), and the oldest defenceman in NHL history to record a hat-trick (previously held by Mathieu Schneider at 37 years of age).
On 18 January 2011, Lidström was named a team captain in the 2011 NHL All-Star Game in Raleigh, North Carolina. His team won by a final score of 11–10 over Team Staal, captained by Eric Staal of the Carolina Hurricanes. Lidström finished +7 with one assist.
On 20 June 2011, after briefly contemplating retirement yet again, Lidström signed a one-year contract worth $6.2 million with Detroit, the same amount he had been paid the previous season. On 23 June 2011, he won his seventh Norris Trophy even though his plus/minus rating for the year was −2, tying with Doug Harvey and remaining one behind Bobby Orr for most Norris Trophies. This was only the third time in history that a player with a negative plus/minus rating won the Norris Trophy.
On 22 October 2011, in a game against the Washington Capitals, Lidström became the 14th player in the history of the NHL to play 1,500 games. He is the first player not being born in North America, and therefore the first Swedish and European player, as well as the first player to accomplish this in his 20th NHL season. Lidström played in his 1,550th game on 12 February 2012, against the Philadelphia Flyers, surpassing Alex Delvecchio's previous Red Wing record of 1,549 games. This also makes him the NHL player who has played the most games while always playing for the same NHL team (Gordie Howe played more games, 1,687, with the Red Wings, but also played for the Hartford Whalers for one season). In this regard, Lidström joins former Red Wings Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman as the only three players with over 1,500 games having played exclusively for just one team throughout their careers.
Retirement
On 31 May 2012, Lidström announced his retirement from the NHL via a press conference with Red Wings Owner Mike Ilitch and General Manager Ken Holland present. The night before, he told the Swedish tabloid Expressen, "I came to the decision last week and I informed our general manager, Ken Holland." Discussing Lidström's retirement, former teammate Steve Yzerman described Lidström as "one of the all-time best defencemen to ever play." Former teammate and fellow Norris Trophy winning defenseman Paul Coffey said, "He was an incredible player" while Chris Chelios said, "There's been guys who are great players, but no one's better than Nick. As good? Yes. But this is as big as it gets. He's one of the best athletes ever and...if you're going to talk about someone who's perfect, Nick's pretty darn close to being perfect." Washington Capitals defenceman John Carlson described Lidström as "one of the game's all-time greats on and off the ice." Ken Holland stated his belief that Lidström was "the most valuable player of his era."
The following weekend, on 3 June 2012, Lidström and his wife took out a full-page ad giving thanks to the city of Detroit for making his family feel at home for the past 21 years. On 8 July 2012, Lidström was named a scout for the Red Wings.
On 28 February 2014, Lidström was inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame.
During the 2013–14 season, Lidström had his number 5 jersey retired by the Red Wings. Initially, ceremonies were planned for the previous season, on 5 February 2013 — however, the lockout had made it hard to determine when Lidström would be able to attend the ceremony. The Red Wings officially retired his number on 6 March 2014, in a pre-game ceremony at Joe Louis Arena.
International play
Prior to his NHL career, Lidström competed in one European Junior Championships in 1988, one World Junior Championship in 1990 and one Canada Cup in 1991 for Sweden.
Prior to his rookie season with the Red Wings, he earned his first gold medal with Sweden at the 1991 World Championships. Three years later, he competed in the 1994 World Championships in Italy and won a bronze medal. Two years later, he participated in the inaugural 1996 World Cup of Hockey (successor of the Canada Cup) and contributed three points in four games. He made his Olympic debut with Sweden at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.
Four years later was his next international appearance, playing in his second Olympics at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, where Sweden was upset by Belarus in the quarter-final after being heavy favourites in the round-robin. Lidström made his third World Championships appearance in 2004, but only appeared in two games. That summer, he also competed in the 2004 World Cup of Hockey, where he scored one goal.
In the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, Lidström helped Sweden avenge their quarter-final upset to Belarus in Salt Lake City, scoring the game winning goal in the gold medal game against Finland. In doing so, Lidström became a member of the Triple Gold Club, adding an Olympic gold medal to go with his previous Stanley Cups with Detroit and his World Championship gold medal in 1991. Lidström was also selected to the 2010 Olympic All-Star Team.
Lidström also played for Sweden in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, serving as team captain in what would be his final Olympic appearance. Lidström announced his retirement from Olympic competition following Sweden's loss to Slovakia.
Personal life
Lidström is married to Annika, with whom he has four children. All four sons play high-level hockey: Kevin (born 1994), is currently a defenceman for Swedish Division 1 team SK Lejon; Adam (born 1996) also plays in Division 1 with Enköpings SK; Samuel (born in 2000) plays on J20 SuperElit team VIK Västerås HK; and Lucas (born in 2003) also plays for VIK Västerås HK on its U16 team.
Lidström was featured on an episode of NHL 36.
In October 2019, Lidström released his authorized biography in North America titled Nicklas Lidstrom: The Pursuit of Perfection.
Career statistics
Regular season and playoffs
International
Awards
World Championship gold medal winner (Sweden, 1991).
NHL All-Rookie Team (1992).
4x Stanley Cup winner (1997, 1998, 2002, and 2008).
12x NHL All-Star Game (1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2008, 2009*, 2011).
10x NHL First All-Star Team member (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
2x NHL Second All-Star Team member (2009, 2010).
7x Norris Trophy winner (2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2002).
Olympic gold medal winner (Sweden, 2006)
Olympic All-Star Team (2006).
Member of the Triple Gold Club.
2x Viking Award winner (2000 and 2006).
Inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame – 2014
Detroit Red Wings #5 retired on 6 March 2014
Inducted into the IIHF Hall of Fame – 2014
Inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame – 2015
Introduced into the IIHF All-Time Sweden Team - 2020
*did not attend
Records
All records are as of the end of the regular season unless otherwise noted.
NHL
First European-born and trained Norris Trophy winner (2000–01).
First European-born and trained Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2001–02).
Fourth defenceman (and first European-born and trained defenceman) in NHL to win James Norris Memorial Trophy three years running (2001–2003, 2006–2008), and third seven-time Norris Trophy winner.
First European-born and trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team (2008).
First European-born and trained defenceman to reach 1,000 points.
Most regular-season games played by a player born in Europe, any position (1,564).
Most regular-season games played by a player in a career spent with only one team (1,564).
Most regular-season wins played in (900).
Most postseason games played with single franchise, career (263)
Most postseason assists by defenceman with single franchise, career (129)
Most postseason points by defenceman with single franchise, career (183)
Highest postseason plus/minus, career (+61)
Most postseason power-play goals by defenceman, career (30)
Most postseason shots on goal with single franchise, career (656)
Oldest player to record his first hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest defenceman to record a hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest Norris Trophy winner (41 years, 57 days) (2010–2011)
Oldest defenceman to score in a Game 7 (39 years, 364 days)
Detroit Red Wings
Points by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 80).
Assists by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 64).
Postseason goals by a defenceman, career (54).
Post-season power-play goals, career (30).
Power play goals by a defenceman, career (132).
Postseason points by a defenceman, career (183).
Postseason assists, career (129).
Postseason games played, career (263).
Games played by a defenceman, career (1,564).
Goals, assists, and points by a defenceman, career (264, 878, and 1142).
Goals in a single postseason by a defenceman (1998, 6).
Best postseason plus/minus, career (+61).
Best regular season plus/minus, career (+450).
See also
List of NHL players with 1000 points
List of NHL players with 1000 games played
List of Detroit Red Wings award winners
List of Detroit Red Wings draft picks
List of Detroit Red Wings records
References
External links
1970 births
Conn Smythe Trophy winners
Detroit Red Wings captains
Detroit Red Wings draft picks
Detroit Red Wings players
Detroit Red Wings scouts
Hockey Hall of Fame inductees
Ice hockey players at the 1998 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2002 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2006 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2010 Winter Olympics
IIHF Hall of Fame inductees
James Norris Memorial Trophy winners
Living people
Medalists at the 2006 Winter Olympics
National Hockey League All-Stars
National Hockey League players with retired numbers
Olympic gold medalists for Sweden
Olympic ice hockey players of Sweden
Olympic medalists in ice hockey
Sportspeople from Västerås
Stanley Cup champions
Swedish expatriate sportspeople in the United States
Swedish ice hockey defencemen
Triple Gold Club
VIK Västerås HK players
Swedish expatriate ice hockey people | true | [
"The 1934–35 Detroit Red Wings season was the ninth season for the Detroit NHL franchise, third as the Red Wings. The Red Wings finished fourth in the American Division and did not qualify for the playoffs.\n\nOffseason\n\nRegular season\n\nFinal standings\n\nRecord vs. opponents\n\nSchedule and results\n\nPlayoffs\nThe Red Wings didn't make it into the playoffs\n\nPlayer statistics\n\nRegular season\nScoring\n\nGoaltending\n\nNote: Pos = Position; GP = Games played; G = Goals; A = Assists; Pts = Points; PIM = Penalty minutes; PPG = Power-play goals; SHG = Short-handed goals; GWG = Game-winning goals\n MIN = Minutes played; W = Wins; L = Losses; T = Ties; GA = Goals-against; GAA = Goals-against average; SO = Shutouts;\n\nAwards and records\n\nTransactions\n\nSee also\n1934–35 NHL season\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\nDetroit Red Wings seasons\nDetroit\nDetroit\nDetroit Red Wings\nDetroit Red Wings",
"This is a list of broadcasters for the Detroit Red Wings ice hockey team.\n\nHistorical overview\n\nRadio history\nWWJ did the radio broadcast for the Detroit Red Wings' opener in 1926-27 with Foster Hewitt on commentary.\n\nRegular radio broadcasts for the Red Wings started in 1935-36, with Al Nagler doing home games through 1959-60. Gene Osborn did play-by-play on home games in 1960-61. In 1961-62, broadcasts moved to WJR for one year and all games were broadcast with Nagler and Budd Lynch splitting play-by-play duties. From 1962-64, Budd Lynch did play-by-play alone, but he was joined by Bruce Martyn in 1964-65. They split play-by-play through 1972-73. Then, Martyn did all of the play-by-play until he retired after 1994-95 and was replaced by Ken Kal. \n \nPaul Woods has done radio color since 1987-88. Paul Chapman did it in 1986-87, succeeding Sid Abel, who had teamed with Martyn since 1976-77. Prior to that, Len Hardman did home games in 1972-73, Al Coates in 1973-74 and 1975-76, and Budd Lynch in 1974-75. On road games, Martyn either worked alone or found a local sportscaster to join him.\n\nTelevision history\nThe Red Wings televised Sunday home games from 1949–50 through 1959-60; the first six years were simulcasts, Budd Lynch did TV only in the remaining years. The Red Wings returned to TV when channel 50 went on the air January 10, 1965, doing simulcasts through 1972–73. Budd Lynch and Larry Adderly did TV the next two years. Simulcasts returned from 1975–76 through 1984–85.\n\nDuring the late 1970s and early 1980s, the games were either on TV or radio, not both, because the same stations (WJR radio, WKBD-TV) had the Pistons' rights as well and that's how conflicts were handled.\n\nBy 1985–86, the Red Wings also were on the Pro-Am Sports System pay-TV channel, who broadcast about 20 games a year. Budd Lynch was involved with Alex Delvecchio on color. Also, they called Strader up from the farm club, and he took over the play-by-play duties, calling TV games on both WKBD and PASS Sports alongside Mickey Redmond until 1996. Mike Goldberg did play-by-play in 1996–97 while Ken Daniels started working play-by-play in 1997–98. \n\nIn 2001, WJR lost its longtime flagship radio rights to the Detroit Tigers and Detroit Red Wings, both of whom moved to CBS-owned WXYT and WXYT-FM.\n\nOn December 12, 2006, Daniels broadcast a game between the Red Wings and the Ottawa Senators from ice-level between the benches, while color commentator Redmond remained in the booth. This was the first time a U.S. local station had attempted this type of broadcast. Daniels received a Michigan EMMY Award for this broadcast at the 29th Annual Michigan EMMY Awards on June 16, 2007 in Detroit.\n\nOn June 4, 2008, Daniels filled-in for regular Detroit radio broadcast announcer Ken Kal for Game 6 of the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals between the Red Wings and the Pittsburgh Penguins. Kal was suffering from laryngitis and thus, was unable to call the game. The Red Wings had a 3-2 lead in the series and won the game, and the cup. With 45 seconds left in the game, Daniels took off the headset and handed the game over to Kal, saying, \"I don't care if you can't talk, you have to bring it home\". Kal called the final 10 seconds, and was able to make the call \"...The Detroit Red Wings are the 2008 Stanley Cup Champions!\"\n\nLarry Murphy was an alternate color commentator for the Detroit Red Wings on Fox Sports Detroit. He only did color commentator duties for Red Wings west coast road trips in place of Mickey Redmond. From 2003 to 2006, he shared this duty with former teammate Pat Verbeek where they would alternate road trips. However following the 2005–06 NHL season, Verbeek left the job as broadcaster to become a scout for the Red Wings and Murphy took over full-time on west coast road trips. In addition in 2006, Murphy started contributing as a studio analyst on pregames, post games and intermissions in which he does not broadcast. In the 2007–08 season, Murphy began serving as a \"Between the Benches\" reporter for Fox Sports Detroit when Mickey Redmond was broadcasting, and subbed for Redmond when he had surgery to remove a tumor on his lung. He also made occasional appearances on the NHL Network's nightly hockey highlight show, NHL on the Fly. In March 2013, it was announced by Fox Sports Detroit that he had been fired, after being told they weren't satisfied with ratings. On February 14, 2019, it was announced Murphy would return as a studio analyst for the Red Wings on Fox Sports Detroit for the remainder of the 2018–19 season.\n\nHonored broadcasters\nFour members of the Red Wings organization have received the Foster Hewitt Memorial Award:\n Budd Lynch: TV and radio play-by-play and color – 1949–1975 (awarded 1985)\n Bruce Martyn: Radio play-by-play – 1964–1995 (awarded 1991)\n Mickey Redmond: TV color commentary – 1979–1981, 1986–present (awarded 2011)\n Dave Strader: TV play-by-play – 1985–1996 (awarded 2017)\n\nLynch called the first locally televised game at Olympia for the original WWJ-TV in 1949. He remained with the organization for 63 years, serving as director of publicity from 1975 to 1982, and was the public address announcer from 1982 until his death in 2012. From 2008 to 2012, a second PA announcer was added to work alongside him, first John Fossen, then Erich Freiny. Freiny took over as the sole PA announcer following Lynch's death.\n\nCurrent broadcasters\n\nThe Red Wings' flagship radio stations are Detroit sister stations WXYT-AM 1270 and WXYT-FM 97.1. Games are carried on both stations unless there is a conflict with Detroit Tigers baseball. There are several affiliate stations throughout Michigan and Southwestern Ontario.\n\nThe Red Wings' exclusive local television rights are held by Bally Sports Detroit. The channel shared professional team coverage rights with some Detroit area broadcast television stations until the spring of 2008. In March 2008, the channel signed new long-term contracts with the Pistons, Red Wings and Tigers to broadcast more games than in previous years, becoming the exclusive local home of all three teams for the first time until at least 2018. This leaves only the NFL's Detroit Lions as the only local professional sports team in Detroit to have all of its games on broadcast television.\n\nAnnouncers:\n\n Ken Daniels: Television play-by-play announcer.\n Mickey Redmond: Television color commentator (home games and select away games).\n Chris Osgood: Television color commentator (select away games that Redmond does not attend) and studio analyst (when not color commentator during play).\n Larry Murphy: Studio analyst and television color commentator (select away games that Redmond and Osgood do not attend).\n John Keating: Television pre-game and post-game show host.\n Ken Kal: Radio play-by-play announcer.\n Paul Woods: Radio analyst.\n Trevor Thompson, Mickey York: TV pre-game and post-game show hosts and reporters.\n Jeff Riger: Primary radio intermission and post-game host.\n\nSee also\nHistorical NHL over-the-air television broadcasters\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nDetroit Sports Broadcasters Association\nMichigan Sports Hall of Fame\nInterview with Ken on Hockey Refs.com\nBudd Lynch in the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame\nDetroit Free Press: Budd Lynch, 91, remains the voice of Wings' championship history\n\n \nLists of National Hockey League broadcasters\nBroadcasters\nPrime Sports\nFox Sports Networks\nBally Sports"
] |
[
"Nicklas Lidström",
"Playing career",
"When did his playing career start?",
"I don't know.",
"What teams did he play for?",
"Detroit Red Wings,",
"What position did he play for the Detroit Red Wings?",
"Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time,"
] | C_276d1808eff343c6b87224b9513cbd4e_1 | What happened while he played for the Red Wings? | 4 | What happened while Nicklas Lidström played defence for the Red Wings? | Nicklas Lidström | Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidstrom was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidstrom was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004-05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In 14 consecutive seasons (since 1995-96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting. Lidstrom played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08. With the exception of the cancelled 2004-05 season lockout year, Lidstrom played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honor he shares with Larry Robinson). Known for his durability, Lidstrom consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005-06 season, a career high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies, from 2001 to 2003, becoming the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003-04 season, he played in his 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994-95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute). In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidstrom was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy. CANNOTANSWER | He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08. | Erik Nicklas Lidström (; born 28 April 1970) is a Swedish former professional ice hockey defenceman and current vice president of hockey operations for the Detroit Red Wings. He played 20 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the Detroit Red Wings, which he captained for the final six seasons of his career. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest defencemen in NHL history.
Over his 20 NHL seasons, Lidström won four Stanley Cup championships, seven James Norris Memorial Trophies (awarded to the NHL's top defenceman), one Conn Smythe Trophy as the playoff MVP, and was voted into 12 NHL All-Star Games. The Red Wings never missed the playoffs during his career, the longest in league history for a player never missing the playoffs. Lidström was the first European-born-and-trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team, as well as the first European player named playoff MVP. Lidström is also the all-time leader in games played with a single NHL team by a European-born player. Lidström was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame on 9 November 2015. In 2017, Lidström was named one of the "100 Greatest NHL Players" in history.
Playing career
Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidström was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidström was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004–05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In his final 16 seasons (beginning in 1995–96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting.
Lidström played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams, in 1996–97, 1997–98, 2001–02 and 2007–08. Save for the cancelled 2004–05 season lockout year, Lidström played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honour he shares with Larry Robinson).
Known for his durability, Lidström consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005–06 season, a career-high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies from 2001 to 2003 to become the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003–04 season, he played in the 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994–95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute).
In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidström was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy.
Early career
Lidström began his career in Avesta, Sweden, playing with Skogsbo SK, before moving on to play with VIK Västerås HK of the Swedish Elitserien. In three seasons with the team, he played in 103 games, scoring 12 goals and 30 assists. Drafted by the Detroit Red Wings 53rd overall in the 1989 NHL Entry Draft, Lidström joined the team in the 1991–92 season, though he returned to play for Västerås IK for a brief period during the 1994–95 NHL lockout. Lidström scored 60 points in his rookie season, finishing second to Pavel Bure in voting for that year's Calder Trophy. He was selected to the 1992 NHL All-Rookie Team, along with fellow Red Wings defenceman Vladimir Konstantinov.
NHL career (1991–2012)
Swedish national team
Representing Sweden, Lidström won the World Championship in 1991. At the 2006 Winter Olympics, Lidström was a major factor in Sweden's win over Finland in the finals, scoring the gold medal-clinching goal, thus earning him a spot on the Olympic All-Star Team. He also became the 17th member of the Triple Gold Club. The Hockey News selected Lidström as the "Best European-trained player ever in the NHL." The Sporting News and Sports Illustrated selected Lidström as the "NHL Player of the Decade."
Post-lockout career
Lidström was set to make $10 million during the 2005–06 season. However, due to the new terms of the NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement that was implemented during the 2004–05 season, salaries on pre-existing contracts were reduced by 24%, which lowered his compensation to $7.6 million. That season, he posted a career-high 64 assists and 16 goals to for 80 points.
On 30 June 2006, it was announced that Lidström had signed a two-year, $15.2 million contract extension with the Red Wings. Instead of seeking more money elsewhere, Lidström decided to remain with Detroit for the same annual salary as he earned during the 2005–06 season.
Lidström was an alternate captain of the Red Wings since the 1997–98 season, but was awarded the captaincy after the 2006 retirement of long-time Red Wings captain Steve Yzerman. It was an honour made more special by the fact that he became the first European captain in franchise history. In his first year of captaincy, Lidström led the Red Wings to the Western Conference Finals, but lost to eventual Stanley Cup champions, the Anaheim Ducks. In the off-season, Lidström joined an elite group by capturing the Norris Trophy as the NHL's outstanding defenceman for the fifth time. Lidström became the fourth defenceman in NHL history with as many as five Norris Trophy wins, joining Hockey Hall of Famers Bobby Orr (eight), Doug Harvey (seven) and Ray Bourque (five).
Near the beginning of the 2007–08 season, in an 8 October win against the Edmonton Oilers, Lidström registered two assists to surpass Peter Forsberg as the second-highest scoring Swedish-born NHL player of all-time. Accordingly, he trails only Mats Sundin (as of the end of the 2011–12 season, Lidström has 1,142 points to Sundin's 1,349). Later in the season, on 26 December, Lidström signed a contract extension through the 2009–10 season. Several months later, on 3 April 2008, he assisted on a goal by Johan Franzén to tie Luc Robitaille at 42nd in the all-time NHL assists, with 726.
Entering the playoffs as Presidents' Trophy winners for the highest team point total during the regular season, the Red Wings met the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals. Despite a Game 5, triple-overtime victory by the Penguins to stave off elimination, Lidström and the Red Wings defeated Pittsburgh in Game 6 to capture the Stanley Cup. In doing so, Lidström became the first European-born-and-trained captain to win the Stanley Cup. In 1934, Charlie Gardiner, a goaltender born in Scotland, had captained the Chicago Black Hawks to win the Stanley Cup and in 1938, Johnny Gottselig, a left-winger born in Russia, also captained Chicago to a championship, but both players were trained in Canada.
Just over one week after winning his fourth Stanley Cup in 11 seasons, on 12 June, Lidström won the Norris Trophy for the third-straight season and the sixth time in seven seasons.
As the Red Wings opened the 2008–09 pre-season against the Montreal Canadiens, Lidström suffered a broken nose as a shot from Canadiens forward Chris Higgins ricocheted and hit him in the face. From then on, he began wearing a visor. He returned in time for the regular season and was selected to the 2009 NHL All-Star Game in Montreal. However, in the midst of dealing with tendinitis that had been bothering him all season, Lidström chose to sit out All-Star weekend, along with teammate Pavel Datsyuk. Consequently, Lidström and Datsyuk were both suspended one game by the NHL due to League policy for missing the All-Star Game without significant injury.
The Red Wings opened the 2009–10 season in Stockholm, Sweden. During the team's trip in Sweden, Lidström was honored by his home county, Dalarna, as an Ambassador of Honor. On 15 October 2009, in a game against the Los Angeles Kings, Lidström became the first European-born defenceman to reach 1,000 points after recording two assists in the game. He is the fourth player to score 1,000 points as a Red Wing (after Gordie Howe, Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman), and the eighth defenceman to do so in the history of the NHL. On 5 March 2010, Lidström earned his 800th career assist. Also during the 2009–10 season, Lidström played in his 1,395th game (finishing the season with 1,412), setting an all-time record for NHL games played by a player born in Europe; earlier in the season, Lidström had passed Teppo Numminen for games played by a player trained in Europe. Lidström is also second all-time in games played in a Red Wing uniform, behind only Howe.
On 23 April 2010, Lidström played in his 237th career playoff game, moving past Mark Messier into sole possession of third place on the NHL's all-time list (Chris Chelios, 266; Patrick Roy, 247). In the same game, he had an assist to tie Al MacInnis (121) for the third-most assists in the post-season by a defenceman (Ray Bourque 139; Paul Coffey 137).
On 27 April 2010, a day before his 40th birthday, Lidström had three points in a Game 7 win over the Phoenix Coyotes in the first round of the 2010 playoffs, pushing his active playoff points lead to 171 points, and tying him for 17th on the all-time playoff points list with fellow countryman Peter Forsberg.
As of the end of the 2009–10 season, Lidström has missed only 28 of a possible 1,440 regular-season team games (one due to suspension).
After contemplating retirement, Lidström agreed on a one-year contract with the Red Wings on 1 June 2010; the contract paid him slightly over $6 million.
On 15 December 2010, Lidström recorded his first career hat-trick, at 40 years of age, against the St. Louis Blues, sealing a 5–2 Detroit victory. After the game, he was asked how it feels to score his first hat-trick, responding, "It feels great, I've never in my life been able to notch three goals in a game." The hat-trick made him the oldest player in NHL history to record his first hat-trick (previously held by Scott Mellanby at 36 years of age), and the oldest defenceman in NHL history to record a hat-trick (previously held by Mathieu Schneider at 37 years of age).
On 18 January 2011, Lidström was named a team captain in the 2011 NHL All-Star Game in Raleigh, North Carolina. His team won by a final score of 11–10 over Team Staal, captained by Eric Staal of the Carolina Hurricanes. Lidström finished +7 with one assist.
On 20 June 2011, after briefly contemplating retirement yet again, Lidström signed a one-year contract worth $6.2 million with Detroit, the same amount he had been paid the previous season. On 23 June 2011, he won his seventh Norris Trophy even though his plus/minus rating for the year was −2, tying with Doug Harvey and remaining one behind Bobby Orr for most Norris Trophies. This was only the third time in history that a player with a negative plus/minus rating won the Norris Trophy.
On 22 October 2011, in a game against the Washington Capitals, Lidström became the 14th player in the history of the NHL to play 1,500 games. He is the first player not being born in North America, and therefore the first Swedish and European player, as well as the first player to accomplish this in his 20th NHL season. Lidström played in his 1,550th game on 12 February 2012, against the Philadelphia Flyers, surpassing Alex Delvecchio's previous Red Wing record of 1,549 games. This also makes him the NHL player who has played the most games while always playing for the same NHL team (Gordie Howe played more games, 1,687, with the Red Wings, but also played for the Hartford Whalers for one season). In this regard, Lidström joins former Red Wings Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman as the only three players with over 1,500 games having played exclusively for just one team throughout their careers.
Retirement
On 31 May 2012, Lidström announced his retirement from the NHL via a press conference with Red Wings Owner Mike Ilitch and General Manager Ken Holland present. The night before, he told the Swedish tabloid Expressen, "I came to the decision last week and I informed our general manager, Ken Holland." Discussing Lidström's retirement, former teammate Steve Yzerman described Lidström as "one of the all-time best defencemen to ever play." Former teammate and fellow Norris Trophy winning defenseman Paul Coffey said, "He was an incredible player" while Chris Chelios said, "There's been guys who are great players, but no one's better than Nick. As good? Yes. But this is as big as it gets. He's one of the best athletes ever and...if you're going to talk about someone who's perfect, Nick's pretty darn close to being perfect." Washington Capitals defenceman John Carlson described Lidström as "one of the game's all-time greats on and off the ice." Ken Holland stated his belief that Lidström was "the most valuable player of his era."
The following weekend, on 3 June 2012, Lidström and his wife took out a full-page ad giving thanks to the city of Detroit for making his family feel at home for the past 21 years. On 8 July 2012, Lidström was named a scout for the Red Wings.
On 28 February 2014, Lidström was inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame.
During the 2013–14 season, Lidström had his number 5 jersey retired by the Red Wings. Initially, ceremonies were planned for the previous season, on 5 February 2013 — however, the lockout had made it hard to determine when Lidström would be able to attend the ceremony. The Red Wings officially retired his number on 6 March 2014, in a pre-game ceremony at Joe Louis Arena.
International play
Prior to his NHL career, Lidström competed in one European Junior Championships in 1988, one World Junior Championship in 1990 and one Canada Cup in 1991 for Sweden.
Prior to his rookie season with the Red Wings, he earned his first gold medal with Sweden at the 1991 World Championships. Three years later, he competed in the 1994 World Championships in Italy and won a bronze medal. Two years later, he participated in the inaugural 1996 World Cup of Hockey (successor of the Canada Cup) and contributed three points in four games. He made his Olympic debut with Sweden at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.
Four years later was his next international appearance, playing in his second Olympics at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, where Sweden was upset by Belarus in the quarter-final after being heavy favourites in the round-robin. Lidström made his third World Championships appearance in 2004, but only appeared in two games. That summer, he also competed in the 2004 World Cup of Hockey, where he scored one goal.
In the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, Lidström helped Sweden avenge their quarter-final upset to Belarus in Salt Lake City, scoring the game winning goal in the gold medal game against Finland. In doing so, Lidström became a member of the Triple Gold Club, adding an Olympic gold medal to go with his previous Stanley Cups with Detroit and his World Championship gold medal in 1991. Lidström was also selected to the 2010 Olympic All-Star Team.
Lidström also played for Sweden in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, serving as team captain in what would be his final Olympic appearance. Lidström announced his retirement from Olympic competition following Sweden's loss to Slovakia.
Personal life
Lidström is married to Annika, with whom he has four children. All four sons play high-level hockey: Kevin (born 1994), is currently a defenceman for Swedish Division 1 team SK Lejon; Adam (born 1996) also plays in Division 1 with Enköpings SK; Samuel (born in 2000) plays on J20 SuperElit team VIK Västerås HK; and Lucas (born in 2003) also plays for VIK Västerås HK on its U16 team.
Lidström was featured on an episode of NHL 36.
In October 2019, Lidström released his authorized biography in North America titled Nicklas Lidstrom: The Pursuit of Perfection.
Career statistics
Regular season and playoffs
International
Awards
World Championship gold medal winner (Sweden, 1991).
NHL All-Rookie Team (1992).
4x Stanley Cup winner (1997, 1998, 2002, and 2008).
12x NHL All-Star Game (1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2008, 2009*, 2011).
10x NHL First All-Star Team member (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
2x NHL Second All-Star Team member (2009, 2010).
7x Norris Trophy winner (2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2002).
Olympic gold medal winner (Sweden, 2006)
Olympic All-Star Team (2006).
Member of the Triple Gold Club.
2x Viking Award winner (2000 and 2006).
Inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame – 2014
Detroit Red Wings #5 retired on 6 March 2014
Inducted into the IIHF Hall of Fame – 2014
Inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame – 2015
Introduced into the IIHF All-Time Sweden Team - 2020
*did not attend
Records
All records are as of the end of the regular season unless otherwise noted.
NHL
First European-born and trained Norris Trophy winner (2000–01).
First European-born and trained Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2001–02).
Fourth defenceman (and first European-born and trained defenceman) in NHL to win James Norris Memorial Trophy three years running (2001–2003, 2006–2008), and third seven-time Norris Trophy winner.
First European-born and trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team (2008).
First European-born and trained defenceman to reach 1,000 points.
Most regular-season games played by a player born in Europe, any position (1,564).
Most regular-season games played by a player in a career spent with only one team (1,564).
Most regular-season wins played in (900).
Most postseason games played with single franchise, career (263)
Most postseason assists by defenceman with single franchise, career (129)
Most postseason points by defenceman with single franchise, career (183)
Highest postseason plus/minus, career (+61)
Most postseason power-play goals by defenceman, career (30)
Most postseason shots on goal with single franchise, career (656)
Oldest player to record his first hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest defenceman to record a hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest Norris Trophy winner (41 years, 57 days) (2010–2011)
Oldest defenceman to score in a Game 7 (39 years, 364 days)
Detroit Red Wings
Points by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 80).
Assists by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 64).
Postseason goals by a defenceman, career (54).
Post-season power-play goals, career (30).
Power play goals by a defenceman, career (132).
Postseason points by a defenceman, career (183).
Postseason assists, career (129).
Postseason games played, career (263).
Games played by a defenceman, career (1,564).
Goals, assists, and points by a defenceman, career (264, 878, and 1142).
Goals in a single postseason by a defenceman (1998, 6).
Best postseason plus/minus, career (+61).
Best regular season plus/minus, career (+450).
See also
List of NHL players with 1000 points
List of NHL players with 1000 games played
List of Detroit Red Wings award winners
List of Detroit Red Wings draft picks
List of Detroit Red Wings records
References
External links
1970 births
Conn Smythe Trophy winners
Detroit Red Wings captains
Detroit Red Wings draft picks
Detroit Red Wings players
Detroit Red Wings scouts
Hockey Hall of Fame inductees
Ice hockey players at the 1998 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2002 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2006 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2010 Winter Olympics
IIHF Hall of Fame inductees
James Norris Memorial Trophy winners
Living people
Medalists at the 2006 Winter Olympics
National Hockey League All-Stars
National Hockey League players with retired numbers
Olympic gold medalists for Sweden
Olympic ice hockey players of Sweden
Olympic medalists in ice hockey
Sportspeople from Västerås
Stanley Cup champions
Swedish expatriate sportspeople in the United States
Swedish ice hockey defencemen
Triple Gold Club
VIK Västerås HK players
Swedish expatriate ice hockey people | false | [
"The 1954 Detroit Red Wings prison game was an exhibition ice hockey game played on February 2, 1954. The exhibition was played outdoors at the Marquette Branch Prison between the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League (NHL) and a team put together by the inmates of the prison. It was the first ever outdoor game played by the Detroit Red Wings. After the first period the Red Wings were winning 18–0, and the scores for the remainder of the match were not kept.\n\nThe original planning for the game began in June 1953 when the general manager for the Red Wings, Jack Adams, visited the prison while doing a promotional tour for Stroh’s beer. There, the warden asked Adams if the Red Wings would come play the prison. Adams agreed, but only because he never expected the game to ever actually happen. Some say that Adams also agreed as a favor to two inmates he knew, Harry Keywell and Ray Bernstein, who were both members of the notorious Purple Gang.\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n The Day the Pros Faced Off with the Cons: Marquette's Most Infamous Hockey Game\n\n1953–54 NHL season\nDetroit Red Wings games\nNHL outdoor games\nFebruary 1954 sports events\nDetroit Red Wings prison",
"Yuri Gennadievich Butsayev (born October 11, 1978) is a Russian former professional ice hockey winger. He played in the National Hockey League (NHL) with the Detroit Red Wings and the Atlanta Thrashers. He was drafted in the second round, 49th overall, by the Red Wings in the 1997 NHL Entry Draft. Yuri is the brother of the former NHL player Viacheslav Butsayev.\n\nPlaying career\nDrafted from HC Lada Togliatti, Butsayev made his National Hockey League debut with the Red Wings during the 1999–2000 season, appearing in 57 games and scoring five goals. After spending parts of the next two seasons with the Red Wings, Butsayev was traded to the Atlanta Thrashers along with a draft pick for defenceman Jiri Slegr.\n\nAfter spending parts of two seasons with the Thrashers, Butsayev returned to Russia during the 2003 season and has played there ever since. Butsayev played only 99 games in the NHL 75 with the wings and 24 with the thrashers. He scored a total of 10 NHL goals.\n\nPersonal\nIn September 2009 Butsayev was found guilty and sentenced to 10 months of conditional imprisonment for rape in Finland. The sexual assault had happened in Asikkala in July 2009. Butsayev was imprisoned for more than a month, but was allowed to leave the country after receiving his sentence.\n\nCareer statistics\n\nRegular season and playoffs\n\nInternational\n\nAwards and honours\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n \n\n1978 births\nAtlanta Thrashers players\nChicago Wolves players\nCincinnati Mighty Ducks players\nDetroit Red Wings draft picks\nDetroit Red Wings players\nHC CSKA Moscow players\nHC Dynamo Moscow players\nHC Lada Togliatti players\nHC MVD players\nHC Sibir Novosibirsk players\nZauralie Kurgan players\nLiving people\nLokomotiv Yaroslavl players\nRussian ice hockey left wingers\nTorpedo Nizhny Novgorod players"
] |
[
"Nicklas Lidström",
"Playing career",
"When did his playing career start?",
"I don't know.",
"What teams did he play for?",
"Detroit Red Wings,",
"What position did he play for the Detroit Red Wings?",
"Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time,",
"What happened while he played for the Red Wings?",
"He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08."
] | C_276d1808eff343c6b87224b9513cbd4e_1 | What else did he achieve on the Red Wings? | 5 | What else did Nicklas Lidström achieve on the Red Wings along with being considered one of the greatest defencemen and being on four Stanley Cup-winning teams? | Nicklas Lidström | Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidstrom was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidstrom was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004-05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In 14 consecutive seasons (since 1995-96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting. Lidstrom played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08. With the exception of the cancelled 2004-05 season lockout year, Lidstrom played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honor he shares with Larry Robinson). Known for his durability, Lidstrom consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005-06 season, a career high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies, from 2001 to 2003, becoming the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003-04 season, he played in his 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994-95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute). In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidstrom was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy. CANNOTANSWER | Known for his durability, Lidstrom consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. | Erik Nicklas Lidström (; born 28 April 1970) is a Swedish former professional ice hockey defenceman and current vice president of hockey operations for the Detroit Red Wings. He played 20 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the Detroit Red Wings, which he captained for the final six seasons of his career. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest defencemen in NHL history.
Over his 20 NHL seasons, Lidström won four Stanley Cup championships, seven James Norris Memorial Trophies (awarded to the NHL's top defenceman), one Conn Smythe Trophy as the playoff MVP, and was voted into 12 NHL All-Star Games. The Red Wings never missed the playoffs during his career, the longest in league history for a player never missing the playoffs. Lidström was the first European-born-and-trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team, as well as the first European player named playoff MVP. Lidström is also the all-time leader in games played with a single NHL team by a European-born player. Lidström was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame on 9 November 2015. In 2017, Lidström was named one of the "100 Greatest NHL Players" in history.
Playing career
Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidström was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidström was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004–05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In his final 16 seasons (beginning in 1995–96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting.
Lidström played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams, in 1996–97, 1997–98, 2001–02 and 2007–08. Save for the cancelled 2004–05 season lockout year, Lidström played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honour he shares with Larry Robinson).
Known for his durability, Lidström consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005–06 season, a career-high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies from 2001 to 2003 to become the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003–04 season, he played in the 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994–95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute).
In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidström was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy.
Early career
Lidström began his career in Avesta, Sweden, playing with Skogsbo SK, before moving on to play with VIK Västerås HK of the Swedish Elitserien. In three seasons with the team, he played in 103 games, scoring 12 goals and 30 assists. Drafted by the Detroit Red Wings 53rd overall in the 1989 NHL Entry Draft, Lidström joined the team in the 1991–92 season, though he returned to play for Västerås IK for a brief period during the 1994–95 NHL lockout. Lidström scored 60 points in his rookie season, finishing second to Pavel Bure in voting for that year's Calder Trophy. He was selected to the 1992 NHL All-Rookie Team, along with fellow Red Wings defenceman Vladimir Konstantinov.
NHL career (1991–2012)
Swedish national team
Representing Sweden, Lidström won the World Championship in 1991. At the 2006 Winter Olympics, Lidström was a major factor in Sweden's win over Finland in the finals, scoring the gold medal-clinching goal, thus earning him a spot on the Olympic All-Star Team. He also became the 17th member of the Triple Gold Club. The Hockey News selected Lidström as the "Best European-trained player ever in the NHL." The Sporting News and Sports Illustrated selected Lidström as the "NHL Player of the Decade."
Post-lockout career
Lidström was set to make $10 million during the 2005–06 season. However, due to the new terms of the NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement that was implemented during the 2004–05 season, salaries on pre-existing contracts were reduced by 24%, which lowered his compensation to $7.6 million. That season, he posted a career-high 64 assists and 16 goals to for 80 points.
On 30 June 2006, it was announced that Lidström had signed a two-year, $15.2 million contract extension with the Red Wings. Instead of seeking more money elsewhere, Lidström decided to remain with Detroit for the same annual salary as he earned during the 2005–06 season.
Lidström was an alternate captain of the Red Wings since the 1997–98 season, but was awarded the captaincy after the 2006 retirement of long-time Red Wings captain Steve Yzerman. It was an honour made more special by the fact that he became the first European captain in franchise history. In his first year of captaincy, Lidström led the Red Wings to the Western Conference Finals, but lost to eventual Stanley Cup champions, the Anaheim Ducks. In the off-season, Lidström joined an elite group by capturing the Norris Trophy as the NHL's outstanding defenceman for the fifth time. Lidström became the fourth defenceman in NHL history with as many as five Norris Trophy wins, joining Hockey Hall of Famers Bobby Orr (eight), Doug Harvey (seven) and Ray Bourque (five).
Near the beginning of the 2007–08 season, in an 8 October win against the Edmonton Oilers, Lidström registered two assists to surpass Peter Forsberg as the second-highest scoring Swedish-born NHL player of all-time. Accordingly, he trails only Mats Sundin (as of the end of the 2011–12 season, Lidström has 1,142 points to Sundin's 1,349). Later in the season, on 26 December, Lidström signed a contract extension through the 2009–10 season. Several months later, on 3 April 2008, he assisted on a goal by Johan Franzén to tie Luc Robitaille at 42nd in the all-time NHL assists, with 726.
Entering the playoffs as Presidents' Trophy winners for the highest team point total during the regular season, the Red Wings met the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals. Despite a Game 5, triple-overtime victory by the Penguins to stave off elimination, Lidström and the Red Wings defeated Pittsburgh in Game 6 to capture the Stanley Cup. In doing so, Lidström became the first European-born-and-trained captain to win the Stanley Cup. In 1934, Charlie Gardiner, a goaltender born in Scotland, had captained the Chicago Black Hawks to win the Stanley Cup and in 1938, Johnny Gottselig, a left-winger born in Russia, also captained Chicago to a championship, but both players were trained in Canada.
Just over one week after winning his fourth Stanley Cup in 11 seasons, on 12 June, Lidström won the Norris Trophy for the third-straight season and the sixth time in seven seasons.
As the Red Wings opened the 2008–09 pre-season against the Montreal Canadiens, Lidström suffered a broken nose as a shot from Canadiens forward Chris Higgins ricocheted and hit him in the face. From then on, he began wearing a visor. He returned in time for the regular season and was selected to the 2009 NHL All-Star Game in Montreal. However, in the midst of dealing with tendinitis that had been bothering him all season, Lidström chose to sit out All-Star weekend, along with teammate Pavel Datsyuk. Consequently, Lidström and Datsyuk were both suspended one game by the NHL due to League policy for missing the All-Star Game without significant injury.
The Red Wings opened the 2009–10 season in Stockholm, Sweden. During the team's trip in Sweden, Lidström was honored by his home county, Dalarna, as an Ambassador of Honor. On 15 October 2009, in a game against the Los Angeles Kings, Lidström became the first European-born defenceman to reach 1,000 points after recording two assists in the game. He is the fourth player to score 1,000 points as a Red Wing (after Gordie Howe, Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman), and the eighth defenceman to do so in the history of the NHL. On 5 March 2010, Lidström earned his 800th career assist. Also during the 2009–10 season, Lidström played in his 1,395th game (finishing the season with 1,412), setting an all-time record for NHL games played by a player born in Europe; earlier in the season, Lidström had passed Teppo Numminen for games played by a player trained in Europe. Lidström is also second all-time in games played in a Red Wing uniform, behind only Howe.
On 23 April 2010, Lidström played in his 237th career playoff game, moving past Mark Messier into sole possession of third place on the NHL's all-time list (Chris Chelios, 266; Patrick Roy, 247). In the same game, he had an assist to tie Al MacInnis (121) for the third-most assists in the post-season by a defenceman (Ray Bourque 139; Paul Coffey 137).
On 27 April 2010, a day before his 40th birthday, Lidström had three points in a Game 7 win over the Phoenix Coyotes in the first round of the 2010 playoffs, pushing his active playoff points lead to 171 points, and tying him for 17th on the all-time playoff points list with fellow countryman Peter Forsberg.
As of the end of the 2009–10 season, Lidström has missed only 28 of a possible 1,440 regular-season team games (one due to suspension).
After contemplating retirement, Lidström agreed on a one-year contract with the Red Wings on 1 June 2010; the contract paid him slightly over $6 million.
On 15 December 2010, Lidström recorded his first career hat-trick, at 40 years of age, against the St. Louis Blues, sealing a 5–2 Detroit victory. After the game, he was asked how it feels to score his first hat-trick, responding, "It feels great, I've never in my life been able to notch three goals in a game." The hat-trick made him the oldest player in NHL history to record his first hat-trick (previously held by Scott Mellanby at 36 years of age), and the oldest defenceman in NHL history to record a hat-trick (previously held by Mathieu Schneider at 37 years of age).
On 18 January 2011, Lidström was named a team captain in the 2011 NHL All-Star Game in Raleigh, North Carolina. His team won by a final score of 11–10 over Team Staal, captained by Eric Staal of the Carolina Hurricanes. Lidström finished +7 with one assist.
On 20 June 2011, after briefly contemplating retirement yet again, Lidström signed a one-year contract worth $6.2 million with Detroit, the same amount he had been paid the previous season. On 23 June 2011, he won his seventh Norris Trophy even though his plus/minus rating for the year was −2, tying with Doug Harvey and remaining one behind Bobby Orr for most Norris Trophies. This was only the third time in history that a player with a negative plus/minus rating won the Norris Trophy.
On 22 October 2011, in a game against the Washington Capitals, Lidström became the 14th player in the history of the NHL to play 1,500 games. He is the first player not being born in North America, and therefore the first Swedish and European player, as well as the first player to accomplish this in his 20th NHL season. Lidström played in his 1,550th game on 12 February 2012, against the Philadelphia Flyers, surpassing Alex Delvecchio's previous Red Wing record of 1,549 games. This also makes him the NHL player who has played the most games while always playing for the same NHL team (Gordie Howe played more games, 1,687, with the Red Wings, but also played for the Hartford Whalers for one season). In this regard, Lidström joins former Red Wings Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman as the only three players with over 1,500 games having played exclusively for just one team throughout their careers.
Retirement
On 31 May 2012, Lidström announced his retirement from the NHL via a press conference with Red Wings Owner Mike Ilitch and General Manager Ken Holland present. The night before, he told the Swedish tabloid Expressen, "I came to the decision last week and I informed our general manager, Ken Holland." Discussing Lidström's retirement, former teammate Steve Yzerman described Lidström as "one of the all-time best defencemen to ever play." Former teammate and fellow Norris Trophy winning defenseman Paul Coffey said, "He was an incredible player" while Chris Chelios said, "There's been guys who are great players, but no one's better than Nick. As good? Yes. But this is as big as it gets. He's one of the best athletes ever and...if you're going to talk about someone who's perfect, Nick's pretty darn close to being perfect." Washington Capitals defenceman John Carlson described Lidström as "one of the game's all-time greats on and off the ice." Ken Holland stated his belief that Lidström was "the most valuable player of his era."
The following weekend, on 3 June 2012, Lidström and his wife took out a full-page ad giving thanks to the city of Detroit for making his family feel at home for the past 21 years. On 8 July 2012, Lidström was named a scout for the Red Wings.
On 28 February 2014, Lidström was inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame.
During the 2013–14 season, Lidström had his number 5 jersey retired by the Red Wings. Initially, ceremonies were planned for the previous season, on 5 February 2013 — however, the lockout had made it hard to determine when Lidström would be able to attend the ceremony. The Red Wings officially retired his number on 6 March 2014, in a pre-game ceremony at Joe Louis Arena.
International play
Prior to his NHL career, Lidström competed in one European Junior Championships in 1988, one World Junior Championship in 1990 and one Canada Cup in 1991 for Sweden.
Prior to his rookie season with the Red Wings, he earned his first gold medal with Sweden at the 1991 World Championships. Three years later, he competed in the 1994 World Championships in Italy and won a bronze medal. Two years later, he participated in the inaugural 1996 World Cup of Hockey (successor of the Canada Cup) and contributed three points in four games. He made his Olympic debut with Sweden at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.
Four years later was his next international appearance, playing in his second Olympics at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, where Sweden was upset by Belarus in the quarter-final after being heavy favourites in the round-robin. Lidström made his third World Championships appearance in 2004, but only appeared in two games. That summer, he also competed in the 2004 World Cup of Hockey, where he scored one goal.
In the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, Lidström helped Sweden avenge their quarter-final upset to Belarus in Salt Lake City, scoring the game winning goal in the gold medal game against Finland. In doing so, Lidström became a member of the Triple Gold Club, adding an Olympic gold medal to go with his previous Stanley Cups with Detroit and his World Championship gold medal in 1991. Lidström was also selected to the 2010 Olympic All-Star Team.
Lidström also played for Sweden in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, serving as team captain in what would be his final Olympic appearance. Lidström announced his retirement from Olympic competition following Sweden's loss to Slovakia.
Personal life
Lidström is married to Annika, with whom he has four children. All four sons play high-level hockey: Kevin (born 1994), is currently a defenceman for Swedish Division 1 team SK Lejon; Adam (born 1996) also plays in Division 1 with Enköpings SK; Samuel (born in 2000) plays on J20 SuperElit team VIK Västerås HK; and Lucas (born in 2003) also plays for VIK Västerås HK on its U16 team.
Lidström was featured on an episode of NHL 36.
In October 2019, Lidström released his authorized biography in North America titled Nicklas Lidstrom: The Pursuit of Perfection.
Career statistics
Regular season and playoffs
International
Awards
World Championship gold medal winner (Sweden, 1991).
NHL All-Rookie Team (1992).
4x Stanley Cup winner (1997, 1998, 2002, and 2008).
12x NHL All-Star Game (1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2008, 2009*, 2011).
10x NHL First All-Star Team member (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
2x NHL Second All-Star Team member (2009, 2010).
7x Norris Trophy winner (2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2002).
Olympic gold medal winner (Sweden, 2006)
Olympic All-Star Team (2006).
Member of the Triple Gold Club.
2x Viking Award winner (2000 and 2006).
Inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame – 2014
Detroit Red Wings #5 retired on 6 March 2014
Inducted into the IIHF Hall of Fame – 2014
Inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame – 2015
Introduced into the IIHF All-Time Sweden Team - 2020
*did not attend
Records
All records are as of the end of the regular season unless otherwise noted.
NHL
First European-born and trained Norris Trophy winner (2000–01).
First European-born and trained Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2001–02).
Fourth defenceman (and first European-born and trained defenceman) in NHL to win James Norris Memorial Trophy three years running (2001–2003, 2006–2008), and third seven-time Norris Trophy winner.
First European-born and trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team (2008).
First European-born and trained defenceman to reach 1,000 points.
Most regular-season games played by a player born in Europe, any position (1,564).
Most regular-season games played by a player in a career spent with only one team (1,564).
Most regular-season wins played in (900).
Most postseason games played with single franchise, career (263)
Most postseason assists by defenceman with single franchise, career (129)
Most postseason points by defenceman with single franchise, career (183)
Highest postseason plus/minus, career (+61)
Most postseason power-play goals by defenceman, career (30)
Most postseason shots on goal with single franchise, career (656)
Oldest player to record his first hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest defenceman to record a hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest Norris Trophy winner (41 years, 57 days) (2010–2011)
Oldest defenceman to score in a Game 7 (39 years, 364 days)
Detroit Red Wings
Points by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 80).
Assists by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 64).
Postseason goals by a defenceman, career (54).
Post-season power-play goals, career (30).
Power play goals by a defenceman, career (132).
Postseason points by a defenceman, career (183).
Postseason assists, career (129).
Postseason games played, career (263).
Games played by a defenceman, career (1,564).
Goals, assists, and points by a defenceman, career (264, 878, and 1142).
Goals in a single postseason by a defenceman (1998, 6).
Best postseason plus/minus, career (+61).
Best regular season plus/minus, career (+450).
See also
List of NHL players with 1000 points
List of NHL players with 1000 games played
List of Detroit Red Wings award winners
List of Detroit Red Wings draft picks
List of Detroit Red Wings records
References
External links
1970 births
Conn Smythe Trophy winners
Detroit Red Wings captains
Detroit Red Wings draft picks
Detroit Red Wings players
Detroit Red Wings scouts
Hockey Hall of Fame inductees
Ice hockey players at the 1998 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2002 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2006 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2010 Winter Olympics
IIHF Hall of Fame inductees
James Norris Memorial Trophy winners
Living people
Medalists at the 2006 Winter Olympics
National Hockey League All-Stars
National Hockey League players with retired numbers
Olympic gold medalists for Sweden
Olympic ice hockey players of Sweden
Olympic medalists in ice hockey
Sportspeople from Västerås
Stanley Cup champions
Swedish expatriate sportspeople in the United States
Swedish ice hockey defencemen
Triple Gold Club
VIK Västerås HK players
Swedish expatriate ice hockey people | false | [
"Filip Zadina (; born 27 November 1999) is a Czech professional ice hockey forward currently playing with the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League (NHL). Zadina was drafted 6th overall by the Red Wings in the 2018 NHL Entry Draft.\n\nPlaying career\nZadina made his Czech Extraliga debut playing with HC Dynamo Pardubice during the 2015–16 Czech Extraliga season.\n\nZadina was selected 10th overall by the Halifax Mooseheads in the 2017 CHL Import Draft. He committed to the Mooseheads believing they would help him achieve his dream of playing in the NHL. He led all rookies in points, was named to the First All-Star Team, the All-Rookie Team, and won the Michael Bossy Trophy as the best professional prospect in the league.\n\nPrior to the draft Zadina was considered a top prospect, with NHL Central Scouting Bureau describing him as a natural scorer with a great finishing touch. He was the third ranked North American based skater, before he was selected sixth overall in the 2018 NHL Entry Draft by the Detroit Red Wings on 22 June 2018. He soon agreed to a three-year, entry-level contract with the Red Wings on 7 July 2018. After attending Red Wings training camp prior to the 2018–19 season, Zadina was reassigned to the Grand Rapids Griffins in the American Hockey League on 30 September. On 16 February 2019, in a game against the San Antonio Rampage, Zadina scored eight seconds into overtime, setting the Griffins franchise record for fastest overtime goal.\n\nOn 23 February 2019, Zadina was recalled by the Red Wings. Prior to being recalled, he recorded 15 goals and 16 assists in 45 games with the Griffins, ranking third on the team in goals and fourth in points. He made his NHL debut for the Red Wings the next day in a game against the San Jose Sharks. On 5 March, he scored his first career NHL goal in his fourth NHL game, against Semyon Varlamov of the Colorado Avalanche. On 15 March, Zadina was assigned to the Griffins. He recorded one goal and two assists in nine games with the Red Wings, and averaged 15:23 of ice time. On 24 November 2019, Zadina was again recalled by the Red Wings. On 11 December 2019 Zadina, was reassigned to the Grand Rapids Griffins (AHL).\n\nOn 7 August 2020, with the 2020–21 NHL season delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Zadina having trained in the off-season with HC Oceláři Třinec was loaned by the Red Wings to join the Czech ELH club for the beginning of their season until the resumption of the Red Wings training camp in November.\n\nPersonal life\nFilip is the son of , a retired professional ice hockey player who is currently an assistant coach for HC Oceláři Třinec of the Czech Extraliga.\n\nCareer statistics\n\nRegular season and playoffs\n\nInternational\n\nAwards and honours\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n1999 births\nCzech ice hockey forwards\nDetroit Red Wings draft picks\nDetroit Red Wings players\nGrand Rapids Griffins players\nHalifax Mooseheads players\nHC Dynamo Pardubice players\nHC Oceláři Třinec players\nLiving people\nNational Hockey League first round draft picks\nSportspeople from Pardubice",
"This is a list of broadcasters for the Detroit Red Wings ice hockey team.\n\nHistorical overview\n\nRadio history\nWWJ did the radio broadcast for the Detroit Red Wings' opener in 1926-27 with Foster Hewitt on commentary.\n\nRegular radio broadcasts for the Red Wings started in 1935-36, with Al Nagler doing home games through 1959-60. Gene Osborn did play-by-play on home games in 1960-61. In 1961-62, broadcasts moved to WJR for one year and all games were broadcast with Nagler and Budd Lynch splitting play-by-play duties. From 1962-64, Budd Lynch did play-by-play alone, but he was joined by Bruce Martyn in 1964-65. They split play-by-play through 1972-73. Then, Martyn did all of the play-by-play until he retired after 1994-95 and was replaced by Ken Kal. \n \nPaul Woods has done radio color since 1987-88. Paul Chapman did it in 1986-87, succeeding Sid Abel, who had teamed with Martyn since 1976-77. Prior to that, Len Hardman did home games in 1972-73, Al Coates in 1973-74 and 1975-76, and Budd Lynch in 1974-75. On road games, Martyn either worked alone or found a local sportscaster to join him.\n\nTelevision history\nThe Red Wings televised Sunday home games from 1949–50 through 1959-60; the first six years were simulcasts, Budd Lynch did TV only in the remaining years. The Red Wings returned to TV when channel 50 went on the air January 10, 1965, doing simulcasts through 1972–73. Budd Lynch and Larry Adderly did TV the next two years. Simulcasts returned from 1975–76 through 1984–85.\n\nDuring the late 1970s and early 1980s, the games were either on TV or radio, not both, because the same stations (WJR radio, WKBD-TV) had the Pistons' rights as well and that's how conflicts were handled.\n\nBy 1985–86, the Red Wings also were on the Pro-Am Sports System pay-TV channel, who broadcast about 20 games a year. Budd Lynch was involved with Alex Delvecchio on color. Also, they called Strader up from the farm club, and he took over the play-by-play duties, calling TV games on both WKBD and PASS Sports alongside Mickey Redmond until 1996. Mike Goldberg did play-by-play in 1996–97 while Ken Daniels started working play-by-play in 1997–98. \n\nIn 2001, WJR lost its longtime flagship radio rights to the Detroit Tigers and Detroit Red Wings, both of whom moved to CBS-owned WXYT and WXYT-FM.\n\nOn December 12, 2006, Daniels broadcast a game between the Red Wings and the Ottawa Senators from ice-level between the benches, while color commentator Redmond remained in the booth. This was the first time a U.S. local station had attempted this type of broadcast. Daniels received a Michigan EMMY Award for this broadcast at the 29th Annual Michigan EMMY Awards on June 16, 2007 in Detroit.\n\nOn June 4, 2008, Daniels filled-in for regular Detroit radio broadcast announcer Ken Kal for Game 6 of the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals between the Red Wings and the Pittsburgh Penguins. Kal was suffering from laryngitis and thus, was unable to call the game. The Red Wings had a 3-2 lead in the series and won the game, and the cup. With 45 seconds left in the game, Daniels took off the headset and handed the game over to Kal, saying, \"I don't care if you can't talk, you have to bring it home\". Kal called the final 10 seconds, and was able to make the call \"...The Detroit Red Wings are the 2008 Stanley Cup Champions!\"\n\nLarry Murphy was an alternate color commentator for the Detroit Red Wings on Fox Sports Detroit. He only did color commentator duties for Red Wings west coast road trips in place of Mickey Redmond. From 2003 to 2006, he shared this duty with former teammate Pat Verbeek where they would alternate road trips. However following the 2005–06 NHL season, Verbeek left the job as broadcaster to become a scout for the Red Wings and Murphy took over full-time on west coast road trips. In addition in 2006, Murphy started contributing as a studio analyst on pregames, post games and intermissions in which he does not broadcast. In the 2007–08 season, Murphy began serving as a \"Between the Benches\" reporter for Fox Sports Detroit when Mickey Redmond was broadcasting, and subbed for Redmond when he had surgery to remove a tumor on his lung. He also made occasional appearances on the NHL Network's nightly hockey highlight show, NHL on the Fly. In March 2013, it was announced by Fox Sports Detroit that he had been fired, after being told they weren't satisfied with ratings. On February 14, 2019, it was announced Murphy would return as a studio analyst for the Red Wings on Fox Sports Detroit for the remainder of the 2018–19 season.\n\nHonored broadcasters\nFour members of the Red Wings organization have received the Foster Hewitt Memorial Award:\n Budd Lynch: TV and radio play-by-play and color – 1949–1975 (awarded 1985)\n Bruce Martyn: Radio play-by-play – 1964–1995 (awarded 1991)\n Mickey Redmond: TV color commentary – 1979–1981, 1986–present (awarded 2011)\n Dave Strader: TV play-by-play – 1985–1996 (awarded 2017)\n\nLynch called the first locally televised game at Olympia for the original WWJ-TV in 1949. He remained with the organization for 63 years, serving as director of publicity from 1975 to 1982, and was the public address announcer from 1982 until his death in 2012. From 2008 to 2012, a second PA announcer was added to work alongside him, first John Fossen, then Erich Freiny. Freiny took over as the sole PA announcer following Lynch's death.\n\nCurrent broadcasters\n\nThe Red Wings' flagship radio stations are Detroit sister stations WXYT-AM 1270 and WXYT-FM 97.1. Games are carried on both stations unless there is a conflict with Detroit Tigers baseball. There are several affiliate stations throughout Michigan and Southwestern Ontario.\n\nThe Red Wings' exclusive local television rights are held by Bally Sports Detroit. The channel shared professional team coverage rights with some Detroit area broadcast television stations until the spring of 2008. In March 2008, the channel signed new long-term contracts with the Pistons, Red Wings and Tigers to broadcast more games than in previous years, becoming the exclusive local home of all three teams for the first time until at least 2018. This leaves only the NFL's Detroit Lions as the only local professional sports team in Detroit to have all of its games on broadcast television.\n\nAnnouncers:\n\n Ken Daniels: Television play-by-play announcer.\n Mickey Redmond: Television color commentator (home games and select away games).\n Chris Osgood: Television color commentator (select away games that Redmond does not attend) and studio analyst (when not color commentator during play).\n Larry Murphy: Studio analyst and television color commentator (select away games that Redmond and Osgood do not attend).\n John Keating: Television pre-game and post-game show host.\n Ken Kal: Radio play-by-play announcer.\n Paul Woods: Radio analyst.\n Trevor Thompson, Mickey York: TV pre-game and post-game show hosts and reporters.\n Jeff Riger: Primary radio intermission and post-game host.\n\nSee also\nHistorical NHL over-the-air television broadcasters\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nDetroit Sports Broadcasters Association\nMichigan Sports Hall of Fame\nInterview with Ken on Hockey Refs.com\nBudd Lynch in the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame\nDetroit Free Press: Budd Lynch, 91, remains the voice of Wings' championship history\n\n \nLists of National Hockey League broadcasters\nBroadcasters\nPrime Sports\nFox Sports Networks\nBally Sports"
] |
[
"Nicklas Lidström",
"Playing career",
"When did his playing career start?",
"I don't know.",
"What teams did he play for?",
"Detroit Red Wings,",
"What position did he play for the Detroit Red Wings?",
"Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time,",
"What happened while he played for the Red Wings?",
"He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08.",
"What else did he achieve on the Red Wings?",
"Known for his durability, Lidstrom consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game."
] | C_276d1808eff343c6b87224b9513cbd4e_1 | What else was Lidstrom known for doing? | 6 | What else was Nicklas Lidström known for doing aside from ranking amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game? | Nicklas Lidström | Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidstrom was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidstrom was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004-05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In 14 consecutive seasons (since 1995-96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting. Lidstrom played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08. With the exception of the cancelled 2004-05 season lockout year, Lidstrom played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honor he shares with Larry Robinson). Known for his durability, Lidstrom consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005-06 season, a career high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies, from 2001 to 2003, becoming the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003-04 season, he played in his 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994-95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute). In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidstrom was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy. CANNOTANSWER | He won three consecutive Norris Trophies, from 2001 to 2003, | Erik Nicklas Lidström (; born 28 April 1970) is a Swedish former professional ice hockey defenceman and current vice president of hockey operations for the Detroit Red Wings. He played 20 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the Detroit Red Wings, which he captained for the final six seasons of his career. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest defencemen in NHL history.
Over his 20 NHL seasons, Lidström won four Stanley Cup championships, seven James Norris Memorial Trophies (awarded to the NHL's top defenceman), one Conn Smythe Trophy as the playoff MVP, and was voted into 12 NHL All-Star Games. The Red Wings never missed the playoffs during his career, the longest in league history for a player never missing the playoffs. Lidström was the first European-born-and-trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team, as well as the first European player named playoff MVP. Lidström is also the all-time leader in games played with a single NHL team by a European-born player. Lidström was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame on 9 November 2015. In 2017, Lidström was named one of the "100 Greatest NHL Players" in history.
Playing career
Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidström was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidström was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004–05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In his final 16 seasons (beginning in 1995–96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting.
Lidström played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams, in 1996–97, 1997–98, 2001–02 and 2007–08. Save for the cancelled 2004–05 season lockout year, Lidström played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honour he shares with Larry Robinson).
Known for his durability, Lidström consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005–06 season, a career-high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies from 2001 to 2003 to become the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003–04 season, he played in the 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994–95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute).
In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidström was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy.
Early career
Lidström began his career in Avesta, Sweden, playing with Skogsbo SK, before moving on to play with VIK Västerås HK of the Swedish Elitserien. In three seasons with the team, he played in 103 games, scoring 12 goals and 30 assists. Drafted by the Detroit Red Wings 53rd overall in the 1989 NHL Entry Draft, Lidström joined the team in the 1991–92 season, though he returned to play for Västerås IK for a brief period during the 1994–95 NHL lockout. Lidström scored 60 points in his rookie season, finishing second to Pavel Bure in voting for that year's Calder Trophy. He was selected to the 1992 NHL All-Rookie Team, along with fellow Red Wings defenceman Vladimir Konstantinov.
NHL career (1991–2012)
Swedish national team
Representing Sweden, Lidström won the World Championship in 1991. At the 2006 Winter Olympics, Lidström was a major factor in Sweden's win over Finland in the finals, scoring the gold medal-clinching goal, thus earning him a spot on the Olympic All-Star Team. He also became the 17th member of the Triple Gold Club. The Hockey News selected Lidström as the "Best European-trained player ever in the NHL." The Sporting News and Sports Illustrated selected Lidström as the "NHL Player of the Decade."
Post-lockout career
Lidström was set to make $10 million during the 2005–06 season. However, due to the new terms of the NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement that was implemented during the 2004–05 season, salaries on pre-existing contracts were reduced by 24%, which lowered his compensation to $7.6 million. That season, he posted a career-high 64 assists and 16 goals to for 80 points.
On 30 June 2006, it was announced that Lidström had signed a two-year, $15.2 million contract extension with the Red Wings. Instead of seeking more money elsewhere, Lidström decided to remain with Detroit for the same annual salary as he earned during the 2005–06 season.
Lidström was an alternate captain of the Red Wings since the 1997–98 season, but was awarded the captaincy after the 2006 retirement of long-time Red Wings captain Steve Yzerman. It was an honour made more special by the fact that he became the first European captain in franchise history. In his first year of captaincy, Lidström led the Red Wings to the Western Conference Finals, but lost to eventual Stanley Cup champions, the Anaheim Ducks. In the off-season, Lidström joined an elite group by capturing the Norris Trophy as the NHL's outstanding defenceman for the fifth time. Lidström became the fourth defenceman in NHL history with as many as five Norris Trophy wins, joining Hockey Hall of Famers Bobby Orr (eight), Doug Harvey (seven) and Ray Bourque (five).
Near the beginning of the 2007–08 season, in an 8 October win against the Edmonton Oilers, Lidström registered two assists to surpass Peter Forsberg as the second-highest scoring Swedish-born NHL player of all-time. Accordingly, he trails only Mats Sundin (as of the end of the 2011–12 season, Lidström has 1,142 points to Sundin's 1,349). Later in the season, on 26 December, Lidström signed a contract extension through the 2009–10 season. Several months later, on 3 April 2008, he assisted on a goal by Johan Franzén to tie Luc Robitaille at 42nd in the all-time NHL assists, with 726.
Entering the playoffs as Presidents' Trophy winners for the highest team point total during the regular season, the Red Wings met the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals. Despite a Game 5, triple-overtime victory by the Penguins to stave off elimination, Lidström and the Red Wings defeated Pittsburgh in Game 6 to capture the Stanley Cup. In doing so, Lidström became the first European-born-and-trained captain to win the Stanley Cup. In 1934, Charlie Gardiner, a goaltender born in Scotland, had captained the Chicago Black Hawks to win the Stanley Cup and in 1938, Johnny Gottselig, a left-winger born in Russia, also captained Chicago to a championship, but both players were trained in Canada.
Just over one week after winning his fourth Stanley Cup in 11 seasons, on 12 June, Lidström won the Norris Trophy for the third-straight season and the sixth time in seven seasons.
As the Red Wings opened the 2008–09 pre-season against the Montreal Canadiens, Lidström suffered a broken nose as a shot from Canadiens forward Chris Higgins ricocheted and hit him in the face. From then on, he began wearing a visor. He returned in time for the regular season and was selected to the 2009 NHL All-Star Game in Montreal. However, in the midst of dealing with tendinitis that had been bothering him all season, Lidström chose to sit out All-Star weekend, along with teammate Pavel Datsyuk. Consequently, Lidström and Datsyuk were both suspended one game by the NHL due to League policy for missing the All-Star Game without significant injury.
The Red Wings opened the 2009–10 season in Stockholm, Sweden. During the team's trip in Sweden, Lidström was honored by his home county, Dalarna, as an Ambassador of Honor. On 15 October 2009, in a game against the Los Angeles Kings, Lidström became the first European-born defenceman to reach 1,000 points after recording two assists in the game. He is the fourth player to score 1,000 points as a Red Wing (after Gordie Howe, Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman), and the eighth defenceman to do so in the history of the NHL. On 5 March 2010, Lidström earned his 800th career assist. Also during the 2009–10 season, Lidström played in his 1,395th game (finishing the season with 1,412), setting an all-time record for NHL games played by a player born in Europe; earlier in the season, Lidström had passed Teppo Numminen for games played by a player trained in Europe. Lidström is also second all-time in games played in a Red Wing uniform, behind only Howe.
On 23 April 2010, Lidström played in his 237th career playoff game, moving past Mark Messier into sole possession of third place on the NHL's all-time list (Chris Chelios, 266; Patrick Roy, 247). In the same game, he had an assist to tie Al MacInnis (121) for the third-most assists in the post-season by a defenceman (Ray Bourque 139; Paul Coffey 137).
On 27 April 2010, a day before his 40th birthday, Lidström had three points in a Game 7 win over the Phoenix Coyotes in the first round of the 2010 playoffs, pushing his active playoff points lead to 171 points, and tying him for 17th on the all-time playoff points list with fellow countryman Peter Forsberg.
As of the end of the 2009–10 season, Lidström has missed only 28 of a possible 1,440 regular-season team games (one due to suspension).
After contemplating retirement, Lidström agreed on a one-year contract with the Red Wings on 1 June 2010; the contract paid him slightly over $6 million.
On 15 December 2010, Lidström recorded his first career hat-trick, at 40 years of age, against the St. Louis Blues, sealing a 5–2 Detroit victory. After the game, he was asked how it feels to score his first hat-trick, responding, "It feels great, I've never in my life been able to notch three goals in a game." The hat-trick made him the oldest player in NHL history to record his first hat-trick (previously held by Scott Mellanby at 36 years of age), and the oldest defenceman in NHL history to record a hat-trick (previously held by Mathieu Schneider at 37 years of age).
On 18 January 2011, Lidström was named a team captain in the 2011 NHL All-Star Game in Raleigh, North Carolina. His team won by a final score of 11–10 over Team Staal, captained by Eric Staal of the Carolina Hurricanes. Lidström finished +7 with one assist.
On 20 June 2011, after briefly contemplating retirement yet again, Lidström signed a one-year contract worth $6.2 million with Detroit, the same amount he had been paid the previous season. On 23 June 2011, he won his seventh Norris Trophy even though his plus/minus rating for the year was −2, tying with Doug Harvey and remaining one behind Bobby Orr for most Norris Trophies. This was only the third time in history that a player with a negative plus/minus rating won the Norris Trophy.
On 22 October 2011, in a game against the Washington Capitals, Lidström became the 14th player in the history of the NHL to play 1,500 games. He is the first player not being born in North America, and therefore the first Swedish and European player, as well as the first player to accomplish this in his 20th NHL season. Lidström played in his 1,550th game on 12 February 2012, against the Philadelphia Flyers, surpassing Alex Delvecchio's previous Red Wing record of 1,549 games. This also makes him the NHL player who has played the most games while always playing for the same NHL team (Gordie Howe played more games, 1,687, with the Red Wings, but also played for the Hartford Whalers for one season). In this regard, Lidström joins former Red Wings Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman as the only three players with over 1,500 games having played exclusively for just one team throughout their careers.
Retirement
On 31 May 2012, Lidström announced his retirement from the NHL via a press conference with Red Wings Owner Mike Ilitch and General Manager Ken Holland present. The night before, he told the Swedish tabloid Expressen, "I came to the decision last week and I informed our general manager, Ken Holland." Discussing Lidström's retirement, former teammate Steve Yzerman described Lidström as "one of the all-time best defencemen to ever play." Former teammate and fellow Norris Trophy winning defenseman Paul Coffey said, "He was an incredible player" while Chris Chelios said, "There's been guys who are great players, but no one's better than Nick. As good? Yes. But this is as big as it gets. He's one of the best athletes ever and...if you're going to talk about someone who's perfect, Nick's pretty darn close to being perfect." Washington Capitals defenceman John Carlson described Lidström as "one of the game's all-time greats on and off the ice." Ken Holland stated his belief that Lidström was "the most valuable player of his era."
The following weekend, on 3 June 2012, Lidström and his wife took out a full-page ad giving thanks to the city of Detroit for making his family feel at home for the past 21 years. On 8 July 2012, Lidström was named a scout for the Red Wings.
On 28 February 2014, Lidström was inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame.
During the 2013–14 season, Lidström had his number 5 jersey retired by the Red Wings. Initially, ceremonies were planned for the previous season, on 5 February 2013 — however, the lockout had made it hard to determine when Lidström would be able to attend the ceremony. The Red Wings officially retired his number on 6 March 2014, in a pre-game ceremony at Joe Louis Arena.
International play
Prior to his NHL career, Lidström competed in one European Junior Championships in 1988, one World Junior Championship in 1990 and one Canada Cup in 1991 for Sweden.
Prior to his rookie season with the Red Wings, he earned his first gold medal with Sweden at the 1991 World Championships. Three years later, he competed in the 1994 World Championships in Italy and won a bronze medal. Two years later, he participated in the inaugural 1996 World Cup of Hockey (successor of the Canada Cup) and contributed three points in four games. He made his Olympic debut with Sweden at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.
Four years later was his next international appearance, playing in his second Olympics at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, where Sweden was upset by Belarus in the quarter-final after being heavy favourites in the round-robin. Lidström made his third World Championships appearance in 2004, but only appeared in two games. That summer, he also competed in the 2004 World Cup of Hockey, where he scored one goal.
In the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, Lidström helped Sweden avenge their quarter-final upset to Belarus in Salt Lake City, scoring the game winning goal in the gold medal game against Finland. In doing so, Lidström became a member of the Triple Gold Club, adding an Olympic gold medal to go with his previous Stanley Cups with Detroit and his World Championship gold medal in 1991. Lidström was also selected to the 2010 Olympic All-Star Team.
Lidström also played for Sweden in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, serving as team captain in what would be his final Olympic appearance. Lidström announced his retirement from Olympic competition following Sweden's loss to Slovakia.
Personal life
Lidström is married to Annika, with whom he has four children. All four sons play high-level hockey: Kevin (born 1994), is currently a defenceman for Swedish Division 1 team SK Lejon; Adam (born 1996) also plays in Division 1 with Enköpings SK; Samuel (born in 2000) plays on J20 SuperElit team VIK Västerås HK; and Lucas (born in 2003) also plays for VIK Västerås HK on its U16 team.
Lidström was featured on an episode of NHL 36.
In October 2019, Lidström released his authorized biography in North America titled Nicklas Lidstrom: The Pursuit of Perfection.
Career statistics
Regular season and playoffs
International
Awards
World Championship gold medal winner (Sweden, 1991).
NHL All-Rookie Team (1992).
4x Stanley Cup winner (1997, 1998, 2002, and 2008).
12x NHL All-Star Game (1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2008, 2009*, 2011).
10x NHL First All-Star Team member (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
2x NHL Second All-Star Team member (2009, 2010).
7x Norris Trophy winner (2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2002).
Olympic gold medal winner (Sweden, 2006)
Olympic All-Star Team (2006).
Member of the Triple Gold Club.
2x Viking Award winner (2000 and 2006).
Inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame – 2014
Detroit Red Wings #5 retired on 6 March 2014
Inducted into the IIHF Hall of Fame – 2014
Inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame – 2015
Introduced into the IIHF All-Time Sweden Team - 2020
*did not attend
Records
All records are as of the end of the regular season unless otherwise noted.
NHL
First European-born and trained Norris Trophy winner (2000–01).
First European-born and trained Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2001–02).
Fourth defenceman (and first European-born and trained defenceman) in NHL to win James Norris Memorial Trophy three years running (2001–2003, 2006–2008), and third seven-time Norris Trophy winner.
First European-born and trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team (2008).
First European-born and trained defenceman to reach 1,000 points.
Most regular-season games played by a player born in Europe, any position (1,564).
Most regular-season games played by a player in a career spent with only one team (1,564).
Most regular-season wins played in (900).
Most postseason games played with single franchise, career (263)
Most postseason assists by defenceman with single franchise, career (129)
Most postseason points by defenceman with single franchise, career (183)
Highest postseason plus/minus, career (+61)
Most postseason power-play goals by defenceman, career (30)
Most postseason shots on goal with single franchise, career (656)
Oldest player to record his first hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest defenceman to record a hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest Norris Trophy winner (41 years, 57 days) (2010–2011)
Oldest defenceman to score in a Game 7 (39 years, 364 days)
Detroit Red Wings
Points by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 80).
Assists by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 64).
Postseason goals by a defenceman, career (54).
Post-season power-play goals, career (30).
Power play goals by a defenceman, career (132).
Postseason points by a defenceman, career (183).
Postseason assists, career (129).
Postseason games played, career (263).
Games played by a defenceman, career (1,564).
Goals, assists, and points by a defenceman, career (264, 878, and 1142).
Goals in a single postseason by a defenceman (1998, 6).
Best postseason plus/minus, career (+61).
Best regular season plus/minus, career (+450).
See also
List of NHL players with 1000 points
List of NHL players with 1000 games played
List of Detroit Red Wings award winners
List of Detroit Red Wings draft picks
List of Detroit Red Wings records
References
External links
1970 births
Conn Smythe Trophy winners
Detroit Red Wings captains
Detroit Red Wings draft picks
Detroit Red Wings players
Detroit Red Wings scouts
Hockey Hall of Fame inductees
Ice hockey players at the 1998 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2002 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2006 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2010 Winter Olympics
IIHF Hall of Fame inductees
James Norris Memorial Trophy winners
Living people
Medalists at the 2006 Winter Olympics
National Hockey League All-Stars
National Hockey League players with retired numbers
Olympic gold medalists for Sweden
Olympic ice hockey players of Sweden
Olympic medalists in ice hockey
Sportspeople from Västerås
Stanley Cup champions
Swedish expatriate sportspeople in the United States
Swedish ice hockey defencemen
Triple Gold Club
VIK Västerås HK players
Swedish expatriate ice hockey people | false | [
"Mary E. Lidstrom is a Professor of Microbiology at the University of Washington. She also holds the Frank Jungers Chair of Engineering, in the Department of Chemical Engineering. She currently is a fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology, a member of the National Academy of Sciences and serves on the editorial boards of the Journal of Bacteriology and FEMS Microbial Ecology.\n\nEducation\nLidstrom received a B.S. degree in Microbiology from Oregon State University and an M.S. and Ph.D. in Bacteriology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.\n\nResearch career\nLidstrom's work spans microbial physiology and natural complex microbial communities and has applications to biotechnology. Specifically she has worked extensively on methylotroph bacteria that grow on one-carbon compounds.\n\nAfter conducting her doctorate research on C-1 metabolism in Methylobacterium organophilum, Lidstrom undertook post-doctoral research at University of Sheffield UK with J. Rodney Quayle on species of the methylotrophic yeasts Hansenula and Candida, and then returned to the US with faculty posts at the University of Washington, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and the California Institute of Technology. In 1995 she moved to University of Washington and has remained there.\n\nLidstrom is a fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology and a member of the National Academy of Sciences from 2013. Lidstrom was the Vice Provost of Research at the University of Washington from 2005 until 2021.\n\nPublications\nLidstrom is the author or co-author of over 300 scientific publications. These include:\n\n Yanning Zheng, Derek F. Harris, Yu Zheng and 9 further authors including Mary E. Lidstrom (2018) A pathway for biological methane production using bacterial iron-only nitrogenase. Nature Microbiology 3 (3) 281-286\n Frances Chu and Mary E. Lidstrom (2016) XoxF acts as the predominant methanol dehydrogenase in the type I methanotroph Methylomicrobium buryatense. American Society for Microbiology 8 (198) 1317-1325\n Mary E. Lidstrom and Michael C. Konopka (2010) The role of physiological heterogeneity in microbial population behavior. Nature Chemical Biology 6 (10) 705-712\n Ludmila Chistoserdova, Marina G. Kalyuzhnaya and Mary E. Lidstrom (2009) The Expanding World of Methylotrophic Metabolism. Annual Review of Microbiology 63 477-499\n\nHonors \n\n American Society for Microbiology Proctor & Gamble Award for Applied and Environmental Microbiology, 2013\n Member of National Academy of Sciences, 2013\n Howard Hughes Medical Center for Learning at the Life Science/Engineering Boundary Award, 2010\n ASM Graduate Microbiology Teaching and Mentoring Award, 2006\n American Association for the Advancement of Science Fellow, 2005\n American Academy of Microbiology, 1992\n NSF Faculty Award for Women, 1991\n\nReferences\n\nLiving people\nPlace of birth missing (living people)\nUniversity of Washington faculty\nAmerican microbiologists\nWomen microbiologists\nOregon State University alumni\nUniversity of Wisconsin–Madison alumni\nMembers of the United States National Academy of Sciences\n1951 births",
"The 2011 National Hockey League All-Star Game (also known as the 2011 National Hockey League All-Star Game presented by Discover) was played on January 30, 2011. The game took place at the RBC Center in Raleigh, home of the Carolina Hurricanes. Originally, the Game was supposed to be hosted by the Phoenix Coyotes, but due to ownership issues, the NHL decided to move the game. After bidding for the game reopened, it was awarded to Carolina and fulfilled a nine-year-old promise made to the franchise by NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman.\n\nThe 2011 version of the All-Star Game featured a break from the traditional way in which teams were organized. Instead of using conferences or player nationalities as in the past, teams were selected by captains in a fantasy draft days prior to the game. Fans still elected players to the All-Star Game, but instead of the traditional 12 starters (six for each team), they elected only six players, with the remaining 36 players involved in the game selected by the NHL. Sidney Crosby received the most votes of any player, but due to a concussion he was unable to participate in the game. The participating players voted for team captains, selecting Nicklas Lidstrom of the Detroit Red Wings and Eric Staal of the Hurricanes.\n\nStaal won the first pick in the draft and selected longtime teammate Cam Ward, while the Toronto Maple Leafs' Phil Kessel was the last player chosen. The annual SuperSkills Competition was held the night before the Game and featured Alexander Ovechkin winning his third consecutive Breakaway Challenge. In addition, Zdeno Chara broke his own SuperSkills Competition record for hardest shot at 105.9 mph (170.4 km/hr). Team Staal won the contest 33–22.\n\nTeam Lidstrom won the game 11–10, the 21 combined goals was the fourth highest total scored in an NHL All-Star Game. The first Penalty shot in All-Star Game history was called after Ovechkin threw his stick to break-up a Matt Duchene breakaway. Registering one goal and two assists, Patrick Sharp of the losing Team Staal won the Most Valuable Player Award. Jeff Skinner was the youngest player to ever play in an NHL All-Star Game. Shea Weber recorded four assists, making him only the second defenceman to accomplish the feat in one All-Star Game. Fellow defenceman Lidstrom registered a +7 rating, the highest in an All-Star Game since 1991. Winning goaltender Tim Thomas became the first goaltender in NHL history to win three consecutive All-Star Games. This had been the first NHL All-Star Game since the 2009 season, since there wasn't one in 2010 due to the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada the first time in an NHL Market.\n\nBackground\nThe 58th National Hockey League All-Star Game was originally scheduled to be hosted by the Phoenix Coyotes at Jobing.com Arena in Glendale, Arizona. However, due to the ongoing bankruptcy case, potential ownership changes in the Coyotes organization, and the possibility of relocation, the NHL decided to reopen bidding to host the game. In the bidding process, 14 teams made bids for All-Star Games or NHL Drafts for the next three years. Out of all the bids, the NHL chose the Carolina Hurricanes to be the new host team and on April 7, 2010, the announcement was made by NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and Hurricanes President and General Manager Jim Rutherford.\n\nThe awarding of the All-Star Game fulfilled a nine-year-old promise Bettman made to the city of Raleigh. In 2001, he promised the organization that they would host an All-Star Game if the season ticket base reached 12,000. After reaching that plateau, Bettman indicated that other community assets were still required to secure a bid. Most notably, a proper convention center for ancillary events was needed, along with a four-star hotel, which was completed in 2009 with the new Raleigh Convention Center and adjoining Raleigh Marriott City Center in downtown Raleigh.\n\nThree months after receiving the All-Star Game, the Hurricanes unveiled the logo for the 2011 game. The logo was designed with some homage to the host team and city hidden within it. The shape of the logo is similar to the Hurricanes primary logo, along with the team colors of red, black and silver. The banners at the top and bottom of the logo are inspired by the state flag of North Carolina.\n\nThe NHL and the city of Raleigh also presented a three-day festival to coincide with All-Star weekend called NHL All-Star Wide Open. The festivities include a series of free concerts, headlined by the band 3 Doors Down, interactive games and attractions, special appearances, Hockey Hall of Fame trophy and memorabilia displays, pin trading and trading card zones and a street party similar to the city's own annual festival, Raleigh Wide Open. There was also a charity 5K fun run, starting and ending at RBC Center with the Carolina Hurricanes \"Kids 'N Community Foundation\" being the beneficiary of the raised funds.\n\nNew format\nOn November 10, 2010, the National Hockey League Players' Association (NHLPA) unveiled a new format for selecting the NHL All-Star teams: the traditional conference format was replaced by a \"fantasy draft.\" Fans voted for six players, from either conference (three forwards, two defencemen and one goaltender), and the NHL selected another 36 players, for a total of 42 players. The chosen players then appointed two captains; the NHL and NHLPA, with input from the players, named two alternate captains for each team. Each team had two forwards and one defenceman as its captain and alternates. The captains and alternates selected their team members in a fantasy-style draft held on January 28, 2011. The first pick was determined by a coin toss, with alternating picks after the first. Teams consisted of three goaltenders, six defencemen and 12 forwards. Although the draft rules did not dictate a strict order in which positions had to be filled, to guarantee the final picks were not constrained by having to satisfy roster composition rules, the teams' three goaltenders had to be chosen by the end of round ten, and all defencemen had to be chosen by the end of round 15. According to NHL Vice President of Hockey and Business Development Brendan Shanahan, the new format was introduced to add excitement and intrigue into all the events, while make it more fun for everyone involved.\n\nFor 2011, the NHL eliminated the YoungStars Game which had been played in the previous five All-Star weekends. However, rookies were still featured at the Super Skills Competition. A group of 12 Calder Trophy-eligible players were split into two groups of six. At the conclusion of the fantasy draft's 15th round, one rookie was selected from the 12 to choose which team his group would join for the competition.\n\nThis was the first time the traditional \"East vs. West\" format was not used since 2002, when the World All-Star Team defeated North America 8–5 in Los Angeles.\n\nUniforms\nThe All-Star uniforms that debuted in this game featured a unique striping pattern coming from the back of the shoulders going down the arms. As the main stripe crossed below the elbow, it, and the radiating stripes coming from it, switched from the back of the sleeves to the front. The front of the jersey also featured the player's number between the collar and the large NHL crest, an unusual placement for a uniform number. Team Staal wore white uniforms with red trim, while Team Lidstrom wore navy blue uniforms with lighter blue trim. These uniforms would return for the next All-Star Game.\n\nThe Guardian Project\n\nDuring the All-Star weekend, the NHL announced a new \"superhero franchise\", The Guardian Project. Created by comic book writer Stan Lee, the project featured 30 new superheroes representing the 30 NHL teams, all which were unveiled at the All-Star Game. The goal of the project was to appeal to pre-teen and teenage boys in hopes of bringing in \"new audience to the NHL, while engaging the existing, established hockey fan base through a compelling tale of good vs. evil.\"\n\nVoting\n\nOne hundred players were chosen to be on the ballot for the All-Star Game (minimum of two players from each team), but fans were also given the option to write in any player who was not listed. Ballots were all digital for the fourth consecutive time, giving fans the ability to cast votes online at NHL.com and Facebook. Votes could also be cast via text messages from mobile devices and Smartphone users could vote by way of a mobile ballot feature. The NHL put no limitation on the number of votes an individual could cast. When fan balloting ended, 14.3 million votes had been cast and the top six were named to the All-Star Game. The six top vote recipients were from only two teams, the Pittsburgh Penguins (4) and Chicago Blackhawks (2). Individually, Sidney Crosby led all players with 635,509 votes, while teammate Kris Letang was elected as a write-in candidate. The six players elected by the fans are listed below with their vote totals.\n\nDraft\n\nAfter naming the remaining All-Stars, each player voted for team captains. The players selected the 12-time All-Star, Nicklas Lidstrom, and the captain of the host Carolina Hurricanes, Eric Staal. Lidstrom was assigned the home blue uniforms while Staal received the away whites. The NHL further named their alternate captains, placing Ryan Kesler and Mike Green with Staal while Patrick Kane and Martin St. Louis joined Team Lidstrom. Prior to the draft, the NHL determined head coaches for the teams via a coin toss. Chicago's Joel Quenneville and his assistant, Mike Haviland, were named coaches as a result of winning the Stanley Cup last year. Philadelphia Flyers Head Coach Peter Laviolette and the Vancouver Canucks' Alain Vigneault earned the distinction by having the highest winning percentage through January 8, 2011. After the coin toss, Quenneville was assigned to Team Staal, while Laviolette and Vigneault were given Team Lidstrom.\n\nTeam Staal won the first pick in the draft, and Eric Staal chose longtime teammate Cam Ward with his first pick. With the fifth pick in the draft, Team Staal selected Daniel Sedin. His twin brother Henrik was taken with the next pick by Team Lidstrom. The All-Star Game marked the first time the two have ever played against each other in an organized game. Throughout the draft, Eric Staal selected players that had a personal connection with him. He selected his brother, Rangers defenceman Marc Staal, in the seventh round, fellow Thunder Bay native Patrick Sharp in the eighth round, and teammate Jeff Skinner in the 11th round. The last player selected was Toronto's Phil Kessel. As a reward for being the last selection, he was given a new car and $20,000 was given to the charity of his choice. Kessel stated he would put the money toward a cancer charity he became involved with in 2006 when he was battling testicular cancer. When the time came for the rookies to decide which team they would participate in the skills competition, Taylor Hall, who won the right via a puck flip, chose Team Lidstrom for his group. All players were allowed to wear the numbers they use in their respective teams. For Team Lidstrom, Henrik Sedin and Dustin Byfuglien both wore number 33, while Brad Richards and Steven Stamkos wore number 91. Team Staal had three pairs having same number: Patrick Sharp and Corey Perry with number 10, Daniel Sedin and Dan Boyle with number 22 and Paul Stastny and Patrik Elias with number 26. The complete team rosters are listed below with players appearing in the order in which they were chosen.\n\nWithdrawn\nPrior to the draft several players withdrew due to injury or, in the case of Jarome Iginla, family concerns.\n\nSuperSkills Competition\n\nThe SuperSkills competition began with the Fastest Skater competition, where the competitors skated one lap around the rink. The winner of each round earned a point for their team. The opening round was skated backwards, followed by each team's rookie representative. Then two goaltenders skated off before returning to the traditional form. Following preliminary rounds the two fastest competitors from each team faced off in a final round, where Michael Grabner defeated Taylor Hall earning two points for Team Staal. The Breakaway Challenge featured six players (three from each team) taking four shoot-out attempts. Fans voted for the winner via text message. The winner earned four points for his team. Second place was awarded three points and third received one point. Alexander Ovechkin won by a wide margin defeating second place P. K. Subban by over 17 percentage points, it was the third consecutive win in the competition by Ovechkin. Loui Eriksson finished third to round out the point earners from the competition. The Shooting Accuracy featured two players shooting targets in the four corners of the net. Winners were determined by the fastest player to hit all four targets. Daniel Sedin hit all four targets on four shots in his first round setting the overall fastest time hitting them all in just 7.3 seconds. He followed that up by hitting four in five shots during the final round to defeat the Blackhawks' Patrick Kane.\n\nFollowing Shooting Accuracy, both teams participated in the Skills Challenge Relay. Each team broke into two groups and went through a series of drills designed to showcase players' skills. It started with one timers, then proceeded to passing, where a single player had to complete a pass into six small nets. From there it went to the Puck Control Relay, having a participant skate through a series of cones with a puck. Another player then took on the Stick Handling drill, controlling a puck through a series of stationary pucks. The relay ended when a final player completed the Shooting Accuracy, again hitting all four targets. The two groups from Team Lidstrom finished first and third in the competition, gaining their team a total of five points. During the Hardest Shot competition reigning champion Zdeno Chara was defeated in his preliminary round match up by Shea Weber. In the final round, Chara again matched up with Weber. Chara successfully defended his title by defeating Weber with a shot registering 105.9 mph. The speed set a new SuperSkills record surpassing his own record and marking the fourth time he has won the event. Despite being down by a large margin prior to the Elimination Shootout, Team Lidstrom still had an opportunity to win the contest. Players continued to shoot provided they scored – scoring one point per goal, until only one player remained. However, the shoot-out was won by Team Staal's Corey Perry as he was the only player to score in all three of his attempts. The full results are listed below.\n\nGame play\n\nThe scoring started early in the game as Team Staal's Alexander Ovechkin scored the game's first goal in just 50 seconds into the first period. When he took his first shift Jeff Skinner officially became the youngest player to play in an All-Star game (18 years, 259 days) surpassing the mark set in 1984 by Steve Yzerman by eight days. By the time Claude Giroux scored, less than five minutes later, Team Staal had opened up a 4–0 lead. Team Lidstrom's Marc-Andre Fleury allowed the four goals on only nine shots while his counterpart Cam Ward stopped the first four shots he faced. The tide turned a little over halfway through the first period when Anze Kopitar scored on a backhand shot. Team Lidstrom completed the first period comeback with under four minutes left in the period when Eriksson and Matt Duchene scored 23 seconds apart to tie the game at four. Team Lidstrom finished the period scoring on four of their final ten shots.\n\nTeam Staal recaptured the lead early in the second with goals by Patrick Sharp and Kris Letang. They were unable to hold the lead though as Team Lidstrom tied the game at six with a second goal from Kopitar and one by Steven Stamkos. They quickly took their first lead on a goal by Daniel Briere just 1:20 later, ending the period up 7–6.\n\nEarly in the third period Eric Staal tied the game at seven with his first goal of the game. Minutes later Duchene got a breakaway, but before he could take a shot, Ovechkin threw his stick at the puck, resulting in the first penalty shot in All-Star game history, and only the third penalty assessed during the past ten years of All-Star competition. Duchene took the shot against Henrik Lundqvist, who stopped the attempt. Kris Letang scored shortly after the penalty shot to give back the lead to Team Staal. Briere scored a little over a minute later assisted by Weber and Henrik Sedin to re-tie the game. Weber's assist was his fourth of the game making him the second defenceman in history to record four assists in an All-Star Game (Ray Bourque, 1985). Team Lidstrom added two more goals before Rick Nash scored to cut the deficit to one. With about a minute and a half left in the game, Team Staal pulled their goaltender for the extra attacker. The decision backfired as Eriksson scored on the empty net with 1:11 remaining. Eric Staal scored with 33.6 seconds remaining to bring his team back within one goal, but they failed to get another shot on goal before time ran out. By coming back from a four-goal deficit to win the game Team Lidstrom set the record for biggest comeback victory in All-Star history. Lidstrom finished the game with a +7 rating, the highest rating since 1991 when Adam Oates was also a +7 for the Wales Conference. Tim Thomas earned the victory becoming the first goaltender to win three straight All-Star Games. Patrick Sharp was named Most Valuable Player (MVP) after registering one goal and two assists in a losing cause for Team Staal. The combined 21 goals was the fourth highest total in NHL All-Star Game history.\n\nSummary\n\nW – Tim Thomas\nL – Henrik Lundqvist\n\nKey\n Player1 (Player2, Player3) 1:00 denotes that Player1 scored a goal after 1:00, with assists from Player2 and Player3.\n GWG denotes the game-winning goal.\n EN denotes an empty net goal\n W denotes the goaltender awarded the win.\n L denotes the goaltender assigned the loss.\n\nSource: NHL\n\nNotes\nA: Briere was named as a replacement for Iginla.\nB: Yandle was named as a replacement for Enstrom.\nC: Havlat was named as a replacement for Hemsky.\nD: Stastny was named as a replacement for Crosby.\nE: Skinner was named as a replacement for Malkin.\nF: McBain replaced Eberle on the rookie team.\nG: Subban was named as a replacement for Skinner who was promoted from the rookie team to the All-Star Game.\nH: Chara's shot was 105.9 mph (170.4 km/hr), a new record.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Official Site\n\nAll\nNational Hockey League All-Star Games\nNHL All-Star Game"
] |
[
"Nicklas Lidström",
"Playing career",
"When did his playing career start?",
"I don't know.",
"What teams did he play for?",
"Detroit Red Wings,",
"What position did he play for the Detroit Red Wings?",
"Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time,",
"What happened while he played for the Red Wings?",
"He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08.",
"What else did he achieve on the Red Wings?",
"Known for his durability, Lidstrom consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game.",
"What else was Lidstrom known for doing?",
"He won three consecutive Norris Trophies, from 2001 to 2003,"
] | C_276d1808eff343c6b87224b9513cbd4e_1 | Did he win any other trophies or awards? | 7 | Did Nicklas Lidström win any other trophies or awards aside from the three consecutive Norris Trophies? | Nicklas Lidström | Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidstrom was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidstrom was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004-05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In 14 consecutive seasons (since 1995-96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting. Lidstrom played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams in 1996-97, 1997-98, 2001-02 and 2007-08. With the exception of the cancelled 2004-05 season lockout year, Lidstrom played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honor he shares with Larry Robinson). Known for his durability, Lidstrom consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005-06 season, a career high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies, from 2001 to 2003, becoming the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003-04 season, he played in his 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994-95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute). In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidstrom was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy. CANNOTANSWER | In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidstrom was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, | Erik Nicklas Lidström (; born 28 April 1970) is a Swedish former professional ice hockey defenceman and current vice president of hockey operations for the Detroit Red Wings. He played 20 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the Detroit Red Wings, which he captained for the final six seasons of his career. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest defencemen in NHL history.
Over his 20 NHL seasons, Lidström won four Stanley Cup championships, seven James Norris Memorial Trophies (awarded to the NHL's top defenceman), one Conn Smythe Trophy as the playoff MVP, and was voted into 12 NHL All-Star Games. The Red Wings never missed the playoffs during his career, the longest in league history for a player never missing the playoffs. Lidström was the first European-born-and-trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team, as well as the first European player named playoff MVP. Lidström is also the all-time leader in games played with a single NHL team by a European-born player. Lidström was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame on 9 November 2015. In 2017, Lidström was named one of the "100 Greatest NHL Players" in history.
Playing career
Widely considered one of the greatest defencemen of all time, Lidström was awarded the Norris Trophy seven times, a feat matched by only two other players: Doug Harvey and by Bobby Orr (who won the trophy eight times). Lidström was nominated for the award a total of 12 times in his last 14 seasons in the NHL, the first three times finishing as the runner-up, and won it in seven of his last ten (2004–05 had no winner due to the NHL lockout). In his final 16 seasons (beginning in 1995–96), he finished no lower than sixth place in Norris Trophy voting.
Lidström played his entire 20-year NHL career with the Detroit Red Wings, finishing his career with the second-most Stanley Cup playoff games played in NHL history, with 263 appearances (Chris Chelios ranks first with 266). He was a member of four Stanley Cup-winning teams, in 1996–97, 1997–98, 2001–02 and 2007–08. Save for the cancelled 2004–05 season lockout year, Lidström played in the playoffs for an NHL record 20 consecutive seasons (an honour he shares with Larry Robinson).
Known for his durability, Lidström consistently ranked amongst the top in the NHL in ice time per game. He averaged 28:07 minutes in the 2005–06 season, a career-high. He won three consecutive Norris Trophies from 2001 to 2003 to become the first defenceman since Bobby Orr to win three straight. In the 2003–04 season, he played in the 1,000th game of his career, having missed only 17 games in 12-and-a-half seasons (1994–95 was shortened to 48 games instead of the usual 82 by a labour dispute).
In the 2002 Stanley Cup playoffs, Lidström was named the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as most valuable player during the playoffs, becoming the first European to ever be awarded the trophy.
Early career
Lidström began his career in Avesta, Sweden, playing with Skogsbo SK, before moving on to play with VIK Västerås HK of the Swedish Elitserien. In three seasons with the team, he played in 103 games, scoring 12 goals and 30 assists. Drafted by the Detroit Red Wings 53rd overall in the 1989 NHL Entry Draft, Lidström joined the team in the 1991–92 season, though he returned to play for Västerås IK for a brief period during the 1994–95 NHL lockout. Lidström scored 60 points in his rookie season, finishing second to Pavel Bure in voting for that year's Calder Trophy. He was selected to the 1992 NHL All-Rookie Team, along with fellow Red Wings defenceman Vladimir Konstantinov.
NHL career (1991–2012)
Swedish national team
Representing Sweden, Lidström won the World Championship in 1991. At the 2006 Winter Olympics, Lidström was a major factor in Sweden's win over Finland in the finals, scoring the gold medal-clinching goal, thus earning him a spot on the Olympic All-Star Team. He also became the 17th member of the Triple Gold Club. The Hockey News selected Lidström as the "Best European-trained player ever in the NHL." The Sporting News and Sports Illustrated selected Lidström as the "NHL Player of the Decade."
Post-lockout career
Lidström was set to make $10 million during the 2005–06 season. However, due to the new terms of the NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement that was implemented during the 2004–05 season, salaries on pre-existing contracts were reduced by 24%, which lowered his compensation to $7.6 million. That season, he posted a career-high 64 assists and 16 goals to for 80 points.
On 30 June 2006, it was announced that Lidström had signed a two-year, $15.2 million contract extension with the Red Wings. Instead of seeking more money elsewhere, Lidström decided to remain with Detroit for the same annual salary as he earned during the 2005–06 season.
Lidström was an alternate captain of the Red Wings since the 1997–98 season, but was awarded the captaincy after the 2006 retirement of long-time Red Wings captain Steve Yzerman. It was an honour made more special by the fact that he became the first European captain in franchise history. In his first year of captaincy, Lidström led the Red Wings to the Western Conference Finals, but lost to eventual Stanley Cup champions, the Anaheim Ducks. In the off-season, Lidström joined an elite group by capturing the Norris Trophy as the NHL's outstanding defenceman for the fifth time. Lidström became the fourth defenceman in NHL history with as many as five Norris Trophy wins, joining Hockey Hall of Famers Bobby Orr (eight), Doug Harvey (seven) and Ray Bourque (five).
Near the beginning of the 2007–08 season, in an 8 October win against the Edmonton Oilers, Lidström registered two assists to surpass Peter Forsberg as the second-highest scoring Swedish-born NHL player of all-time. Accordingly, he trails only Mats Sundin (as of the end of the 2011–12 season, Lidström has 1,142 points to Sundin's 1,349). Later in the season, on 26 December, Lidström signed a contract extension through the 2009–10 season. Several months later, on 3 April 2008, he assisted on a goal by Johan Franzén to tie Luc Robitaille at 42nd in the all-time NHL assists, with 726.
Entering the playoffs as Presidents' Trophy winners for the highest team point total during the regular season, the Red Wings met the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 2008 Stanley Cup Finals. Despite a Game 5, triple-overtime victory by the Penguins to stave off elimination, Lidström and the Red Wings defeated Pittsburgh in Game 6 to capture the Stanley Cup. In doing so, Lidström became the first European-born-and-trained captain to win the Stanley Cup. In 1934, Charlie Gardiner, a goaltender born in Scotland, had captained the Chicago Black Hawks to win the Stanley Cup and in 1938, Johnny Gottselig, a left-winger born in Russia, also captained Chicago to a championship, but both players were trained in Canada.
Just over one week after winning his fourth Stanley Cup in 11 seasons, on 12 June, Lidström won the Norris Trophy for the third-straight season and the sixth time in seven seasons.
As the Red Wings opened the 2008–09 pre-season against the Montreal Canadiens, Lidström suffered a broken nose as a shot from Canadiens forward Chris Higgins ricocheted and hit him in the face. From then on, he began wearing a visor. He returned in time for the regular season and was selected to the 2009 NHL All-Star Game in Montreal. However, in the midst of dealing with tendinitis that had been bothering him all season, Lidström chose to sit out All-Star weekend, along with teammate Pavel Datsyuk. Consequently, Lidström and Datsyuk were both suspended one game by the NHL due to League policy for missing the All-Star Game without significant injury.
The Red Wings opened the 2009–10 season in Stockholm, Sweden. During the team's trip in Sweden, Lidström was honored by his home county, Dalarna, as an Ambassador of Honor. On 15 October 2009, in a game against the Los Angeles Kings, Lidström became the first European-born defenceman to reach 1,000 points after recording two assists in the game. He is the fourth player to score 1,000 points as a Red Wing (after Gordie Howe, Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman), and the eighth defenceman to do so in the history of the NHL. On 5 March 2010, Lidström earned his 800th career assist. Also during the 2009–10 season, Lidström played in his 1,395th game (finishing the season with 1,412), setting an all-time record for NHL games played by a player born in Europe; earlier in the season, Lidström had passed Teppo Numminen for games played by a player trained in Europe. Lidström is also second all-time in games played in a Red Wing uniform, behind only Howe.
On 23 April 2010, Lidström played in his 237th career playoff game, moving past Mark Messier into sole possession of third place on the NHL's all-time list (Chris Chelios, 266; Patrick Roy, 247). In the same game, he had an assist to tie Al MacInnis (121) for the third-most assists in the post-season by a defenceman (Ray Bourque 139; Paul Coffey 137).
On 27 April 2010, a day before his 40th birthday, Lidström had three points in a Game 7 win over the Phoenix Coyotes in the first round of the 2010 playoffs, pushing his active playoff points lead to 171 points, and tying him for 17th on the all-time playoff points list with fellow countryman Peter Forsberg.
As of the end of the 2009–10 season, Lidström has missed only 28 of a possible 1,440 regular-season team games (one due to suspension).
After contemplating retirement, Lidström agreed on a one-year contract with the Red Wings on 1 June 2010; the contract paid him slightly over $6 million.
On 15 December 2010, Lidström recorded his first career hat-trick, at 40 years of age, against the St. Louis Blues, sealing a 5–2 Detroit victory. After the game, he was asked how it feels to score his first hat-trick, responding, "It feels great, I've never in my life been able to notch three goals in a game." The hat-trick made him the oldest player in NHL history to record his first hat-trick (previously held by Scott Mellanby at 36 years of age), and the oldest defenceman in NHL history to record a hat-trick (previously held by Mathieu Schneider at 37 years of age).
On 18 January 2011, Lidström was named a team captain in the 2011 NHL All-Star Game in Raleigh, North Carolina. His team won by a final score of 11–10 over Team Staal, captained by Eric Staal of the Carolina Hurricanes. Lidström finished +7 with one assist.
On 20 June 2011, after briefly contemplating retirement yet again, Lidström signed a one-year contract worth $6.2 million with Detroit, the same amount he had been paid the previous season. On 23 June 2011, he won his seventh Norris Trophy even though his plus/minus rating for the year was −2, tying with Doug Harvey and remaining one behind Bobby Orr for most Norris Trophies. This was only the third time in history that a player with a negative plus/minus rating won the Norris Trophy.
On 22 October 2011, in a game against the Washington Capitals, Lidström became the 14th player in the history of the NHL to play 1,500 games. He is the first player not being born in North America, and therefore the first Swedish and European player, as well as the first player to accomplish this in his 20th NHL season. Lidström played in his 1,550th game on 12 February 2012, against the Philadelphia Flyers, surpassing Alex Delvecchio's previous Red Wing record of 1,549 games. This also makes him the NHL player who has played the most games while always playing for the same NHL team (Gordie Howe played more games, 1,687, with the Red Wings, but also played for the Hartford Whalers for one season). In this regard, Lidström joins former Red Wings Alex Delvecchio and Steve Yzerman as the only three players with over 1,500 games having played exclusively for just one team throughout their careers.
Retirement
On 31 May 2012, Lidström announced his retirement from the NHL via a press conference with Red Wings Owner Mike Ilitch and General Manager Ken Holland present. The night before, he told the Swedish tabloid Expressen, "I came to the decision last week and I informed our general manager, Ken Holland." Discussing Lidström's retirement, former teammate Steve Yzerman described Lidström as "one of the all-time best defencemen to ever play." Former teammate and fellow Norris Trophy winning defenseman Paul Coffey said, "He was an incredible player" while Chris Chelios said, "There's been guys who are great players, but no one's better than Nick. As good? Yes. But this is as big as it gets. He's one of the best athletes ever and...if you're going to talk about someone who's perfect, Nick's pretty darn close to being perfect." Washington Capitals defenceman John Carlson described Lidström as "one of the game's all-time greats on and off the ice." Ken Holland stated his belief that Lidström was "the most valuable player of his era."
The following weekend, on 3 June 2012, Lidström and his wife took out a full-page ad giving thanks to the city of Detroit for making his family feel at home for the past 21 years. On 8 July 2012, Lidström was named a scout for the Red Wings.
On 28 February 2014, Lidström was inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame.
During the 2013–14 season, Lidström had his number 5 jersey retired by the Red Wings. Initially, ceremonies were planned for the previous season, on 5 February 2013 — however, the lockout had made it hard to determine when Lidström would be able to attend the ceremony. The Red Wings officially retired his number on 6 March 2014, in a pre-game ceremony at Joe Louis Arena.
International play
Prior to his NHL career, Lidström competed in one European Junior Championships in 1988, one World Junior Championship in 1990 and one Canada Cup in 1991 for Sweden.
Prior to his rookie season with the Red Wings, he earned his first gold medal with Sweden at the 1991 World Championships. Three years later, he competed in the 1994 World Championships in Italy and won a bronze medal. Two years later, he participated in the inaugural 1996 World Cup of Hockey (successor of the Canada Cup) and contributed three points in four games. He made his Olympic debut with Sweden at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan.
Four years later was his next international appearance, playing in his second Olympics at the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, where Sweden was upset by Belarus in the quarter-final after being heavy favourites in the round-robin. Lidström made his third World Championships appearance in 2004, but only appeared in two games. That summer, he also competed in the 2004 World Cup of Hockey, where he scored one goal.
In the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy, Lidström helped Sweden avenge their quarter-final upset to Belarus in Salt Lake City, scoring the game winning goal in the gold medal game against Finland. In doing so, Lidström became a member of the Triple Gold Club, adding an Olympic gold medal to go with his previous Stanley Cups with Detroit and his World Championship gold medal in 1991. Lidström was also selected to the 2010 Olympic All-Star Team.
Lidström also played for Sweden in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, serving as team captain in what would be his final Olympic appearance. Lidström announced his retirement from Olympic competition following Sweden's loss to Slovakia.
Personal life
Lidström is married to Annika, with whom he has four children. All four sons play high-level hockey: Kevin (born 1994), is currently a defenceman for Swedish Division 1 team SK Lejon; Adam (born 1996) also plays in Division 1 with Enköpings SK; Samuel (born in 2000) plays on J20 SuperElit team VIK Västerås HK; and Lucas (born in 2003) also plays for VIK Västerås HK on its U16 team.
Lidström was featured on an episode of NHL 36.
In October 2019, Lidström released his authorized biography in North America titled Nicklas Lidstrom: The Pursuit of Perfection.
Career statistics
Regular season and playoffs
International
Awards
World Championship gold medal winner (Sweden, 1991).
NHL All-Rookie Team (1992).
4x Stanley Cup winner (1997, 1998, 2002, and 2008).
12x NHL All-Star Game (1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007, 2008, 2009*, 2011).
10x NHL First All-Star Team member (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
2x NHL Second All-Star Team member (2009, 2010).
7x Norris Trophy winner (2001, 2002, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2011).
Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2002).
Olympic gold medal winner (Sweden, 2006)
Olympic All-Star Team (2006).
Member of the Triple Gold Club.
2x Viking Award winner (2000 and 2006).
Inducted into the Michigan Sports Hall of Fame – 2014
Detroit Red Wings #5 retired on 6 March 2014
Inducted into the IIHF Hall of Fame – 2014
Inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame – 2015
Introduced into the IIHF All-Time Sweden Team - 2020
*did not attend
Records
All records are as of the end of the regular season unless otherwise noted.
NHL
First European-born and trained Norris Trophy winner (2000–01).
First European-born and trained Conn Smythe Trophy winner (2001–02).
Fourth defenceman (and first European-born and trained defenceman) in NHL to win James Norris Memorial Trophy three years running (2001–2003, 2006–2008), and third seven-time Norris Trophy winner.
First European-born and trained captain of a Stanley Cup-winning team (2008).
First European-born and trained defenceman to reach 1,000 points.
Most regular-season games played by a player born in Europe, any position (1,564).
Most regular-season games played by a player in a career spent with only one team (1,564).
Most regular-season wins played in (900).
Most postseason games played with single franchise, career (263)
Most postseason assists by defenceman with single franchise, career (129)
Most postseason points by defenceman with single franchise, career (183)
Highest postseason plus/minus, career (+61)
Most postseason power-play goals by defenceman, career (30)
Most postseason shots on goal with single franchise, career (656)
Oldest player to record his first hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest defenceman to record a hat-trick (40 years, 210 days)
Oldest Norris Trophy winner (41 years, 57 days) (2010–2011)
Oldest defenceman to score in a Game 7 (39 years, 364 days)
Detroit Red Wings
Points by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 80).
Assists by a defenceman, season (2005–06, 64).
Postseason goals by a defenceman, career (54).
Post-season power-play goals, career (30).
Power play goals by a defenceman, career (132).
Postseason points by a defenceman, career (183).
Postseason assists, career (129).
Postseason games played, career (263).
Games played by a defenceman, career (1,564).
Goals, assists, and points by a defenceman, career (264, 878, and 1142).
Goals in a single postseason by a defenceman (1998, 6).
Best postseason plus/minus, career (+61).
Best regular season plus/minus, career (+450).
See also
List of NHL players with 1000 points
List of NHL players with 1000 games played
List of Detroit Red Wings award winners
List of Detroit Red Wings draft picks
List of Detroit Red Wings records
References
External links
1970 births
Conn Smythe Trophy winners
Detroit Red Wings captains
Detroit Red Wings draft picks
Detroit Red Wings players
Detroit Red Wings scouts
Hockey Hall of Fame inductees
Ice hockey players at the 1998 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2002 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2006 Winter Olympics
Ice hockey players at the 2010 Winter Olympics
IIHF Hall of Fame inductees
James Norris Memorial Trophy winners
Living people
Medalists at the 2006 Winter Olympics
National Hockey League All-Stars
National Hockey League players with retired numbers
Olympic gold medalists for Sweden
Olympic ice hockey players of Sweden
Olympic medalists in ice hockey
Sportspeople from Västerås
Stanley Cup champions
Swedish expatriate sportspeople in the United States
Swedish ice hockey defencemen
Triple Gold Club
VIK Västerås HK players
Swedish expatriate ice hockey people | false | [
"Juan de Cárcer y Disdier was a Spanish football manager. He coached Real Madrid for seven years from 1920-1927. He did not win any trophies.\n\nReal Madrid CF managers\nSpanish football managers\nYear of birth missing\nYear of death missing",
"The Flemish Sportsjewel is an annual award given to a Flemish sportsperson, either following a remarkable achievement or at the end of an exceptional career in sports.\n \nEach individual can only win the award once during his or her career, making this trophy one of the most prestigious in Flemish sports. The trophy is awarded by the Flemish Administration represented by the Flemish Minister for Sport, and was first handed out in 1982.\n\nWinners\n\nSee also\nBelgian Sportsman of the year\nBelgian Sports Personality of the Year\n\nReferences \n\nNational sportsperson-of-the-year trophies and awards\nBelgian sports trophies and awards\nAwards established in 1982\n1982 establishments in Belgium"
] |
[
"Eurythmics",
"1990-98: Hiatus and solo careers"
] | C_16f0e54b9b3c4a6e8d82a614cc545917_0 | Why did they go on Hiatus? | 1 | Why did Eurythmics go on Hiatus? | Eurythmics | After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached no.6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. He also formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983-1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released. In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US. Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful. CANNOTANSWER | ), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, | Eurythmics were a British pop duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. Stewart and Lennox were both previously in The Tourists, a band which broke up in 1980; Eurythmics were formed later that year in Wagga Wagga, Australia. The duo released their first studio album, In the Garden, in 1981 to little success, but went on to achieve global acclaim when their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), was released in 1983. The title track became a worldwide hit which topped the charts in various countries including the US. The duo went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split up in 1990. By this time, Stewart was a sought-after record producer, while Lennox began a solo recording career in 1992 with her debut album Diva. After almost a decade apart, Eurythmics reunited to record their ninth album, Peace, released in late 1999. They reunited again in 2005 to release the single "I've Got a Life", as part of a new Eurythmics compilation album, Ultimate Collection.
The duo have won an MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist in 1984, the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1987, the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 1999, and in 2005 were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. The Eurythmics have sold an estimated 75 million records worldwide. In 2017, the group was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and were nominated again in 2018.
History
1976–1982: Formation and In the Garden
Lennox and Stewart met in 1975 in a restaurant in London, where Lennox worked at that time. They first played together in 1976 in the punk rock band The Catch. After releasing one single as The Catch in 1977, the band evolved into The Tourists. Stewart and Lennox were also romantically involved. The Tourists achieved some commercial success, but the experience was reportedly an unhappy one. Personal and musical tensions existed within the group, whose main songwriter was Peet Coombes, and legal wranglings happened with the band's management, publishers and record labels. Lennox and Stewart felt the fixed band line-up was an inadequate vehicle to explore their experimental creative leanings and decided their next project should be much more flexible and free from artistic compromise. They were interested in creating pop music, but wanted freedom to experiment with electronics and the avant-garde.
It was in a hotel in Wagga Wagga, Australia, while playing around with a portable mini-synthesizer that Lennox and Stewart decided to become a duo. Calling themselves Eurythmics (after the pedagogical exercise system that Lennox had encountered as a child), they decided to keep themselves as the only permanent members and songwriters, and involve others in the collaboration "on the basis of mutual compatibility and availability". The duo signed to RCA Records. At this time, Lennox and Stewart also split as a couple. During the period that Lennox and Stewart were in The Tourists, and later as Eurythmics, they were managed by Kenny Smith and Sandra Turnbull of Hyper Kinetics Ltd.
They recorded their first album in Cologne with Conny Plank (who had produced the later Tourists sessions). This resulted in the album In the Garden, released in October 1981. The album mixed psychedelic, krautrock and electropop influences, and featured contributions from Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit (of Can), drummer Clem Burke (of Blondie), Robert Görl (of D.A.F.), and flautist Tim Wheater. A couple of the songs were co-written by guitarist Roger Pomphrey (later a TV director). The album was not a commercial success (though the debut single "Never Gonna Cry Again" made the UK charts at No. 63). Lennox and Stewart then activated their new Eurythmics mode of operation by touring the record as a duo, accompanied by backing tracks and electronics, carted around the country by themselves in a horse-box.
During 1982, the duo retreated to Chalk Farm in London and used a bank loan to establish a small eight-track studio above a picture framing factory, giving them freedom to record without having to pay expensive studio fees. They began to employ much more electronics in their music, collaborating with Raynard Faulkner and Adam Williams, recording many tracks in the studio and playing live using various line-up permutations. However, the three new singles they released that year ("This Is the House", "The Walk" and "Love Is a Stranger") all performed badly on initial release in the UK. Although their mode of operation had given them the creative freedom they desired, commercial success still eluded them and the responsibility of personally running so many of their affairs (down to transporting their own stage equipment) took its toll. Lennox apparently suffered at least one nervous breakdown during this period, while Stewart was hospitalised with a collapsed lung.
1983–1984: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and Touch
Eurythmics' commercial breakthrough came with their second album, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), released in January 1983. The successful title track featured a dark and powerful sequenced synth bass line and a dramatic video that introduced the now orange crew-cut Lennox to audiences. The song reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart, becoming one of the year's biggest sellers, and later topped the US Billboard Hot 100. The band's fortunes changed immensely from this moment on, and Lennox quickly became a pop icon, gracing the covers of numerous magazines including Rolling Stone. Their previous single, "Love Is a Stranger", was also re-released and became another chart success. The video for the song saw Lennox in many different character guises, a concept she would employ in various subsequent videos. The album's working title was Invisible Hands (as was a track left off the album), inspiring the name of the British independent company Invisible Hands Music – known for releasing music by Hugh Cornwell, Mick Karn and Hazel O'Connor. The album also featured a cover of the 1968 Sam & Dave hit "Wrap It Up", performed as a duet between Lennox and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti.
The duo quickly recorded a follow-up album, Touch, which was released in November 1983. It became the duo's first No. 1 album in the UK, and also spawned three major hit singles. "Who's That Girl?" was a top 3 hit in the UK, the video depicting Lennox as both a blonde chanteuse and as a gender-bending Elvis Presley clone. It also featured cameo appearances by Hazel O'Connor, Bananarama (including Stewart's future wife, Siobhan Fahey), Kate Garner of Haysi Fantayzee, Thereza Bazar of Dollar, Jay Aston and Cheryl Baker of Bucks Fizz, Kiki Dee, Jacquie O'Sullivan and the gender-bending pop singer Marilyn, who would go on to musical success of his own that same year. The upbeat, calypso-flavoured "Right by Your Side" showed a different side of Eurythmics altogether and also made the Top 10, and "Here Comes the Rain Again" (No. eight in the UK, No. four in the US) was an orchestral/synth ballad (with orchestrations by Michael Kamen).
In 1984 RCA released Touch Dance, an EP of remixes of four of the tracks from Touch, aimed at the club market. The remixes were by prominent New York City producers Francois Kevorkian and John "Jellybean" Benitez. Also released in 1984 was Eurythmics' soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother). Virgin Films had contracted the band to provide a soundtrack for Michael Radford's modern film adaptation of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, Radford later said that the music had been "foisted" on his film against his wishes, and that Virgin had replaced most of Dominic Muldowney's original orchestral score with the Eurythmics soundtrack (including the song "Julia", which was heard during the end credits). Nevertheless, the record was presented as "music derived from the original score of Eurythmics for the Michael Radford film version of Orwell's 1984". Eurythmics charged that they had been misled by the film's producers as well, and the album was withdrawn from the market for a period while matters were litigated. The album's first single, "Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)", was a top 5 hit in the UK, Australia and across Europe, and a major dance success in the United States.
1985–1986: Be Yourself Tonight and new musical direction
The duo's next album, Be Yourself Tonight, was produced in a week in Paris. It showcased much more of a "band style" and a centred sound (with an R&B influence), with real drums, brass, and much more guitar from Stewart. Almost a dozen other musicians were enlisted, including members of Tom Petty's Heartbreakers, guest harmonica from Stevie Wonder, bass guitar from Dean Garcia, string arrangements by Michael Kamen, and Lennox singing duets with Aretha Franklin and Elvis Costello. It continued the duo's transatlantic chart domination in 1985, and contained four hit singles: "Would I Lie to You?" was a US Billboard top five hit and Australian No. one, while "There Must Be an Angel (Playing with My Heart)" (featuring Wonder's harmonica contribution) became their first and only UK No. one single. The feminist anthem "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (a duet with Aretha Franklin, though originally intended for Tina Turner), and "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)" also rode high in the charts. In September 1985, Eurythmics performed "Would I Lie to You?" at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards at the Radio City Music Hall in New York.
1986–1990: Revenge, Savage and We Too Are One
Eurythmics released their next album, Revenge, in 1986. The album continued their move towards a band sound, verging on an AOR-pop/rock sound. Sales continued to be strong in the UK and internationally, but were somewhat slower in the US, though "Missionary Man" reached No. 14 on the US Hot 100 chart and went all the way to No. 1 on the US Album Oriented Rock chart (AOR). Revenge would eventually certify double Platinum in the UK and Gold in the US. The band went on a massive worldwide tour in support of the album, and a live concert video from the Australian leg of the tour was released.
In 1987, Lennox and Stewart released the album Savage. This saw a fairly radical change within the group's sound, being based mainly around programmed samples and drum loops (Lennox would later say that where Revenge was more of a Stewart album in sound, Savage was more of a Lennox one). Lyrically the songs showed an even darker, more obsessive side to Lennox's writing. A video album was also made, directed by Sophie Muller, with a video for each song. This was largely a concept piece, following characters portrayed by Lennox, specifically one of a frustrated housewife-turned-vamp (as exemplified in "Beethoven (I Love to Listen To)", a UK top 30 hit). The brazen, sexually charged rocker "I Need a Man" remains a Eurythmics staple, as does "You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart". Much less commercial than the two previous albums, Savage was mostly ignored in the US, although rock radio in more progressive markets supported "I Need a Man". In the duo's native UK however, the album was a top 10 success and was certified Platinum.
In 1989, Eurythmics released the album We Too Are One, which entered the UK Album Chart at No. 1 (their second No. 1 album after Touch) and gave the duo four UK Top 30 hit singles. The album was a return to the rock/pop sound of their mid-80s albums and was certified Double Platinum in the UK, but was less successful in the US (although the single "Don't Ask Me Why" grazed the Billboard Top 40). Other singles from the album included "Revival", "The King and Queen of America" and "Angel". Accompanying the album, the duo conducted their Revival world tour from 8 September 1989 to 25 January 1990. Parts of the tour (both on and off-stage) were interspersed with promo videos for Eurythmics' 1990 video album We Two Are One Too.
1990–1998: Hiatus and solo careers
After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached No. 6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. A soundtrack of the same name was also released, produced and largely written by Stewart. He formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983–1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released.
In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second No. 1 album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.
Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful.
1999–2005: Peace and Ultimate Collection
In the late 1990s, Eurythmics reunited and recorded a new album, Peace, which was released in 1999. The single "I Saved the World Today" reached No. 11 in the UK Singles Chart, and a remix of "17 Again" gave the duo their first chart-topper on the US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. The band also embarked on a world tour, dubbed the "Peacetour", to support the album. The tour started on 18 September 1999 at Cologne's Kölnarena and ended on 6 December 1999 at the London Docklands Arena (which was filmed and released on video and DVD). All proceeds from the tour went to Greenpeace and Amnesty International. The year 2000 saw numerous European festival appearances by Eurythmics (at Germany's Rock am Ring, among others). In 2001, Stewart performed with U2 for the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert. In 2002, he collaborated with Bryan Ferry on his album Frantic.
In June 2003, Lennox released her third solo album, entitled Bare, which was a top 5 hit in the UK and the US., with three tracks reaching the top of the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. She also recorded the song "Into the West" for Peter Jackson's film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, where it appeared as the closing theme and earned Lennox the Academy Award for Best Song. In November 2003, Eurythmics played three songs at the 46664 in Cape Town, South Africa, for which Stewart was one of the primary organisers. They played an unplugged version of "Here Comes the Rain Again", "7 Seconds" with Youssou N'Dour and "Sweet Dreams". Stewart collaborated with The Rolling Stones vocalist Mick Jagger on the soundtrack to the movie Alfie, released in 2004, including the critically acclaimed "Old Habits Die Hard", which won a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture.
On 7 November 2005, Eurythmics released Ultimate Collection, a remastered greatest hits package with two new songs. One of them, "I've Got a Life", was released as a single and reached No. 14 on the UK Singles Chart as well as spending three consecutive weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play in the US. Lennox and Stewart appeared on a number of TV shows to promote their new compilation album, which was a Top 5 hit and certified Platinum in the UK. On 14 November 2005, the duo's label, RCA, re-released their eight studio albums in remastered and expanded editions featuring rare B-sides, remixes and unreleased songs. The remasters were made available separately with expanded artwork, and also together in a collector's box set, entitled Boxed. However, the 1984 soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) was not included in this re-release campaign as Virgin Records holds the rights to that album. Also in 2005, Eurythmics were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. In 2007, Lennox resumed her solo career with her fourth album, Songs of Mass Destruction, which was a top 10 success in the UK and the US. In 2009, she released her first solo "greatest hits" package, The Annie Lennox Collection. The same year, Lennox stated that although she and Stewart remain friends, she does not foresee any further Eurythmics projects in the future.
In an interview with Reuters in September 2012, Stewart was quizzed on whether a new Eurythmics album is in the works, to which he replied: "We're not talking about one right now, but never say never." He added that he was considering developing a musical based on the music of Eurythmics.
2014: Reuniting for Beatles tribute concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart performed as a duo for "The Night That Changed America: A Grammy Salute to The Beatles". The event was recorded at the Los Angeles Convention Center on 27 January 2014, the day after the Grammy Awards. They performed The Beatles song "The Fool on the Hill".
2019: Reuniting for Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart, billed as Eurythmics, performed at Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert in aid of his Rainforest Foundation Fund on 9 December 2019 at New York City's Beacon Theatre. The group played "Would I Lie to You?", "Here Comes the Rain Again", and "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", before returning to join in the finale performance of Journey’s "Don't Stop Believin' along with the night's other performers.
Discography
In the Garden (1981)
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) (1983)
Touch (1983)
1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) (1984, soundtrack)
Be Yourself Tonight (1985)
Revenge (1986)
Savage (1987)
We Too Are One (1989)
Peace (1999)
Concerts
Sweet Dreams Tour (1983)
Touch Tour (1983–1984)
Revenge Tour (1986–1987)
Revival Tour (1989–1990)
Peace Tour (1999)
Awards
Billboard Music Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1983
| "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|
|-
| 1984
| rowspan=6|Themselves
| Top Disco Artist – Duo/Group
|
|
|-
| rowspan=9|1985
| Top Artist
|
| rowspan=9|
|-
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist – Duo/Group
|
|-
| Top Dance Club Play Artist
|
|-
| rowspan=2|Be Yourself Tonight
| Top Billboard 200 Album
|
|-
| Top Compact Disk
|
|-
| "Would I Lie to You?"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|-
| "Sexcrime"
| Top Dance Play Single
|
|-
| rowspan=2|1986
| rowspan=2|Themselves
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
| rowspan=2|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
Brit Awards
|-
|1984
|Themselves
|Best British Group
|
|-
|rowspan="2" |1986
|Be Yourself Tonight
|Best British Album
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |Themselves
|rowspan="3" |Best British Group
|
|-
|1987
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |1990
|
|-
|We Too Are One
|Best British Album
|
|-
|"Don't Ask Me Why"
|Best British Video
|
|-
|1999
|Themselves
|Outstanding Contribution to British Music
|
|-
| 2010
| "There Must Be an Angel"
| Live Performance of 30 Years
|
Grammy Awards
|-
| 1984
||Themselves
|Best New Artist
|
|-
| 1985
|Eurythmics Sweet Dreams: The Video Album
|Best Video Album
|
|-
|rowspan="2"| 1986
|"Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (with Aretha Franklin)
|Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
|"Would I Lie to You?"
|rowspan="2"|Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
| 1987
|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
| 1990
|Savage
|rowspan="2"|Best Music Video – Long Form
|
|-
| 1991
|We Two Are One Too
|
MTV Video Music Awards
|-
|1984
|"Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1985
|rowspan=5|"Would I Lie to You?"
|Best Stage Performance
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|Best Choreography
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|Best Group Video
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1987
|rowspan=5|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Most Experimental Video
|
|-
|Best Special Effects
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|1988
|"I Need a Man"
|Best Group Video
|
|-
|"You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart"
|Best Direction
|
Music & Media Year-End Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1987
| Themselves
| Group of the Year
|
|
1984: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Best Contemporary Song for "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)"
2000: Silver Clef Award
2000: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2003: Kindred Spirit Music Award
2005: Inducted into UK Music Hall of Fame
2008: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2009: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2010: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
References
External links
19 Recordings artists
1980 establishments in England
Brit Award winners
New wave duos
English pop music duos
English new wave musical groups
English synth-pop groups
British synth-pop new wave groups
Dance-rock musical groups
Grammy Award winners
Ivor Novello Award winners
Male–female musical duos
Musical groups disestablished in 1990
Musical groups disestablished in 2005
Musical groups established in 1980
Musical groups from London
Musical groups reestablished in 1999
RCA Records artists
Female-fronted musical groups | true | [
"Paradises, stylized as PARADISES is a Japanese idol group formed in 2020 after the split of Gang Parade.\n\nHistory\n\n2020: Formation and Paradises\nFollowing the announcement of Saki Kamiya's graduation from Gang Parade, it was announced that Gang Parade would split into two groups: Go to the Beds, consisting of Miki Yamamachi, Yua Yumeno, Can GP Maika, Yui Ga Dockson and Coco Partin Coco, and Paradises, consisting of Yuka Terashima, Usagi Tsukino, Naruhaworld. They released the split EP, G/P, consisting of three songs per group and Saki Kamiya's final solo song on April 1, 2020. Kila May joined the group on May 22. They released their eponymous debut album on July 22. On December 26, Utauuta joined the group and Usagi Tsukino went on a six-month hiatus.\n\n2021: Compilation albums and Paradises Return\nOn January 30, 2021, the group released the compilation album, Paradises (Refresh Ver.), which featured all of their previous songs with the addition of new member Utauuta and the exception of Usagi Tsukino who was on hiatus at the time. They released their first solo EP, Paradises Return, on March 3. On March 27, it was announced that a new member, Ca Non, would join the group. She made her first appearance as a member on April 28. On July 1, Usagi Tsukino returned from her six-month hiatus and a second compilation album, Paradises (Free Ver.), was released which featured all of the group's previous songs with all current Paradises members present. On July 9, Utauuta left the group due to difference in opinion of the direction the group was going in. They released their first single, , on July 28. On October 2, it was announced that all members of Paradises and Go to the Beds would immediately swap groups. They released a second split EP, G⇔P, on December 15.\n\nMembers\n\nCurrent\n\nFormer\n\nDiscography\n\nStudio albums\n\nCompilation albums\n\nExtended plays\n\nSingles\n\nAs lead artist\n\nCollaborations\n\nReferences\n\nJapanese idol groups\nJapanese pop music groups\nMusical groups established in 2020\nMusical groups from Tokyo\n2020 establishments in Japan",
"Nevea Tears was an American metal band from Southern California known for their extensive use of electronics in their songs.\n\nHistory\nNevea Tears formed in 2002 with Greg Gillis and Brent Doan on guitars, Jeff Metajan on keyboards/electronics, Amber Barnard on drums, Dom Gomez on bass and John Morello on vocals. They recorded a demo and sent it to many labels. They were signed by Eulogy Recordings and released their first full length Do I Have to Tell You I Love You? the next year. The band grew to tour with many popular bands of the current hardcore scene for the next three years. Brent and Amber left, leading Jeff to move to guitar and Stephen Crosmer to come in on drums. Shortly before Morello, Gomez and Stephen quit the band, in 2007, Run with the Hunted was released, and in order to go on tour to support their album, the remaining members recruited Aaron Wymore on bass, Matt Marquez on drums, and Alex Reyes on vocals. They went on playing shows for a few months, but lacking loyal members they eventually stopped playing and have been on hiatus since.\n\nDiscography\n Demo (2003)\n Do I Have to Tell You Why I Love You? (Eulogy Recordings, 2004)\n Run with the Hunted (Eulogy, 2007)\n\nReferences\nEduardo Rivadavia, [ Nevea Tears] at AllMusic\n Nevea Tears at Sputnikmusic\n\nExternal links\n Nevea Tears on Myspace\n\nMusical groups from California\nAmerican screamo musical groups\nAmerican post-hardcore musical groups"
] |
[
"Eurythmics",
"1990-98: Hiatus and solo careers",
"Why did they go on Hiatus?",
"), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded,"
] | C_16f0e54b9b3c4a6e8d82a614cc545917_0 | Did they put out any solo albums? | 2 | Did Eurythmics put out any solo albums? | Eurythmics | After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached no.6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. He also formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983-1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released. In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US. Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful. CANNOTANSWER | Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" ( | Eurythmics were a British pop duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. Stewart and Lennox were both previously in The Tourists, a band which broke up in 1980; Eurythmics were formed later that year in Wagga Wagga, Australia. The duo released their first studio album, In the Garden, in 1981 to little success, but went on to achieve global acclaim when their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), was released in 1983. The title track became a worldwide hit which topped the charts in various countries including the US. The duo went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split up in 1990. By this time, Stewart was a sought-after record producer, while Lennox began a solo recording career in 1992 with her debut album Diva. After almost a decade apart, Eurythmics reunited to record their ninth album, Peace, released in late 1999. They reunited again in 2005 to release the single "I've Got a Life", as part of a new Eurythmics compilation album, Ultimate Collection.
The duo have won an MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist in 1984, the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1987, the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 1999, and in 2005 were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. The Eurythmics have sold an estimated 75 million records worldwide. In 2017, the group was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and were nominated again in 2018.
History
1976–1982: Formation and In the Garden
Lennox and Stewart met in 1975 in a restaurant in London, where Lennox worked at that time. They first played together in 1976 in the punk rock band The Catch. After releasing one single as The Catch in 1977, the band evolved into The Tourists. Stewart and Lennox were also romantically involved. The Tourists achieved some commercial success, but the experience was reportedly an unhappy one. Personal and musical tensions existed within the group, whose main songwriter was Peet Coombes, and legal wranglings happened with the band's management, publishers and record labels. Lennox and Stewart felt the fixed band line-up was an inadequate vehicle to explore their experimental creative leanings and decided their next project should be much more flexible and free from artistic compromise. They were interested in creating pop music, but wanted freedom to experiment with electronics and the avant-garde.
It was in a hotel in Wagga Wagga, Australia, while playing around with a portable mini-synthesizer that Lennox and Stewart decided to become a duo. Calling themselves Eurythmics (after the pedagogical exercise system that Lennox had encountered as a child), they decided to keep themselves as the only permanent members and songwriters, and involve others in the collaboration "on the basis of mutual compatibility and availability". The duo signed to RCA Records. At this time, Lennox and Stewart also split as a couple. During the period that Lennox and Stewart were in The Tourists, and later as Eurythmics, they were managed by Kenny Smith and Sandra Turnbull of Hyper Kinetics Ltd.
They recorded their first album in Cologne with Conny Plank (who had produced the later Tourists sessions). This resulted in the album In the Garden, released in October 1981. The album mixed psychedelic, krautrock and electropop influences, and featured contributions from Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit (of Can), drummer Clem Burke (of Blondie), Robert Görl (of D.A.F.), and flautist Tim Wheater. A couple of the songs were co-written by guitarist Roger Pomphrey (later a TV director). The album was not a commercial success (though the debut single "Never Gonna Cry Again" made the UK charts at No. 63). Lennox and Stewart then activated their new Eurythmics mode of operation by touring the record as a duo, accompanied by backing tracks and electronics, carted around the country by themselves in a horse-box.
During 1982, the duo retreated to Chalk Farm in London and used a bank loan to establish a small eight-track studio above a picture framing factory, giving them freedom to record without having to pay expensive studio fees. They began to employ much more electronics in their music, collaborating with Raynard Faulkner and Adam Williams, recording many tracks in the studio and playing live using various line-up permutations. However, the three new singles they released that year ("This Is the House", "The Walk" and "Love Is a Stranger") all performed badly on initial release in the UK. Although their mode of operation had given them the creative freedom they desired, commercial success still eluded them and the responsibility of personally running so many of their affairs (down to transporting their own stage equipment) took its toll. Lennox apparently suffered at least one nervous breakdown during this period, while Stewart was hospitalised with a collapsed lung.
1983–1984: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and Touch
Eurythmics' commercial breakthrough came with their second album, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), released in January 1983. The successful title track featured a dark and powerful sequenced synth bass line and a dramatic video that introduced the now orange crew-cut Lennox to audiences. The song reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart, becoming one of the year's biggest sellers, and later topped the US Billboard Hot 100. The band's fortunes changed immensely from this moment on, and Lennox quickly became a pop icon, gracing the covers of numerous magazines including Rolling Stone. Their previous single, "Love Is a Stranger", was also re-released and became another chart success. The video for the song saw Lennox in many different character guises, a concept she would employ in various subsequent videos. The album's working title was Invisible Hands (as was a track left off the album), inspiring the name of the British independent company Invisible Hands Music – known for releasing music by Hugh Cornwell, Mick Karn and Hazel O'Connor. The album also featured a cover of the 1968 Sam & Dave hit "Wrap It Up", performed as a duet between Lennox and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti.
The duo quickly recorded a follow-up album, Touch, which was released in November 1983. It became the duo's first No. 1 album in the UK, and also spawned three major hit singles. "Who's That Girl?" was a top 3 hit in the UK, the video depicting Lennox as both a blonde chanteuse and as a gender-bending Elvis Presley clone. It also featured cameo appearances by Hazel O'Connor, Bananarama (including Stewart's future wife, Siobhan Fahey), Kate Garner of Haysi Fantayzee, Thereza Bazar of Dollar, Jay Aston and Cheryl Baker of Bucks Fizz, Kiki Dee, Jacquie O'Sullivan and the gender-bending pop singer Marilyn, who would go on to musical success of his own that same year. The upbeat, calypso-flavoured "Right by Your Side" showed a different side of Eurythmics altogether and also made the Top 10, and "Here Comes the Rain Again" (No. eight in the UK, No. four in the US) was an orchestral/synth ballad (with orchestrations by Michael Kamen).
In 1984 RCA released Touch Dance, an EP of remixes of four of the tracks from Touch, aimed at the club market. The remixes were by prominent New York City producers Francois Kevorkian and John "Jellybean" Benitez. Also released in 1984 was Eurythmics' soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother). Virgin Films had contracted the band to provide a soundtrack for Michael Radford's modern film adaptation of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, Radford later said that the music had been "foisted" on his film against his wishes, and that Virgin had replaced most of Dominic Muldowney's original orchestral score with the Eurythmics soundtrack (including the song "Julia", which was heard during the end credits). Nevertheless, the record was presented as "music derived from the original score of Eurythmics for the Michael Radford film version of Orwell's 1984". Eurythmics charged that they had been misled by the film's producers as well, and the album was withdrawn from the market for a period while matters were litigated. The album's first single, "Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)", was a top 5 hit in the UK, Australia and across Europe, and a major dance success in the United States.
1985–1986: Be Yourself Tonight and new musical direction
The duo's next album, Be Yourself Tonight, was produced in a week in Paris. It showcased much more of a "band style" and a centred sound (with an R&B influence), with real drums, brass, and much more guitar from Stewart. Almost a dozen other musicians were enlisted, including members of Tom Petty's Heartbreakers, guest harmonica from Stevie Wonder, bass guitar from Dean Garcia, string arrangements by Michael Kamen, and Lennox singing duets with Aretha Franklin and Elvis Costello. It continued the duo's transatlantic chart domination in 1985, and contained four hit singles: "Would I Lie to You?" was a US Billboard top five hit and Australian No. one, while "There Must Be an Angel (Playing with My Heart)" (featuring Wonder's harmonica contribution) became their first and only UK No. one single. The feminist anthem "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (a duet with Aretha Franklin, though originally intended for Tina Turner), and "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)" also rode high in the charts. In September 1985, Eurythmics performed "Would I Lie to You?" at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards at the Radio City Music Hall in New York.
1986–1990: Revenge, Savage and We Too Are One
Eurythmics released their next album, Revenge, in 1986. The album continued their move towards a band sound, verging on an AOR-pop/rock sound. Sales continued to be strong in the UK and internationally, but were somewhat slower in the US, though "Missionary Man" reached No. 14 on the US Hot 100 chart and went all the way to No. 1 on the US Album Oriented Rock chart (AOR). Revenge would eventually certify double Platinum in the UK and Gold in the US. The band went on a massive worldwide tour in support of the album, and a live concert video from the Australian leg of the tour was released.
In 1987, Lennox and Stewart released the album Savage. This saw a fairly radical change within the group's sound, being based mainly around programmed samples and drum loops (Lennox would later say that where Revenge was more of a Stewart album in sound, Savage was more of a Lennox one). Lyrically the songs showed an even darker, more obsessive side to Lennox's writing. A video album was also made, directed by Sophie Muller, with a video for each song. This was largely a concept piece, following characters portrayed by Lennox, specifically one of a frustrated housewife-turned-vamp (as exemplified in "Beethoven (I Love to Listen To)", a UK top 30 hit). The brazen, sexually charged rocker "I Need a Man" remains a Eurythmics staple, as does "You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart". Much less commercial than the two previous albums, Savage was mostly ignored in the US, although rock radio in more progressive markets supported "I Need a Man". In the duo's native UK however, the album was a top 10 success and was certified Platinum.
In 1989, Eurythmics released the album We Too Are One, which entered the UK Album Chart at No. 1 (their second No. 1 album after Touch) and gave the duo four UK Top 30 hit singles. The album was a return to the rock/pop sound of their mid-80s albums and was certified Double Platinum in the UK, but was less successful in the US (although the single "Don't Ask Me Why" grazed the Billboard Top 40). Other singles from the album included "Revival", "The King and Queen of America" and "Angel". Accompanying the album, the duo conducted their Revival world tour from 8 September 1989 to 25 January 1990. Parts of the tour (both on and off-stage) were interspersed with promo videos for Eurythmics' 1990 video album We Two Are One Too.
1990–1998: Hiatus and solo careers
After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached No. 6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. A soundtrack of the same name was also released, produced and largely written by Stewart. He formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983–1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released.
In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second No. 1 album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.
Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful.
1999–2005: Peace and Ultimate Collection
In the late 1990s, Eurythmics reunited and recorded a new album, Peace, which was released in 1999. The single "I Saved the World Today" reached No. 11 in the UK Singles Chart, and a remix of "17 Again" gave the duo their first chart-topper on the US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. The band also embarked on a world tour, dubbed the "Peacetour", to support the album. The tour started on 18 September 1999 at Cologne's Kölnarena and ended on 6 December 1999 at the London Docklands Arena (which was filmed and released on video and DVD). All proceeds from the tour went to Greenpeace and Amnesty International. The year 2000 saw numerous European festival appearances by Eurythmics (at Germany's Rock am Ring, among others). In 2001, Stewart performed with U2 for the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert. In 2002, he collaborated with Bryan Ferry on his album Frantic.
In June 2003, Lennox released her third solo album, entitled Bare, which was a top 5 hit in the UK and the US., with three tracks reaching the top of the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. She also recorded the song "Into the West" for Peter Jackson's film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, where it appeared as the closing theme and earned Lennox the Academy Award for Best Song. In November 2003, Eurythmics played three songs at the 46664 in Cape Town, South Africa, for which Stewart was one of the primary organisers. They played an unplugged version of "Here Comes the Rain Again", "7 Seconds" with Youssou N'Dour and "Sweet Dreams". Stewart collaborated with The Rolling Stones vocalist Mick Jagger on the soundtrack to the movie Alfie, released in 2004, including the critically acclaimed "Old Habits Die Hard", which won a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture.
On 7 November 2005, Eurythmics released Ultimate Collection, a remastered greatest hits package with two new songs. One of them, "I've Got a Life", was released as a single and reached No. 14 on the UK Singles Chart as well as spending three consecutive weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play in the US. Lennox and Stewart appeared on a number of TV shows to promote their new compilation album, which was a Top 5 hit and certified Platinum in the UK. On 14 November 2005, the duo's label, RCA, re-released their eight studio albums in remastered and expanded editions featuring rare B-sides, remixes and unreleased songs. The remasters were made available separately with expanded artwork, and also together in a collector's box set, entitled Boxed. However, the 1984 soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) was not included in this re-release campaign as Virgin Records holds the rights to that album. Also in 2005, Eurythmics were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. In 2007, Lennox resumed her solo career with her fourth album, Songs of Mass Destruction, which was a top 10 success in the UK and the US. In 2009, she released her first solo "greatest hits" package, The Annie Lennox Collection. The same year, Lennox stated that although she and Stewart remain friends, she does not foresee any further Eurythmics projects in the future.
In an interview with Reuters in September 2012, Stewart was quizzed on whether a new Eurythmics album is in the works, to which he replied: "We're not talking about one right now, but never say never." He added that he was considering developing a musical based on the music of Eurythmics.
2014: Reuniting for Beatles tribute concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart performed as a duo for "The Night That Changed America: A Grammy Salute to The Beatles". The event was recorded at the Los Angeles Convention Center on 27 January 2014, the day after the Grammy Awards. They performed The Beatles song "The Fool on the Hill".
2019: Reuniting for Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart, billed as Eurythmics, performed at Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert in aid of his Rainforest Foundation Fund on 9 December 2019 at New York City's Beacon Theatre. The group played "Would I Lie to You?", "Here Comes the Rain Again", and "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", before returning to join in the finale performance of Journey’s "Don't Stop Believin' along with the night's other performers.
Discography
In the Garden (1981)
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) (1983)
Touch (1983)
1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) (1984, soundtrack)
Be Yourself Tonight (1985)
Revenge (1986)
Savage (1987)
We Too Are One (1989)
Peace (1999)
Concerts
Sweet Dreams Tour (1983)
Touch Tour (1983–1984)
Revenge Tour (1986–1987)
Revival Tour (1989–1990)
Peace Tour (1999)
Awards
Billboard Music Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1983
| "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|
|-
| 1984
| rowspan=6|Themselves
| Top Disco Artist – Duo/Group
|
|
|-
| rowspan=9|1985
| Top Artist
|
| rowspan=9|
|-
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist – Duo/Group
|
|-
| Top Dance Club Play Artist
|
|-
| rowspan=2|Be Yourself Tonight
| Top Billboard 200 Album
|
|-
| Top Compact Disk
|
|-
| "Would I Lie to You?"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|-
| "Sexcrime"
| Top Dance Play Single
|
|-
| rowspan=2|1986
| rowspan=2|Themselves
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
| rowspan=2|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
Brit Awards
|-
|1984
|Themselves
|Best British Group
|
|-
|rowspan="2" |1986
|Be Yourself Tonight
|Best British Album
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |Themselves
|rowspan="3" |Best British Group
|
|-
|1987
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |1990
|
|-
|We Too Are One
|Best British Album
|
|-
|"Don't Ask Me Why"
|Best British Video
|
|-
|1999
|Themselves
|Outstanding Contribution to British Music
|
|-
| 2010
| "There Must Be an Angel"
| Live Performance of 30 Years
|
Grammy Awards
|-
| 1984
||Themselves
|Best New Artist
|
|-
| 1985
|Eurythmics Sweet Dreams: The Video Album
|Best Video Album
|
|-
|rowspan="2"| 1986
|"Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (with Aretha Franklin)
|Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
|"Would I Lie to You?"
|rowspan="2"|Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
| 1987
|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
| 1990
|Savage
|rowspan="2"|Best Music Video – Long Form
|
|-
| 1991
|We Two Are One Too
|
MTV Video Music Awards
|-
|1984
|"Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1985
|rowspan=5|"Would I Lie to You?"
|Best Stage Performance
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|Best Choreography
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|Best Group Video
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1987
|rowspan=5|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Most Experimental Video
|
|-
|Best Special Effects
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|1988
|"I Need a Man"
|Best Group Video
|
|-
|"You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart"
|Best Direction
|
Music & Media Year-End Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1987
| Themselves
| Group of the Year
|
|
1984: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Best Contemporary Song for "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)"
2000: Silver Clef Award
2000: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2003: Kindred Spirit Music Award
2005: Inducted into UK Music Hall of Fame
2008: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2009: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2010: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
References
External links
19 Recordings artists
1980 establishments in England
Brit Award winners
New wave duos
English pop music duos
English new wave musical groups
English synth-pop groups
British synth-pop new wave groups
Dance-rock musical groups
Grammy Award winners
Ivor Novello Award winners
Male–female musical duos
Musical groups disestablished in 1990
Musical groups disestablished in 2005
Musical groups established in 1980
Musical groups from London
Musical groups reestablished in 1999
RCA Records artists
Female-fronted musical groups | true | [
"Drive Inn is a collaboration album with Rainer Bloss and Klaus Schulze.\n\nThere exists an album called Drive Inn II, but despite the fact that Schulze's name is put on the cover, it is a Rainer Bloss solo project. Furthermore, there exists a Drive Inn III by Rainer Bloss. Klaus Schulze has nothing to do with it or any other of Rainer Bloss' solo recordings.\n\nTrack listing\nAll tracks by Rainer Bloss & Klaus Schulze\n\n \"Drive Inn\" – 03:42\n \"Sightseeing\" – 06:24\n \"Truckin'\" – 04:54\n \"Highway\" – 04:45\n \"Racing\" – 06:00\n \"Road Clear\" – 11:11\n \"Drive Out\" – 03:00\n\nPersonnel \nRainer Bloss – synthesizer, keyboards, producer\nClaus Cordes – design\nErnst Fuchs – vocals\nMichael Garvens – percussion, vocals\nKlaus Schulze – synthesizer, guitar, keyboards, vocals, engineer, electronics\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n Drive Inn at the official site of Klaus Schulze\n \n\n1984 albums\nKlaus Schulze albums",
"By the Fire is the seventh solo album by Thurston Moore.\n\nMoore claimed the album and its release were a political act saying \"I put out By the Fire as a political move. Any time you put out a record, a book, a fanzine, a blog, a cassette, a CD, whatever you're doing, that's a political move. You're actually engaging in a social world. I called it By the Fire because of that. [It's] the idea of people sitting around a fire and dialoguing.\"\n\nReception\n\nRon Hart of Spin called the album \"his most direct solo outing since his 1995 debut, Psychic Hearts.\" Stuart Berman of Pitchfork praised the album and said of the almost 90 minutes length of the album \"it's a record that justifies and even demands the extra space to explore.\"\n\nDaniel Sylvester of Exclaim! was less effusive calling the album \"boring and tedious\" and said of it \"much of the material sounds like Sonic Youth, even if the quality isn't there.\"\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\n Thurston Moore – vocals, guitars\n James Sedwards – guitars\n Debbie Googe – bass guitars\n Steve Shelley – drums\n\nReferences \n\n2020 albums\nThurston Moore albums"
] |
[
"Eurythmics",
"1990-98: Hiatus and solo careers",
"Why did they go on Hiatus?",
"), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded,",
"Did they put out any solo albums?",
"Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track \"Lily Was Here\" ("
] | C_16f0e54b9b3c4a6e8d82a614cc545917_0 | What did Lennox do at this time? | 3 | What did Lennox do during the hiatus? | Eurythmics | After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached no.6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. He also formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983-1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released. In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US. Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful. CANNOTANSWER | 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. | Eurythmics were a British pop duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. Stewart and Lennox were both previously in The Tourists, a band which broke up in 1980; Eurythmics were formed later that year in Wagga Wagga, Australia. The duo released their first studio album, In the Garden, in 1981 to little success, but went on to achieve global acclaim when their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), was released in 1983. The title track became a worldwide hit which topped the charts in various countries including the US. The duo went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split up in 1990. By this time, Stewart was a sought-after record producer, while Lennox began a solo recording career in 1992 with her debut album Diva. After almost a decade apart, Eurythmics reunited to record their ninth album, Peace, released in late 1999. They reunited again in 2005 to release the single "I've Got a Life", as part of a new Eurythmics compilation album, Ultimate Collection.
The duo have won an MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist in 1984, the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1987, the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 1999, and in 2005 were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. The Eurythmics have sold an estimated 75 million records worldwide. In 2017, the group was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and were nominated again in 2018.
History
1976–1982: Formation and In the Garden
Lennox and Stewart met in 1975 in a restaurant in London, where Lennox worked at that time. They first played together in 1976 in the punk rock band The Catch. After releasing one single as The Catch in 1977, the band evolved into The Tourists. Stewart and Lennox were also romantically involved. The Tourists achieved some commercial success, but the experience was reportedly an unhappy one. Personal and musical tensions existed within the group, whose main songwriter was Peet Coombes, and legal wranglings happened with the band's management, publishers and record labels. Lennox and Stewart felt the fixed band line-up was an inadequate vehicle to explore their experimental creative leanings and decided their next project should be much more flexible and free from artistic compromise. They were interested in creating pop music, but wanted freedom to experiment with electronics and the avant-garde.
It was in a hotel in Wagga Wagga, Australia, while playing around with a portable mini-synthesizer that Lennox and Stewart decided to become a duo. Calling themselves Eurythmics (after the pedagogical exercise system that Lennox had encountered as a child), they decided to keep themselves as the only permanent members and songwriters, and involve others in the collaboration "on the basis of mutual compatibility and availability". The duo signed to RCA Records. At this time, Lennox and Stewart also split as a couple. During the period that Lennox and Stewart were in The Tourists, and later as Eurythmics, they were managed by Kenny Smith and Sandra Turnbull of Hyper Kinetics Ltd.
They recorded their first album in Cologne with Conny Plank (who had produced the later Tourists sessions). This resulted in the album In the Garden, released in October 1981. The album mixed psychedelic, krautrock and electropop influences, and featured contributions from Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit (of Can), drummer Clem Burke (of Blondie), Robert Görl (of D.A.F.), and flautist Tim Wheater. A couple of the songs were co-written by guitarist Roger Pomphrey (later a TV director). The album was not a commercial success (though the debut single "Never Gonna Cry Again" made the UK charts at No. 63). Lennox and Stewart then activated their new Eurythmics mode of operation by touring the record as a duo, accompanied by backing tracks and electronics, carted around the country by themselves in a horse-box.
During 1982, the duo retreated to Chalk Farm in London and used a bank loan to establish a small eight-track studio above a picture framing factory, giving them freedom to record without having to pay expensive studio fees. They began to employ much more electronics in their music, collaborating with Raynard Faulkner and Adam Williams, recording many tracks in the studio and playing live using various line-up permutations. However, the three new singles they released that year ("This Is the House", "The Walk" and "Love Is a Stranger") all performed badly on initial release in the UK. Although their mode of operation had given them the creative freedom they desired, commercial success still eluded them and the responsibility of personally running so many of their affairs (down to transporting their own stage equipment) took its toll. Lennox apparently suffered at least one nervous breakdown during this period, while Stewart was hospitalised with a collapsed lung.
1983–1984: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and Touch
Eurythmics' commercial breakthrough came with their second album, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), released in January 1983. The successful title track featured a dark and powerful sequenced synth bass line and a dramatic video that introduced the now orange crew-cut Lennox to audiences. The song reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart, becoming one of the year's biggest sellers, and later topped the US Billboard Hot 100. The band's fortunes changed immensely from this moment on, and Lennox quickly became a pop icon, gracing the covers of numerous magazines including Rolling Stone. Their previous single, "Love Is a Stranger", was also re-released and became another chart success. The video for the song saw Lennox in many different character guises, a concept she would employ in various subsequent videos. The album's working title was Invisible Hands (as was a track left off the album), inspiring the name of the British independent company Invisible Hands Music – known for releasing music by Hugh Cornwell, Mick Karn and Hazel O'Connor. The album also featured a cover of the 1968 Sam & Dave hit "Wrap It Up", performed as a duet between Lennox and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti.
The duo quickly recorded a follow-up album, Touch, which was released in November 1983. It became the duo's first No. 1 album in the UK, and also spawned three major hit singles. "Who's That Girl?" was a top 3 hit in the UK, the video depicting Lennox as both a blonde chanteuse and as a gender-bending Elvis Presley clone. It also featured cameo appearances by Hazel O'Connor, Bananarama (including Stewart's future wife, Siobhan Fahey), Kate Garner of Haysi Fantayzee, Thereza Bazar of Dollar, Jay Aston and Cheryl Baker of Bucks Fizz, Kiki Dee, Jacquie O'Sullivan and the gender-bending pop singer Marilyn, who would go on to musical success of his own that same year. The upbeat, calypso-flavoured "Right by Your Side" showed a different side of Eurythmics altogether and also made the Top 10, and "Here Comes the Rain Again" (No. eight in the UK, No. four in the US) was an orchestral/synth ballad (with orchestrations by Michael Kamen).
In 1984 RCA released Touch Dance, an EP of remixes of four of the tracks from Touch, aimed at the club market. The remixes were by prominent New York City producers Francois Kevorkian and John "Jellybean" Benitez. Also released in 1984 was Eurythmics' soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother). Virgin Films had contracted the band to provide a soundtrack for Michael Radford's modern film adaptation of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, Radford later said that the music had been "foisted" on his film against his wishes, and that Virgin had replaced most of Dominic Muldowney's original orchestral score with the Eurythmics soundtrack (including the song "Julia", which was heard during the end credits). Nevertheless, the record was presented as "music derived from the original score of Eurythmics for the Michael Radford film version of Orwell's 1984". Eurythmics charged that they had been misled by the film's producers as well, and the album was withdrawn from the market for a period while matters were litigated. The album's first single, "Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)", was a top 5 hit in the UK, Australia and across Europe, and a major dance success in the United States.
1985–1986: Be Yourself Tonight and new musical direction
The duo's next album, Be Yourself Tonight, was produced in a week in Paris. It showcased much more of a "band style" and a centred sound (with an R&B influence), with real drums, brass, and much more guitar from Stewart. Almost a dozen other musicians were enlisted, including members of Tom Petty's Heartbreakers, guest harmonica from Stevie Wonder, bass guitar from Dean Garcia, string arrangements by Michael Kamen, and Lennox singing duets with Aretha Franklin and Elvis Costello. It continued the duo's transatlantic chart domination in 1985, and contained four hit singles: "Would I Lie to You?" was a US Billboard top five hit and Australian No. one, while "There Must Be an Angel (Playing with My Heart)" (featuring Wonder's harmonica contribution) became their first and only UK No. one single. The feminist anthem "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (a duet with Aretha Franklin, though originally intended for Tina Turner), and "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)" also rode high in the charts. In September 1985, Eurythmics performed "Would I Lie to You?" at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards at the Radio City Music Hall in New York.
1986–1990: Revenge, Savage and We Too Are One
Eurythmics released their next album, Revenge, in 1986. The album continued their move towards a band sound, verging on an AOR-pop/rock sound. Sales continued to be strong in the UK and internationally, but were somewhat slower in the US, though "Missionary Man" reached No. 14 on the US Hot 100 chart and went all the way to No. 1 on the US Album Oriented Rock chart (AOR). Revenge would eventually certify double Platinum in the UK and Gold in the US. The band went on a massive worldwide tour in support of the album, and a live concert video from the Australian leg of the tour was released.
In 1987, Lennox and Stewart released the album Savage. This saw a fairly radical change within the group's sound, being based mainly around programmed samples and drum loops (Lennox would later say that where Revenge was more of a Stewart album in sound, Savage was more of a Lennox one). Lyrically the songs showed an even darker, more obsessive side to Lennox's writing. A video album was also made, directed by Sophie Muller, with a video for each song. This was largely a concept piece, following characters portrayed by Lennox, specifically one of a frustrated housewife-turned-vamp (as exemplified in "Beethoven (I Love to Listen To)", a UK top 30 hit). The brazen, sexually charged rocker "I Need a Man" remains a Eurythmics staple, as does "You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart". Much less commercial than the two previous albums, Savage was mostly ignored in the US, although rock radio in more progressive markets supported "I Need a Man". In the duo's native UK however, the album was a top 10 success and was certified Platinum.
In 1989, Eurythmics released the album We Too Are One, which entered the UK Album Chart at No. 1 (their second No. 1 album after Touch) and gave the duo four UK Top 30 hit singles. The album was a return to the rock/pop sound of their mid-80s albums and was certified Double Platinum in the UK, but was less successful in the US (although the single "Don't Ask Me Why" grazed the Billboard Top 40). Other singles from the album included "Revival", "The King and Queen of America" and "Angel". Accompanying the album, the duo conducted their Revival world tour from 8 September 1989 to 25 January 1990. Parts of the tour (both on and off-stage) were interspersed with promo videos for Eurythmics' 1990 video album We Two Are One Too.
1990–1998: Hiatus and solo careers
After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached No. 6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. A soundtrack of the same name was also released, produced and largely written by Stewart. He formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983–1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released.
In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second No. 1 album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.
Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful.
1999–2005: Peace and Ultimate Collection
In the late 1990s, Eurythmics reunited and recorded a new album, Peace, which was released in 1999. The single "I Saved the World Today" reached No. 11 in the UK Singles Chart, and a remix of "17 Again" gave the duo their first chart-topper on the US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. The band also embarked on a world tour, dubbed the "Peacetour", to support the album. The tour started on 18 September 1999 at Cologne's Kölnarena and ended on 6 December 1999 at the London Docklands Arena (which was filmed and released on video and DVD). All proceeds from the tour went to Greenpeace and Amnesty International. The year 2000 saw numerous European festival appearances by Eurythmics (at Germany's Rock am Ring, among others). In 2001, Stewart performed with U2 for the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert. In 2002, he collaborated with Bryan Ferry on his album Frantic.
In June 2003, Lennox released her third solo album, entitled Bare, which was a top 5 hit in the UK and the US., with three tracks reaching the top of the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. She also recorded the song "Into the West" for Peter Jackson's film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, where it appeared as the closing theme and earned Lennox the Academy Award for Best Song. In November 2003, Eurythmics played three songs at the 46664 in Cape Town, South Africa, for which Stewart was one of the primary organisers. They played an unplugged version of "Here Comes the Rain Again", "7 Seconds" with Youssou N'Dour and "Sweet Dreams". Stewart collaborated with The Rolling Stones vocalist Mick Jagger on the soundtrack to the movie Alfie, released in 2004, including the critically acclaimed "Old Habits Die Hard", which won a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture.
On 7 November 2005, Eurythmics released Ultimate Collection, a remastered greatest hits package with two new songs. One of them, "I've Got a Life", was released as a single and reached No. 14 on the UK Singles Chart as well as spending three consecutive weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play in the US. Lennox and Stewart appeared on a number of TV shows to promote their new compilation album, which was a Top 5 hit and certified Platinum in the UK. On 14 November 2005, the duo's label, RCA, re-released their eight studio albums in remastered and expanded editions featuring rare B-sides, remixes and unreleased songs. The remasters were made available separately with expanded artwork, and also together in a collector's box set, entitled Boxed. However, the 1984 soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) was not included in this re-release campaign as Virgin Records holds the rights to that album. Also in 2005, Eurythmics were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. In 2007, Lennox resumed her solo career with her fourth album, Songs of Mass Destruction, which was a top 10 success in the UK and the US. In 2009, she released her first solo "greatest hits" package, The Annie Lennox Collection. The same year, Lennox stated that although she and Stewart remain friends, she does not foresee any further Eurythmics projects in the future.
In an interview with Reuters in September 2012, Stewart was quizzed on whether a new Eurythmics album is in the works, to which he replied: "We're not talking about one right now, but never say never." He added that he was considering developing a musical based on the music of Eurythmics.
2014: Reuniting for Beatles tribute concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart performed as a duo for "The Night That Changed America: A Grammy Salute to The Beatles". The event was recorded at the Los Angeles Convention Center on 27 January 2014, the day after the Grammy Awards. They performed The Beatles song "The Fool on the Hill".
2019: Reuniting for Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart, billed as Eurythmics, performed at Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert in aid of his Rainforest Foundation Fund on 9 December 2019 at New York City's Beacon Theatre. The group played "Would I Lie to You?", "Here Comes the Rain Again", and "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", before returning to join in the finale performance of Journey’s "Don't Stop Believin' along with the night's other performers.
Discography
In the Garden (1981)
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) (1983)
Touch (1983)
1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) (1984, soundtrack)
Be Yourself Tonight (1985)
Revenge (1986)
Savage (1987)
We Too Are One (1989)
Peace (1999)
Concerts
Sweet Dreams Tour (1983)
Touch Tour (1983–1984)
Revenge Tour (1986–1987)
Revival Tour (1989–1990)
Peace Tour (1999)
Awards
Billboard Music Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1983
| "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|
|-
| 1984
| rowspan=6|Themselves
| Top Disco Artist – Duo/Group
|
|
|-
| rowspan=9|1985
| Top Artist
|
| rowspan=9|
|-
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist – Duo/Group
|
|-
| Top Dance Club Play Artist
|
|-
| rowspan=2|Be Yourself Tonight
| Top Billboard 200 Album
|
|-
| Top Compact Disk
|
|-
| "Would I Lie to You?"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|-
| "Sexcrime"
| Top Dance Play Single
|
|-
| rowspan=2|1986
| rowspan=2|Themselves
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
| rowspan=2|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
Brit Awards
|-
|1984
|Themselves
|Best British Group
|
|-
|rowspan="2" |1986
|Be Yourself Tonight
|Best British Album
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |Themselves
|rowspan="3" |Best British Group
|
|-
|1987
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |1990
|
|-
|We Too Are One
|Best British Album
|
|-
|"Don't Ask Me Why"
|Best British Video
|
|-
|1999
|Themselves
|Outstanding Contribution to British Music
|
|-
| 2010
| "There Must Be an Angel"
| Live Performance of 30 Years
|
Grammy Awards
|-
| 1984
||Themselves
|Best New Artist
|
|-
| 1985
|Eurythmics Sweet Dreams: The Video Album
|Best Video Album
|
|-
|rowspan="2"| 1986
|"Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (with Aretha Franklin)
|Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
|"Would I Lie to You?"
|rowspan="2"|Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
| 1987
|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
| 1990
|Savage
|rowspan="2"|Best Music Video – Long Form
|
|-
| 1991
|We Two Are One Too
|
MTV Video Music Awards
|-
|1984
|"Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1985
|rowspan=5|"Would I Lie to You?"
|Best Stage Performance
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|Best Choreography
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|Best Group Video
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1987
|rowspan=5|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Most Experimental Video
|
|-
|Best Special Effects
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|1988
|"I Need a Man"
|Best Group Video
|
|-
|"You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart"
|Best Direction
|
Music & Media Year-End Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1987
| Themselves
| Group of the Year
|
|
1984: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Best Contemporary Song for "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)"
2000: Silver Clef Award
2000: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2003: Kindred Spirit Music Award
2005: Inducted into UK Music Hall of Fame
2008: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2009: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2010: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
References
External links
19 Recordings artists
1980 establishments in England
Brit Award winners
New wave duos
English pop music duos
English new wave musical groups
English synth-pop groups
British synth-pop new wave groups
Dance-rock musical groups
Grammy Award winners
Ivor Novello Award winners
Male–female musical duos
Musical groups disestablished in 1990
Musical groups disestablished in 2005
Musical groups established in 1980
Musical groups from London
Musical groups reestablished in 1999
RCA Records artists
Female-fronted musical groups | true | [
"Nostalgia is the sixth studio album by Scottish singer-songwriter Annie Lennox. It was released on 30 September 2014 by Island Records. It is Lennox's first album in four years, and her third album of covers. The album consists entirely of cover versions, mainly of compositions from the Great American Songbook originally written in the 1930s; two compositions initially date from the 1950s. The material was researched and learned by Lennox as she studied archival footage uploaded to YouTube.\n\nNostalgia debuted at number nine on the UK Albums Chart, becoming Lennox's sixth UK top-10 solo album. It debuted at number 10 on the US Billboard 200 with first-week sales of 32,000 copies, earning Lennox her third top-10 solo album on the chart, as well as her first-ever number-one album on both Billboards Jazz Albums and Traditional Jazz Albums charts. It had sold 139,000 copies in the United States as of April 2015. Nostalgia peaked inside the top ten in Austria, Canada, Italy and Switzerland. The album was nominated for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album at the 57th Grammy Awards.\n\nBackground and release\nOn 15 August 2014, Lennox published a blog post on her official website announcing the upcoming release of Nostalgia. She stated that the album would initially be released on vinyl LP format on 30 September 2014 as a three-week vinyl exclusive. Nostalgia was previewed to a small audience at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Los Angeles on 12 August 2014.\n\nPromotion\nLennox explained that she did not plan to tour as extensively as she did in support of her album Songs of Mass Destruction (2007). She told Billboard that \"at this point in time, less is more for me. I'm more about quality than quantity, and I think this is quite a niche place to be.\"\n\nThe single \"I Put a Spell on You\" received its first radio play on 15 September 2014 by Ken Bruce on BBC Radio 2. Lennox performed the song at the 57th Annual Grammy Awards in 2015, and coupled with the inclusion of the track as the opening song of the film Fifty Shades of Grey, pushed it into the Billboard Hot 100 at number 97 in February 2015. It also entered the UK Singles Chart at number 63 that same month.\n\nCritical response\n\nNostalgia received generally favourable reviews from critics. At Metacritic, the album has a score of 68 out of 100 based on eight reviews.\n\nMojo gave the album a positive review, stating it was \"Straight and true, without a trace of rear-view-mirror sentimentality.\" Mike Wass of Idolator wrote that Lennox \"breathes new life into the much-covered gems with perhaps the best vocal performance of her long and varied career\", noting the assistance given by the \"haunting arrangements\". He stated that it would be an understatement to call the album \"a departure from Annie's usual oeuvre,\" and that Lennox \"puts her own inimitable spin\" on the tracks. In a mixed review, The Guardian stated \"Lennox can't hope to approach the anguish or disgust of Billie Holiday's original 'Strange Fruit', so why even try, unless you're going to totally reinvent the song like the Cocteau Twins did? Lennox is at her best when she sounds most involved, and her beautiful takes on 'Georgia on My Mind', 'God Bless the Child' and 'You Belong to Me' are full of poignancy and yearning.\"\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\nCredits for Nostalgia adapted from Tidal.\n\nMusicians\n Annie Lennox - all vocals, Fender Rhodes piano, flute, organ, percussion, piano, string arrangement\n Mike Stevens - production, accordion, guitar, harmonica, keyboards, organ, vibraphone\n Chris Hill - bass guitar, double bass\n Ivan Hussey - cello\n Neal Wilkinson - drums\n Nichol Thomposn - trombone\n Simon Finch - trumpet\n Stephen Hussey - viola, violin, orchestration\n Richard Brook - percussion\n\nTechnical\n Mike Stevens - production, engineering, mixing, programming, studio personnel\n Mandy Parnell - master engineering, studio personnel\n Cameron Craig - studio personnel\n\nArtwork\n Gavin Taylor - art direction, design\n Robert Sebree - photography\n\nCharts\n\nWeekly charts\n\nYear-end charts\n\nCertifications\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2014 albums\nAnnie Lennox albums\nBlue Note Records albums\nCovers albums\nIsland Records albums\nTraditional pop albums",
"South Dakota Highway 17 (SD 17) is a state highway in southeastern South Dakota, United States. It runs along the eastern edge of Lennox. SD 17 formerly continued south to what is now SD 46 near Centerville, and north to SD 42 west of Sioux Falls.\n\nRoute description\n\nSD begins at the intersection with SD 44 in southeastern Lennox, in the west-central part of Lincoln County. It travels north along the eastern corporate limit of the town for . It ends at the intersection with 278th Street at the northeastern corner of the Lennox corporate limits.\n\nHistory\n\nThe original SD 17 was established in 1926, from west of Milbank to Peever. This became part of SD 15 by 1929 when it extended north.\nThe current SD 17 was established by 1929. It originally began at an intersection with what is now SD 46 near Centerville. This segment was decommissioned in the 1990s.\n\nIn 2018, the South Dakota State Legislature removed the portion of SD 17 that ran from its current northern terminus up to SD 42 from the state highway system and turned it over to local control.\n\nMajor intersections\n\nSee also\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n The Unofficial South Dakota Highways Page: Highways 1-30\n\n0017\nTransportation in Lincoln County, South Dakota\nTransportation in Minnehaha County, South Dakota"
] |
[
"Eurythmics",
"1990-98: Hiatus and solo careers",
"Why did they go on Hiatus?",
"), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded,",
"Did they put out any solo albums?",
"Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track \"Lily Was Here\" (",
"What did Lennox do at this time?",
"1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva."
] | C_16f0e54b9b3c4a6e8d82a614cc545917_0 | Did the album win any awards? | 4 | Did the album Diva win any awards? | Eurythmics | After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached no.6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. He also formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983-1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released. In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US. Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful. CANNOTANSWER | The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status | Eurythmics were a British pop duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. Stewart and Lennox were both previously in The Tourists, a band which broke up in 1980; Eurythmics were formed later that year in Wagga Wagga, Australia. The duo released their first studio album, In the Garden, in 1981 to little success, but went on to achieve global acclaim when their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), was released in 1983. The title track became a worldwide hit which topped the charts in various countries including the US. The duo went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split up in 1990. By this time, Stewart was a sought-after record producer, while Lennox began a solo recording career in 1992 with her debut album Diva. After almost a decade apart, Eurythmics reunited to record their ninth album, Peace, released in late 1999. They reunited again in 2005 to release the single "I've Got a Life", as part of a new Eurythmics compilation album, Ultimate Collection.
The duo have won an MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist in 1984, the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1987, the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 1999, and in 2005 were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. The Eurythmics have sold an estimated 75 million records worldwide. In 2017, the group was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and were nominated again in 2018.
History
1976–1982: Formation and In the Garden
Lennox and Stewart met in 1975 in a restaurant in London, where Lennox worked at that time. They first played together in 1976 in the punk rock band The Catch. After releasing one single as The Catch in 1977, the band evolved into The Tourists. Stewart and Lennox were also romantically involved. The Tourists achieved some commercial success, but the experience was reportedly an unhappy one. Personal and musical tensions existed within the group, whose main songwriter was Peet Coombes, and legal wranglings happened with the band's management, publishers and record labels. Lennox and Stewart felt the fixed band line-up was an inadequate vehicle to explore their experimental creative leanings and decided their next project should be much more flexible and free from artistic compromise. They were interested in creating pop music, but wanted freedom to experiment with electronics and the avant-garde.
It was in a hotel in Wagga Wagga, Australia, while playing around with a portable mini-synthesizer that Lennox and Stewart decided to become a duo. Calling themselves Eurythmics (after the pedagogical exercise system that Lennox had encountered as a child), they decided to keep themselves as the only permanent members and songwriters, and involve others in the collaboration "on the basis of mutual compatibility and availability". The duo signed to RCA Records. At this time, Lennox and Stewart also split as a couple. During the period that Lennox and Stewart were in The Tourists, and later as Eurythmics, they were managed by Kenny Smith and Sandra Turnbull of Hyper Kinetics Ltd.
They recorded their first album in Cologne with Conny Plank (who had produced the later Tourists sessions). This resulted in the album In the Garden, released in October 1981. The album mixed psychedelic, krautrock and electropop influences, and featured contributions from Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit (of Can), drummer Clem Burke (of Blondie), Robert Görl (of D.A.F.), and flautist Tim Wheater. A couple of the songs were co-written by guitarist Roger Pomphrey (later a TV director). The album was not a commercial success (though the debut single "Never Gonna Cry Again" made the UK charts at No. 63). Lennox and Stewart then activated their new Eurythmics mode of operation by touring the record as a duo, accompanied by backing tracks and electronics, carted around the country by themselves in a horse-box.
During 1982, the duo retreated to Chalk Farm in London and used a bank loan to establish a small eight-track studio above a picture framing factory, giving them freedom to record without having to pay expensive studio fees. They began to employ much more electronics in their music, collaborating with Raynard Faulkner and Adam Williams, recording many tracks in the studio and playing live using various line-up permutations. However, the three new singles they released that year ("This Is the House", "The Walk" and "Love Is a Stranger") all performed badly on initial release in the UK. Although their mode of operation had given them the creative freedom they desired, commercial success still eluded them and the responsibility of personally running so many of their affairs (down to transporting their own stage equipment) took its toll. Lennox apparently suffered at least one nervous breakdown during this period, while Stewart was hospitalised with a collapsed lung.
1983–1984: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and Touch
Eurythmics' commercial breakthrough came with their second album, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), released in January 1983. The successful title track featured a dark and powerful sequenced synth bass line and a dramatic video that introduced the now orange crew-cut Lennox to audiences. The song reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart, becoming one of the year's biggest sellers, and later topped the US Billboard Hot 100. The band's fortunes changed immensely from this moment on, and Lennox quickly became a pop icon, gracing the covers of numerous magazines including Rolling Stone. Their previous single, "Love Is a Stranger", was also re-released and became another chart success. The video for the song saw Lennox in many different character guises, a concept she would employ in various subsequent videos. The album's working title was Invisible Hands (as was a track left off the album), inspiring the name of the British independent company Invisible Hands Music – known for releasing music by Hugh Cornwell, Mick Karn and Hazel O'Connor. The album also featured a cover of the 1968 Sam & Dave hit "Wrap It Up", performed as a duet between Lennox and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti.
The duo quickly recorded a follow-up album, Touch, which was released in November 1983. It became the duo's first No. 1 album in the UK, and also spawned three major hit singles. "Who's That Girl?" was a top 3 hit in the UK, the video depicting Lennox as both a blonde chanteuse and as a gender-bending Elvis Presley clone. It also featured cameo appearances by Hazel O'Connor, Bananarama (including Stewart's future wife, Siobhan Fahey), Kate Garner of Haysi Fantayzee, Thereza Bazar of Dollar, Jay Aston and Cheryl Baker of Bucks Fizz, Kiki Dee, Jacquie O'Sullivan and the gender-bending pop singer Marilyn, who would go on to musical success of his own that same year. The upbeat, calypso-flavoured "Right by Your Side" showed a different side of Eurythmics altogether and also made the Top 10, and "Here Comes the Rain Again" (No. eight in the UK, No. four in the US) was an orchestral/synth ballad (with orchestrations by Michael Kamen).
In 1984 RCA released Touch Dance, an EP of remixes of four of the tracks from Touch, aimed at the club market. The remixes were by prominent New York City producers Francois Kevorkian and John "Jellybean" Benitez. Also released in 1984 was Eurythmics' soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother). Virgin Films had contracted the band to provide a soundtrack for Michael Radford's modern film adaptation of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, Radford later said that the music had been "foisted" on his film against his wishes, and that Virgin had replaced most of Dominic Muldowney's original orchestral score with the Eurythmics soundtrack (including the song "Julia", which was heard during the end credits). Nevertheless, the record was presented as "music derived from the original score of Eurythmics for the Michael Radford film version of Orwell's 1984". Eurythmics charged that they had been misled by the film's producers as well, and the album was withdrawn from the market for a period while matters were litigated. The album's first single, "Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)", was a top 5 hit in the UK, Australia and across Europe, and a major dance success in the United States.
1985–1986: Be Yourself Tonight and new musical direction
The duo's next album, Be Yourself Tonight, was produced in a week in Paris. It showcased much more of a "band style" and a centred sound (with an R&B influence), with real drums, brass, and much more guitar from Stewart. Almost a dozen other musicians were enlisted, including members of Tom Petty's Heartbreakers, guest harmonica from Stevie Wonder, bass guitar from Dean Garcia, string arrangements by Michael Kamen, and Lennox singing duets with Aretha Franklin and Elvis Costello. It continued the duo's transatlantic chart domination in 1985, and contained four hit singles: "Would I Lie to You?" was a US Billboard top five hit and Australian No. one, while "There Must Be an Angel (Playing with My Heart)" (featuring Wonder's harmonica contribution) became their first and only UK No. one single. The feminist anthem "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (a duet with Aretha Franklin, though originally intended for Tina Turner), and "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)" also rode high in the charts. In September 1985, Eurythmics performed "Would I Lie to You?" at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards at the Radio City Music Hall in New York.
1986–1990: Revenge, Savage and We Too Are One
Eurythmics released their next album, Revenge, in 1986. The album continued their move towards a band sound, verging on an AOR-pop/rock sound. Sales continued to be strong in the UK and internationally, but were somewhat slower in the US, though "Missionary Man" reached No. 14 on the US Hot 100 chart and went all the way to No. 1 on the US Album Oriented Rock chart (AOR). Revenge would eventually certify double Platinum in the UK and Gold in the US. The band went on a massive worldwide tour in support of the album, and a live concert video from the Australian leg of the tour was released.
In 1987, Lennox and Stewart released the album Savage. This saw a fairly radical change within the group's sound, being based mainly around programmed samples and drum loops (Lennox would later say that where Revenge was more of a Stewart album in sound, Savage was more of a Lennox one). Lyrically the songs showed an even darker, more obsessive side to Lennox's writing. A video album was also made, directed by Sophie Muller, with a video for each song. This was largely a concept piece, following characters portrayed by Lennox, specifically one of a frustrated housewife-turned-vamp (as exemplified in "Beethoven (I Love to Listen To)", a UK top 30 hit). The brazen, sexually charged rocker "I Need a Man" remains a Eurythmics staple, as does "You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart". Much less commercial than the two previous albums, Savage was mostly ignored in the US, although rock radio in more progressive markets supported "I Need a Man". In the duo's native UK however, the album was a top 10 success and was certified Platinum.
In 1989, Eurythmics released the album We Too Are One, which entered the UK Album Chart at No. 1 (their second No. 1 album after Touch) and gave the duo four UK Top 30 hit singles. The album was a return to the rock/pop sound of their mid-80s albums and was certified Double Platinum in the UK, but was less successful in the US (although the single "Don't Ask Me Why" grazed the Billboard Top 40). Other singles from the album included "Revival", "The King and Queen of America" and "Angel". Accompanying the album, the duo conducted their Revival world tour from 8 September 1989 to 25 January 1990. Parts of the tour (both on and off-stage) were interspersed with promo videos for Eurythmics' 1990 video album We Two Are One Too.
1990–1998: Hiatus and solo careers
After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached No. 6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. A soundtrack of the same name was also released, produced and largely written by Stewart. He formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983–1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released.
In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second No. 1 album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.
Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful.
1999–2005: Peace and Ultimate Collection
In the late 1990s, Eurythmics reunited and recorded a new album, Peace, which was released in 1999. The single "I Saved the World Today" reached No. 11 in the UK Singles Chart, and a remix of "17 Again" gave the duo their first chart-topper on the US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. The band also embarked on a world tour, dubbed the "Peacetour", to support the album. The tour started on 18 September 1999 at Cologne's Kölnarena and ended on 6 December 1999 at the London Docklands Arena (which was filmed and released on video and DVD). All proceeds from the tour went to Greenpeace and Amnesty International. The year 2000 saw numerous European festival appearances by Eurythmics (at Germany's Rock am Ring, among others). In 2001, Stewart performed with U2 for the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert. In 2002, he collaborated with Bryan Ferry on his album Frantic.
In June 2003, Lennox released her third solo album, entitled Bare, which was a top 5 hit in the UK and the US., with three tracks reaching the top of the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. She also recorded the song "Into the West" for Peter Jackson's film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, where it appeared as the closing theme and earned Lennox the Academy Award for Best Song. In November 2003, Eurythmics played three songs at the 46664 in Cape Town, South Africa, for which Stewart was one of the primary organisers. They played an unplugged version of "Here Comes the Rain Again", "7 Seconds" with Youssou N'Dour and "Sweet Dreams". Stewart collaborated with The Rolling Stones vocalist Mick Jagger on the soundtrack to the movie Alfie, released in 2004, including the critically acclaimed "Old Habits Die Hard", which won a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture.
On 7 November 2005, Eurythmics released Ultimate Collection, a remastered greatest hits package with two new songs. One of them, "I've Got a Life", was released as a single and reached No. 14 on the UK Singles Chart as well as spending three consecutive weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play in the US. Lennox and Stewart appeared on a number of TV shows to promote their new compilation album, which was a Top 5 hit and certified Platinum in the UK. On 14 November 2005, the duo's label, RCA, re-released their eight studio albums in remastered and expanded editions featuring rare B-sides, remixes and unreleased songs. The remasters were made available separately with expanded artwork, and also together in a collector's box set, entitled Boxed. However, the 1984 soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) was not included in this re-release campaign as Virgin Records holds the rights to that album. Also in 2005, Eurythmics were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. In 2007, Lennox resumed her solo career with her fourth album, Songs of Mass Destruction, which was a top 10 success in the UK and the US. In 2009, she released her first solo "greatest hits" package, The Annie Lennox Collection. The same year, Lennox stated that although she and Stewart remain friends, she does not foresee any further Eurythmics projects in the future.
In an interview with Reuters in September 2012, Stewart was quizzed on whether a new Eurythmics album is in the works, to which he replied: "We're not talking about one right now, but never say never." He added that he was considering developing a musical based on the music of Eurythmics.
2014: Reuniting for Beatles tribute concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart performed as a duo for "The Night That Changed America: A Grammy Salute to The Beatles". The event was recorded at the Los Angeles Convention Center on 27 January 2014, the day after the Grammy Awards. They performed The Beatles song "The Fool on the Hill".
2019: Reuniting for Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart, billed as Eurythmics, performed at Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert in aid of his Rainforest Foundation Fund on 9 December 2019 at New York City's Beacon Theatre. The group played "Would I Lie to You?", "Here Comes the Rain Again", and "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", before returning to join in the finale performance of Journey’s "Don't Stop Believin' along with the night's other performers.
Discography
In the Garden (1981)
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) (1983)
Touch (1983)
1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) (1984, soundtrack)
Be Yourself Tonight (1985)
Revenge (1986)
Savage (1987)
We Too Are One (1989)
Peace (1999)
Concerts
Sweet Dreams Tour (1983)
Touch Tour (1983–1984)
Revenge Tour (1986–1987)
Revival Tour (1989–1990)
Peace Tour (1999)
Awards
Billboard Music Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1983
| "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|
|-
| 1984
| rowspan=6|Themselves
| Top Disco Artist – Duo/Group
|
|
|-
| rowspan=9|1985
| Top Artist
|
| rowspan=9|
|-
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist – Duo/Group
|
|-
| Top Dance Club Play Artist
|
|-
| rowspan=2|Be Yourself Tonight
| Top Billboard 200 Album
|
|-
| Top Compact Disk
|
|-
| "Would I Lie to You?"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|-
| "Sexcrime"
| Top Dance Play Single
|
|-
| rowspan=2|1986
| rowspan=2|Themselves
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
| rowspan=2|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
Brit Awards
|-
|1984
|Themselves
|Best British Group
|
|-
|rowspan="2" |1986
|Be Yourself Tonight
|Best British Album
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |Themselves
|rowspan="3" |Best British Group
|
|-
|1987
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |1990
|
|-
|We Too Are One
|Best British Album
|
|-
|"Don't Ask Me Why"
|Best British Video
|
|-
|1999
|Themselves
|Outstanding Contribution to British Music
|
|-
| 2010
| "There Must Be an Angel"
| Live Performance of 30 Years
|
Grammy Awards
|-
| 1984
||Themselves
|Best New Artist
|
|-
| 1985
|Eurythmics Sweet Dreams: The Video Album
|Best Video Album
|
|-
|rowspan="2"| 1986
|"Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (with Aretha Franklin)
|Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
|"Would I Lie to You?"
|rowspan="2"|Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
| 1987
|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
| 1990
|Savage
|rowspan="2"|Best Music Video – Long Form
|
|-
| 1991
|We Two Are One Too
|
MTV Video Music Awards
|-
|1984
|"Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1985
|rowspan=5|"Would I Lie to You?"
|Best Stage Performance
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|Best Choreography
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|Best Group Video
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1987
|rowspan=5|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Most Experimental Video
|
|-
|Best Special Effects
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|1988
|"I Need a Man"
|Best Group Video
|
|-
|"You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart"
|Best Direction
|
Music & Media Year-End Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1987
| Themselves
| Group of the Year
|
|
1984: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Best Contemporary Song for "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)"
2000: Silver Clef Award
2000: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2003: Kindred Spirit Music Award
2005: Inducted into UK Music Hall of Fame
2008: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2009: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2010: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
References
External links
19 Recordings artists
1980 establishments in England
Brit Award winners
New wave duos
English pop music duos
English new wave musical groups
English synth-pop groups
British synth-pop new wave groups
Dance-rock musical groups
Grammy Award winners
Ivor Novello Award winners
Male–female musical duos
Musical groups disestablished in 1990
Musical groups disestablished in 2005
Musical groups established in 1980
Musical groups from London
Musical groups reestablished in 1999
RCA Records artists
Female-fronted musical groups | false | [
"Iz*One was a twelve-member South Korean and Japanese girl group formed in 2018 through Produce 48, a music competition reality show. The group achieved significant commercial success with its debut extended play Color*Iz (2018), released under Off the Record Entertainment, and won several new artist awards, including Best New Artist at the 20th Mnet Asian Music Awards, Rookie of the Year at the 33rd Golden Disc Awards, and the New Artist Award at the 28th Seoul Music Awards. The group's second EP, Heart*Iz (2019), was released to greater commercial success than its predecessor, and received Disc Bonsang nominations at the 34th Golden Disc Awards and the 29th Seoul Music Awards respectively. The EP's lead single, \"Violeta\", received a nomination for Song of the Year at the 21st Mnet Asian Music Awards.\n\nThe group earned its first ever daesang award nominations for its first studio album Bloom*Iz, released in February 2020. The album was nominated for Album of the Year at both the 12th Melon Music Awards and the 10th Gaon Chart Music Awards, while its lead single \"Fiesta\" was also nominated at both ceremonies for Best Dance – Female and Song of the Year – February respectively. Iz*One did not win any of the nominations but the group received its second Artist of the Year bonsang at the Melon Music Awards. Bloom*Iz garnered an additional Bonsang Award nomination at the 30th Seoul Music Awards. The group's follow-up EP, Oneiric Diary, released in June 2020, was also nominated alongside its predecessor at the Gaon Awards, for Album of the Year – 3rd Quarter. The group won its third Artist of the Year bonsang at the 3rd Fact Music Awards in December 2020.\n\nAwards and nominations\n\nNotes\n\nReferences \n\nIz*One\nAwards",
"The 54th Academy of Country Music Awards was held at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada on April 7, 2019. Nominations were announced on February 20, 2019 by Reba McEntire during CBS This Morning, with Chris Stapleton and Dan + Shay leading with six nominations each. McEntire returned to host the awards for the sixteenth time.\n\nJason Aldean was presented with the ACM's rare honor \"Artist of the Decade\" by previous holder George Strait.\n\nWinners and Nominees \nThe winners are shown in bold.\n\nPerformances\n\nPresenters\n\nReception \nIn its review of the event, Rolling Stone Country praised that the ACMs took the opportunity to bring seasoned musicians Amanda Shires and Charlie Worsham \"into the fold\" by having them appear alongside Luke Combs and Keith Urban respectively but criticised that the ACMs did not introduce either of them or even feature them on screen. Worsham, who the reviewer believed should have been nominated for his own awards, performed \"mostly in the shadows\" and Shires, who \"helped transform [Combs' performance] with her lyrical playing\" was barely seen. Rolling Stone also praised Reba McEntire's hosting and the performances by Dierks Bentley and Brandi Carlile, Little Big Town, Miranda Lambert and Ashley McBryde but stated that it was \"baffling\" that Kacey Musgraves, who had five nominations and won the CMA Award for Album of the Year and four Grammy Awards including Best Country Album and the all-genre Album of the Year for Golden Hour, did not perform. Musgraves' win made her only the third artist (after Taylor Swift and the artists that appeared on Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?) to win the ACM, CMA and Grammy Awards for Best Country Album as well as the all-genre Grammy for Album of the Year.\n\nSee also\nAcademy of Country Music Awards\n\nReferences\n\nAcademy of Country Music Awards\nAcademy of Country Music Awards\nAcademy of Country Music Awards\nAcademy of Country Music Awards\nAcademy of Country Music Awards\nAcademy of Country Music Awards\nAcademy of Country Music Awards"
] |
[
"Eurythmics",
"1990-98: Hiatus and solo careers",
"Why did they go on Hiatus?",
"), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded,",
"Did they put out any solo albums?",
"Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track \"Lily Was Here\" (",
"What did Lennox do at this time?",
"1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva.",
"Did the album win any awards?",
"The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status"
] | C_16f0e54b9b3c4a6e8d82a614cc545917_0 | Did she release any other solo albums? | 5 | Other than Diva, did Lennox release any other solo albums? | Eurythmics | After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached no.6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. He also formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983-1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released. In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US. Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful. CANNOTANSWER | Medusa, | Eurythmics were a British pop duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. Stewart and Lennox were both previously in The Tourists, a band which broke up in 1980; Eurythmics were formed later that year in Wagga Wagga, Australia. The duo released their first studio album, In the Garden, in 1981 to little success, but went on to achieve global acclaim when their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), was released in 1983. The title track became a worldwide hit which topped the charts in various countries including the US. The duo went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split up in 1990. By this time, Stewart was a sought-after record producer, while Lennox began a solo recording career in 1992 with her debut album Diva. After almost a decade apart, Eurythmics reunited to record their ninth album, Peace, released in late 1999. They reunited again in 2005 to release the single "I've Got a Life", as part of a new Eurythmics compilation album, Ultimate Collection.
The duo have won an MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist in 1984, the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1987, the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 1999, and in 2005 were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. The Eurythmics have sold an estimated 75 million records worldwide. In 2017, the group was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and were nominated again in 2018.
History
1976–1982: Formation and In the Garden
Lennox and Stewart met in 1975 in a restaurant in London, where Lennox worked at that time. They first played together in 1976 in the punk rock band The Catch. After releasing one single as The Catch in 1977, the band evolved into The Tourists. Stewart and Lennox were also romantically involved. The Tourists achieved some commercial success, but the experience was reportedly an unhappy one. Personal and musical tensions existed within the group, whose main songwriter was Peet Coombes, and legal wranglings happened with the band's management, publishers and record labels. Lennox and Stewart felt the fixed band line-up was an inadequate vehicle to explore their experimental creative leanings and decided their next project should be much more flexible and free from artistic compromise. They were interested in creating pop music, but wanted freedom to experiment with electronics and the avant-garde.
It was in a hotel in Wagga Wagga, Australia, while playing around with a portable mini-synthesizer that Lennox and Stewart decided to become a duo. Calling themselves Eurythmics (after the pedagogical exercise system that Lennox had encountered as a child), they decided to keep themselves as the only permanent members and songwriters, and involve others in the collaboration "on the basis of mutual compatibility and availability". The duo signed to RCA Records. At this time, Lennox and Stewart also split as a couple. During the period that Lennox and Stewart were in The Tourists, and later as Eurythmics, they were managed by Kenny Smith and Sandra Turnbull of Hyper Kinetics Ltd.
They recorded their first album in Cologne with Conny Plank (who had produced the later Tourists sessions). This resulted in the album In the Garden, released in October 1981. The album mixed psychedelic, krautrock and electropop influences, and featured contributions from Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit (of Can), drummer Clem Burke (of Blondie), Robert Görl (of D.A.F.), and flautist Tim Wheater. A couple of the songs were co-written by guitarist Roger Pomphrey (later a TV director). The album was not a commercial success (though the debut single "Never Gonna Cry Again" made the UK charts at No. 63). Lennox and Stewart then activated their new Eurythmics mode of operation by touring the record as a duo, accompanied by backing tracks and electronics, carted around the country by themselves in a horse-box.
During 1982, the duo retreated to Chalk Farm in London and used a bank loan to establish a small eight-track studio above a picture framing factory, giving them freedom to record without having to pay expensive studio fees. They began to employ much more electronics in their music, collaborating with Raynard Faulkner and Adam Williams, recording many tracks in the studio and playing live using various line-up permutations. However, the three new singles they released that year ("This Is the House", "The Walk" and "Love Is a Stranger") all performed badly on initial release in the UK. Although their mode of operation had given them the creative freedom they desired, commercial success still eluded them and the responsibility of personally running so many of their affairs (down to transporting their own stage equipment) took its toll. Lennox apparently suffered at least one nervous breakdown during this period, while Stewart was hospitalised with a collapsed lung.
1983–1984: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and Touch
Eurythmics' commercial breakthrough came with their second album, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), released in January 1983. The successful title track featured a dark and powerful sequenced synth bass line and a dramatic video that introduced the now orange crew-cut Lennox to audiences. The song reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart, becoming one of the year's biggest sellers, and later topped the US Billboard Hot 100. The band's fortunes changed immensely from this moment on, and Lennox quickly became a pop icon, gracing the covers of numerous magazines including Rolling Stone. Their previous single, "Love Is a Stranger", was also re-released and became another chart success. The video for the song saw Lennox in many different character guises, a concept she would employ in various subsequent videos. The album's working title was Invisible Hands (as was a track left off the album), inspiring the name of the British independent company Invisible Hands Music – known for releasing music by Hugh Cornwell, Mick Karn and Hazel O'Connor. The album also featured a cover of the 1968 Sam & Dave hit "Wrap It Up", performed as a duet between Lennox and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti.
The duo quickly recorded a follow-up album, Touch, which was released in November 1983. It became the duo's first No. 1 album in the UK, and also spawned three major hit singles. "Who's That Girl?" was a top 3 hit in the UK, the video depicting Lennox as both a blonde chanteuse and as a gender-bending Elvis Presley clone. It also featured cameo appearances by Hazel O'Connor, Bananarama (including Stewart's future wife, Siobhan Fahey), Kate Garner of Haysi Fantayzee, Thereza Bazar of Dollar, Jay Aston and Cheryl Baker of Bucks Fizz, Kiki Dee, Jacquie O'Sullivan and the gender-bending pop singer Marilyn, who would go on to musical success of his own that same year. The upbeat, calypso-flavoured "Right by Your Side" showed a different side of Eurythmics altogether and also made the Top 10, and "Here Comes the Rain Again" (No. eight in the UK, No. four in the US) was an orchestral/synth ballad (with orchestrations by Michael Kamen).
In 1984 RCA released Touch Dance, an EP of remixes of four of the tracks from Touch, aimed at the club market. The remixes were by prominent New York City producers Francois Kevorkian and John "Jellybean" Benitez. Also released in 1984 was Eurythmics' soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother). Virgin Films had contracted the band to provide a soundtrack for Michael Radford's modern film adaptation of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, Radford later said that the music had been "foisted" on his film against his wishes, and that Virgin had replaced most of Dominic Muldowney's original orchestral score with the Eurythmics soundtrack (including the song "Julia", which was heard during the end credits). Nevertheless, the record was presented as "music derived from the original score of Eurythmics for the Michael Radford film version of Orwell's 1984". Eurythmics charged that they had been misled by the film's producers as well, and the album was withdrawn from the market for a period while matters were litigated. The album's first single, "Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)", was a top 5 hit in the UK, Australia and across Europe, and a major dance success in the United States.
1985–1986: Be Yourself Tonight and new musical direction
The duo's next album, Be Yourself Tonight, was produced in a week in Paris. It showcased much more of a "band style" and a centred sound (with an R&B influence), with real drums, brass, and much more guitar from Stewart. Almost a dozen other musicians were enlisted, including members of Tom Petty's Heartbreakers, guest harmonica from Stevie Wonder, bass guitar from Dean Garcia, string arrangements by Michael Kamen, and Lennox singing duets with Aretha Franklin and Elvis Costello. It continued the duo's transatlantic chart domination in 1985, and contained four hit singles: "Would I Lie to You?" was a US Billboard top five hit and Australian No. one, while "There Must Be an Angel (Playing with My Heart)" (featuring Wonder's harmonica contribution) became their first and only UK No. one single. The feminist anthem "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (a duet with Aretha Franklin, though originally intended for Tina Turner), and "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)" also rode high in the charts. In September 1985, Eurythmics performed "Would I Lie to You?" at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards at the Radio City Music Hall in New York.
1986–1990: Revenge, Savage and We Too Are One
Eurythmics released their next album, Revenge, in 1986. The album continued their move towards a band sound, verging on an AOR-pop/rock sound. Sales continued to be strong in the UK and internationally, but were somewhat slower in the US, though "Missionary Man" reached No. 14 on the US Hot 100 chart and went all the way to No. 1 on the US Album Oriented Rock chart (AOR). Revenge would eventually certify double Platinum in the UK and Gold in the US. The band went on a massive worldwide tour in support of the album, and a live concert video from the Australian leg of the tour was released.
In 1987, Lennox and Stewart released the album Savage. This saw a fairly radical change within the group's sound, being based mainly around programmed samples and drum loops (Lennox would later say that where Revenge was more of a Stewart album in sound, Savage was more of a Lennox one). Lyrically the songs showed an even darker, more obsessive side to Lennox's writing. A video album was also made, directed by Sophie Muller, with a video for each song. This was largely a concept piece, following characters portrayed by Lennox, specifically one of a frustrated housewife-turned-vamp (as exemplified in "Beethoven (I Love to Listen To)", a UK top 30 hit). The brazen, sexually charged rocker "I Need a Man" remains a Eurythmics staple, as does "You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart". Much less commercial than the two previous albums, Savage was mostly ignored in the US, although rock radio in more progressive markets supported "I Need a Man". In the duo's native UK however, the album was a top 10 success and was certified Platinum.
In 1989, Eurythmics released the album We Too Are One, which entered the UK Album Chart at No. 1 (their second No. 1 album after Touch) and gave the duo four UK Top 30 hit singles. The album was a return to the rock/pop sound of their mid-80s albums and was certified Double Platinum in the UK, but was less successful in the US (although the single "Don't Ask Me Why" grazed the Billboard Top 40). Other singles from the album included "Revival", "The King and Queen of America" and "Angel". Accompanying the album, the duo conducted their Revival world tour from 8 September 1989 to 25 January 1990. Parts of the tour (both on and off-stage) were interspersed with promo videos for Eurythmics' 1990 video album We Two Are One Too.
1990–1998: Hiatus and solo careers
After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached No. 6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. A soundtrack of the same name was also released, produced and largely written by Stewart. He formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983–1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released.
In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second No. 1 album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.
Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful.
1999–2005: Peace and Ultimate Collection
In the late 1990s, Eurythmics reunited and recorded a new album, Peace, which was released in 1999. The single "I Saved the World Today" reached No. 11 in the UK Singles Chart, and a remix of "17 Again" gave the duo their first chart-topper on the US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. The band also embarked on a world tour, dubbed the "Peacetour", to support the album. The tour started on 18 September 1999 at Cologne's Kölnarena and ended on 6 December 1999 at the London Docklands Arena (which was filmed and released on video and DVD). All proceeds from the tour went to Greenpeace and Amnesty International. The year 2000 saw numerous European festival appearances by Eurythmics (at Germany's Rock am Ring, among others). In 2001, Stewart performed with U2 for the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert. In 2002, he collaborated with Bryan Ferry on his album Frantic.
In June 2003, Lennox released her third solo album, entitled Bare, which was a top 5 hit in the UK and the US., with three tracks reaching the top of the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. She also recorded the song "Into the West" for Peter Jackson's film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, where it appeared as the closing theme and earned Lennox the Academy Award for Best Song. In November 2003, Eurythmics played three songs at the 46664 in Cape Town, South Africa, for which Stewart was one of the primary organisers. They played an unplugged version of "Here Comes the Rain Again", "7 Seconds" with Youssou N'Dour and "Sweet Dreams". Stewart collaborated with The Rolling Stones vocalist Mick Jagger on the soundtrack to the movie Alfie, released in 2004, including the critically acclaimed "Old Habits Die Hard", which won a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture.
On 7 November 2005, Eurythmics released Ultimate Collection, a remastered greatest hits package with two new songs. One of them, "I've Got a Life", was released as a single and reached No. 14 on the UK Singles Chart as well as spending three consecutive weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play in the US. Lennox and Stewart appeared on a number of TV shows to promote their new compilation album, which was a Top 5 hit and certified Platinum in the UK. On 14 November 2005, the duo's label, RCA, re-released their eight studio albums in remastered and expanded editions featuring rare B-sides, remixes and unreleased songs. The remasters were made available separately with expanded artwork, and also together in a collector's box set, entitled Boxed. However, the 1984 soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) was not included in this re-release campaign as Virgin Records holds the rights to that album. Also in 2005, Eurythmics were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. In 2007, Lennox resumed her solo career with her fourth album, Songs of Mass Destruction, which was a top 10 success in the UK and the US. In 2009, she released her first solo "greatest hits" package, The Annie Lennox Collection. The same year, Lennox stated that although she and Stewart remain friends, she does not foresee any further Eurythmics projects in the future.
In an interview with Reuters in September 2012, Stewart was quizzed on whether a new Eurythmics album is in the works, to which he replied: "We're not talking about one right now, but never say never." He added that he was considering developing a musical based on the music of Eurythmics.
2014: Reuniting for Beatles tribute concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart performed as a duo for "The Night That Changed America: A Grammy Salute to The Beatles". The event was recorded at the Los Angeles Convention Center on 27 January 2014, the day after the Grammy Awards. They performed The Beatles song "The Fool on the Hill".
2019: Reuniting for Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart, billed as Eurythmics, performed at Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert in aid of his Rainforest Foundation Fund on 9 December 2019 at New York City's Beacon Theatre. The group played "Would I Lie to You?", "Here Comes the Rain Again", and "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", before returning to join in the finale performance of Journey’s "Don't Stop Believin' along with the night's other performers.
Discography
In the Garden (1981)
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) (1983)
Touch (1983)
1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) (1984, soundtrack)
Be Yourself Tonight (1985)
Revenge (1986)
Savage (1987)
We Too Are One (1989)
Peace (1999)
Concerts
Sweet Dreams Tour (1983)
Touch Tour (1983–1984)
Revenge Tour (1986–1987)
Revival Tour (1989–1990)
Peace Tour (1999)
Awards
Billboard Music Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1983
| "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|
|-
| 1984
| rowspan=6|Themselves
| Top Disco Artist – Duo/Group
|
|
|-
| rowspan=9|1985
| Top Artist
|
| rowspan=9|
|-
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist – Duo/Group
|
|-
| Top Dance Club Play Artist
|
|-
| rowspan=2|Be Yourself Tonight
| Top Billboard 200 Album
|
|-
| Top Compact Disk
|
|-
| "Would I Lie to You?"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|-
| "Sexcrime"
| Top Dance Play Single
|
|-
| rowspan=2|1986
| rowspan=2|Themselves
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
| rowspan=2|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
Brit Awards
|-
|1984
|Themselves
|Best British Group
|
|-
|rowspan="2" |1986
|Be Yourself Tonight
|Best British Album
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |Themselves
|rowspan="3" |Best British Group
|
|-
|1987
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |1990
|
|-
|We Too Are One
|Best British Album
|
|-
|"Don't Ask Me Why"
|Best British Video
|
|-
|1999
|Themselves
|Outstanding Contribution to British Music
|
|-
| 2010
| "There Must Be an Angel"
| Live Performance of 30 Years
|
Grammy Awards
|-
| 1984
||Themselves
|Best New Artist
|
|-
| 1985
|Eurythmics Sweet Dreams: The Video Album
|Best Video Album
|
|-
|rowspan="2"| 1986
|"Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (with Aretha Franklin)
|Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
|"Would I Lie to You?"
|rowspan="2"|Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
| 1987
|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
| 1990
|Savage
|rowspan="2"|Best Music Video – Long Form
|
|-
| 1991
|We Two Are One Too
|
MTV Video Music Awards
|-
|1984
|"Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1985
|rowspan=5|"Would I Lie to You?"
|Best Stage Performance
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|Best Choreography
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|Best Group Video
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1987
|rowspan=5|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Most Experimental Video
|
|-
|Best Special Effects
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|1988
|"I Need a Man"
|Best Group Video
|
|-
|"You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart"
|Best Direction
|
Music & Media Year-End Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1987
| Themselves
| Group of the Year
|
|
1984: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Best Contemporary Song for "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)"
2000: Silver Clef Award
2000: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2003: Kindred Spirit Music Award
2005: Inducted into UK Music Hall of Fame
2008: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2009: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2010: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
References
External links
19 Recordings artists
1980 establishments in England
Brit Award winners
New wave duos
English pop music duos
English new wave musical groups
English synth-pop groups
British synth-pop new wave groups
Dance-rock musical groups
Grammy Award winners
Ivor Novello Award winners
Male–female musical duos
Musical groups disestablished in 1990
Musical groups disestablished in 2005
Musical groups established in 1980
Musical groups from London
Musical groups reestablished in 1999
RCA Records artists
Female-fronted musical groups | true | [
"Solo Live is a solo piano album by Michel Petrucciani, recorded in 1997 at the Alte Oper in Frankfurt, Germany, and released on the Dreyfus label in 1998. A double-CD version of the concert was released in 2007, under the title Piano Solo: The Complete Concert in Germany, and featured 20 tracks instead of the original release's 11.\n\nMusic\nMost of the tracks are Petrucciani originals. \"Looking Up\" is \"overtly optimistic and inherently hopeful\"; \"Home\" is a \"statement of warmth and comfort\"; \"Brazilian Like\" is \"orchestral and melodic to the point at which the tune remains in one's head long after its conclusion\".\n\nReception\nThe AllMusic review awarded it four and a half stars and described it as \"Petrucciani's lasting solo gift to the jazz world\". The Penguin Guide to Jazz gave it a maximum four stars and added it to the suggestsed Core Collection list.\n\nTrack listing\nAll tracks written by Petrucciani, unless stated otherwise.\n\n1998 CD Release\n \"Looking Up\" – 4:24\n \"Besame Mucho\" (Consuelo Velázquez) – 4:03\n \"Rachid\" – 2:22\n \"Chloé Meets Gershwin\" – 4:08\n \"Home\" – 3:40\n \"Brazilian Like\" – 3:07\n \"Little Peace in C for U\" – 4:12\n \"Romantic But Not Blue\" – 3:22\n \"Trilogy in Blois (Morning Sun, Noon Sun and Night Sun in Blois)\" – 11:29\n \"Caravan\" (Irving Mills, Duke Ellington, Juan Tizol) – 10:09\n \"She Did It Again\" / \"Take The A Train\" (Billy Strayhorn) / \"She Did It Again\" – 4:53\n\n2007 2CD Complete Release\n \"Colors\" – 7:43\n \"Training\" – 3:12\n \"Hidden Joy\" – 2:46\n \"Les Grelots\" (Eddie Louiss) – 4:26\n \"Guadeloupe\" – 5:02\n \"Love Letter\" – 5:44\n \"Little Peace in C for U\" – 4:47\n Michel Petrucciani Speech – 2:55\n \"J'Aurais Tellement Voulu\" – 3:30\n \"Rachid\" – 2:22\n \"Chloé Meets Gershwin\" – 4:07\n \"Home\" – 3:29\n \"Brazilian Like\" – 3:13\n \"Romantic But Not Blue\" – 3:28\n \"Trilogy in Blois (Morning Sun in Blois - Noon Sun in Blois - Night Sun in Blois)\" – 11:48\n \"Caravan\" (Ellington, Tizol, Mills) – 10:46\n \"Looking Up\" – 3:51\n \"Besame Mucho\" (Velázquez) – 4:51\n \"She Did It Again\" – 2:08\n \"Take the \"A\" Train\" (Strayhorn) – 2:27\n\nReferences\n\nMichel Petrucciani live albums\n1999 live albums\nBlue Note Records live albums\nSolo piano jazz albums",
"This is the discography of American R&B/soul singer Chaka Khan. It includes two songs that have reached the Top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100. One of those reached the top ten. She has placed four albums in the top twenty of the Billboard Albums Chart.\n\nKhan released her first studio album in 1978 while she was still the lead singer of the R&B/funk band Rufus. She would continue to release albums with the group off and on until its dissolution in 1983. She has recorded a total of twelve albums during her solo career. Her first solo single was \"I'm Every Woman\", also released in 1978. She has released a total of 41 solo singles throughout her career.\n\nLabel associations\nKhan spent the first 14 years of her solo career with Warner Bros. Records, where she released eight albums. She has also released albums for the Elektra, NPG, Earthsong, and Burgundy labels.\n\nAlbums\n\nStudio albums\n\nCompilation albums\n\nSingles\n\nAs main performer\n\nAs featured performer\n\nOther appearances\n\nSingles (above) are excluded.\n\nSee also\nRufus (band)#Discography\n\nNotes\n\nReferences\n\nDiscographies of American artists\nRhythm and blues discographies\nSoul music discographies\nFunk music discographies\nDisco discographies"
] |
[
"Eurythmics",
"1990-98: Hiatus and solo careers",
"Why did they go on Hiatus?",
"), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded,",
"Did they put out any solo albums?",
"Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track \"Lily Was Here\" (",
"What did Lennox do at this time?",
"1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva.",
"Did the album win any awards?",
"The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status",
"Did she release any other solo albums?",
"Medusa,"
] | C_16f0e54b9b3c4a6e8d82a614cc545917_0 | Did Medusa win any awards? | 6 | Did the album Medusa win any awards? | Eurythmics | After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached no.6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. He also formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983-1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released. In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US. Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful. CANNOTANSWER | It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US. | Eurythmics were a British pop duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. Stewart and Lennox were both previously in The Tourists, a band which broke up in 1980; Eurythmics were formed later that year in Wagga Wagga, Australia. The duo released their first studio album, In the Garden, in 1981 to little success, but went on to achieve global acclaim when their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), was released in 1983. The title track became a worldwide hit which topped the charts in various countries including the US. The duo went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split up in 1990. By this time, Stewart was a sought-after record producer, while Lennox began a solo recording career in 1992 with her debut album Diva. After almost a decade apart, Eurythmics reunited to record their ninth album, Peace, released in late 1999. They reunited again in 2005 to release the single "I've Got a Life", as part of a new Eurythmics compilation album, Ultimate Collection.
The duo have won an MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist in 1984, the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1987, the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 1999, and in 2005 were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. The Eurythmics have sold an estimated 75 million records worldwide. In 2017, the group was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and were nominated again in 2018.
History
1976–1982: Formation and In the Garden
Lennox and Stewart met in 1975 in a restaurant in London, where Lennox worked at that time. They first played together in 1976 in the punk rock band The Catch. After releasing one single as The Catch in 1977, the band evolved into The Tourists. Stewart and Lennox were also romantically involved. The Tourists achieved some commercial success, but the experience was reportedly an unhappy one. Personal and musical tensions existed within the group, whose main songwriter was Peet Coombes, and legal wranglings happened with the band's management, publishers and record labels. Lennox and Stewart felt the fixed band line-up was an inadequate vehicle to explore their experimental creative leanings and decided their next project should be much more flexible and free from artistic compromise. They were interested in creating pop music, but wanted freedom to experiment with electronics and the avant-garde.
It was in a hotel in Wagga Wagga, Australia, while playing around with a portable mini-synthesizer that Lennox and Stewart decided to become a duo. Calling themselves Eurythmics (after the pedagogical exercise system that Lennox had encountered as a child), they decided to keep themselves as the only permanent members and songwriters, and involve others in the collaboration "on the basis of mutual compatibility and availability". The duo signed to RCA Records. At this time, Lennox and Stewart also split as a couple. During the period that Lennox and Stewart were in The Tourists, and later as Eurythmics, they were managed by Kenny Smith and Sandra Turnbull of Hyper Kinetics Ltd.
They recorded their first album in Cologne with Conny Plank (who had produced the later Tourists sessions). This resulted in the album In the Garden, released in October 1981. The album mixed psychedelic, krautrock and electropop influences, and featured contributions from Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit (of Can), drummer Clem Burke (of Blondie), Robert Görl (of D.A.F.), and flautist Tim Wheater. A couple of the songs were co-written by guitarist Roger Pomphrey (later a TV director). The album was not a commercial success (though the debut single "Never Gonna Cry Again" made the UK charts at No. 63). Lennox and Stewart then activated their new Eurythmics mode of operation by touring the record as a duo, accompanied by backing tracks and electronics, carted around the country by themselves in a horse-box.
During 1982, the duo retreated to Chalk Farm in London and used a bank loan to establish a small eight-track studio above a picture framing factory, giving them freedom to record without having to pay expensive studio fees. They began to employ much more electronics in their music, collaborating with Raynard Faulkner and Adam Williams, recording many tracks in the studio and playing live using various line-up permutations. However, the three new singles they released that year ("This Is the House", "The Walk" and "Love Is a Stranger") all performed badly on initial release in the UK. Although their mode of operation had given them the creative freedom they desired, commercial success still eluded them and the responsibility of personally running so many of their affairs (down to transporting their own stage equipment) took its toll. Lennox apparently suffered at least one nervous breakdown during this period, while Stewart was hospitalised with a collapsed lung.
1983–1984: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and Touch
Eurythmics' commercial breakthrough came with their second album, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), released in January 1983. The successful title track featured a dark and powerful sequenced synth bass line and a dramatic video that introduced the now orange crew-cut Lennox to audiences. The song reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart, becoming one of the year's biggest sellers, and later topped the US Billboard Hot 100. The band's fortunes changed immensely from this moment on, and Lennox quickly became a pop icon, gracing the covers of numerous magazines including Rolling Stone. Their previous single, "Love Is a Stranger", was also re-released and became another chart success. The video for the song saw Lennox in many different character guises, a concept she would employ in various subsequent videos. The album's working title was Invisible Hands (as was a track left off the album), inspiring the name of the British independent company Invisible Hands Music – known for releasing music by Hugh Cornwell, Mick Karn and Hazel O'Connor. The album also featured a cover of the 1968 Sam & Dave hit "Wrap It Up", performed as a duet between Lennox and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti.
The duo quickly recorded a follow-up album, Touch, which was released in November 1983. It became the duo's first No. 1 album in the UK, and also spawned three major hit singles. "Who's That Girl?" was a top 3 hit in the UK, the video depicting Lennox as both a blonde chanteuse and as a gender-bending Elvis Presley clone. It also featured cameo appearances by Hazel O'Connor, Bananarama (including Stewart's future wife, Siobhan Fahey), Kate Garner of Haysi Fantayzee, Thereza Bazar of Dollar, Jay Aston and Cheryl Baker of Bucks Fizz, Kiki Dee, Jacquie O'Sullivan and the gender-bending pop singer Marilyn, who would go on to musical success of his own that same year. The upbeat, calypso-flavoured "Right by Your Side" showed a different side of Eurythmics altogether and also made the Top 10, and "Here Comes the Rain Again" (No. eight in the UK, No. four in the US) was an orchestral/synth ballad (with orchestrations by Michael Kamen).
In 1984 RCA released Touch Dance, an EP of remixes of four of the tracks from Touch, aimed at the club market. The remixes were by prominent New York City producers Francois Kevorkian and John "Jellybean" Benitez. Also released in 1984 was Eurythmics' soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother). Virgin Films had contracted the band to provide a soundtrack for Michael Radford's modern film adaptation of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, Radford later said that the music had been "foisted" on his film against his wishes, and that Virgin had replaced most of Dominic Muldowney's original orchestral score with the Eurythmics soundtrack (including the song "Julia", which was heard during the end credits). Nevertheless, the record was presented as "music derived from the original score of Eurythmics for the Michael Radford film version of Orwell's 1984". Eurythmics charged that they had been misled by the film's producers as well, and the album was withdrawn from the market for a period while matters were litigated. The album's first single, "Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)", was a top 5 hit in the UK, Australia and across Europe, and a major dance success in the United States.
1985–1986: Be Yourself Tonight and new musical direction
The duo's next album, Be Yourself Tonight, was produced in a week in Paris. It showcased much more of a "band style" and a centred sound (with an R&B influence), with real drums, brass, and much more guitar from Stewart. Almost a dozen other musicians were enlisted, including members of Tom Petty's Heartbreakers, guest harmonica from Stevie Wonder, bass guitar from Dean Garcia, string arrangements by Michael Kamen, and Lennox singing duets with Aretha Franklin and Elvis Costello. It continued the duo's transatlantic chart domination in 1985, and contained four hit singles: "Would I Lie to You?" was a US Billboard top five hit and Australian No. one, while "There Must Be an Angel (Playing with My Heart)" (featuring Wonder's harmonica contribution) became their first and only UK No. one single. The feminist anthem "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (a duet with Aretha Franklin, though originally intended for Tina Turner), and "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)" also rode high in the charts. In September 1985, Eurythmics performed "Would I Lie to You?" at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards at the Radio City Music Hall in New York.
1986–1990: Revenge, Savage and We Too Are One
Eurythmics released their next album, Revenge, in 1986. The album continued their move towards a band sound, verging on an AOR-pop/rock sound. Sales continued to be strong in the UK and internationally, but were somewhat slower in the US, though "Missionary Man" reached No. 14 on the US Hot 100 chart and went all the way to No. 1 on the US Album Oriented Rock chart (AOR). Revenge would eventually certify double Platinum in the UK and Gold in the US. The band went on a massive worldwide tour in support of the album, and a live concert video from the Australian leg of the tour was released.
In 1987, Lennox and Stewart released the album Savage. This saw a fairly radical change within the group's sound, being based mainly around programmed samples and drum loops (Lennox would later say that where Revenge was more of a Stewart album in sound, Savage was more of a Lennox one). Lyrically the songs showed an even darker, more obsessive side to Lennox's writing. A video album was also made, directed by Sophie Muller, with a video for each song. This was largely a concept piece, following characters portrayed by Lennox, specifically one of a frustrated housewife-turned-vamp (as exemplified in "Beethoven (I Love to Listen To)", a UK top 30 hit). The brazen, sexually charged rocker "I Need a Man" remains a Eurythmics staple, as does "You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart". Much less commercial than the two previous albums, Savage was mostly ignored in the US, although rock radio in more progressive markets supported "I Need a Man". In the duo's native UK however, the album was a top 10 success and was certified Platinum.
In 1989, Eurythmics released the album We Too Are One, which entered the UK Album Chart at No. 1 (their second No. 1 album after Touch) and gave the duo four UK Top 30 hit singles. The album was a return to the rock/pop sound of their mid-80s albums and was certified Double Platinum in the UK, but was less successful in the US (although the single "Don't Ask Me Why" grazed the Billboard Top 40). Other singles from the album included "Revival", "The King and Queen of America" and "Angel". Accompanying the album, the duo conducted their Revival world tour from 8 September 1989 to 25 January 1990. Parts of the tour (both on and off-stage) were interspersed with promo videos for Eurythmics' 1990 video album We Two Are One Too.
1990–1998: Hiatus and solo careers
After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached No. 6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. A soundtrack of the same name was also released, produced and largely written by Stewart. He formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983–1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released.
In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second No. 1 album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.
Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful.
1999–2005: Peace and Ultimate Collection
In the late 1990s, Eurythmics reunited and recorded a new album, Peace, which was released in 1999. The single "I Saved the World Today" reached No. 11 in the UK Singles Chart, and a remix of "17 Again" gave the duo their first chart-topper on the US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. The band also embarked on a world tour, dubbed the "Peacetour", to support the album. The tour started on 18 September 1999 at Cologne's Kölnarena and ended on 6 December 1999 at the London Docklands Arena (which was filmed and released on video and DVD). All proceeds from the tour went to Greenpeace and Amnesty International. The year 2000 saw numerous European festival appearances by Eurythmics (at Germany's Rock am Ring, among others). In 2001, Stewart performed with U2 for the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert. In 2002, he collaborated with Bryan Ferry on his album Frantic.
In June 2003, Lennox released her third solo album, entitled Bare, which was a top 5 hit in the UK and the US., with three tracks reaching the top of the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. She also recorded the song "Into the West" for Peter Jackson's film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, where it appeared as the closing theme and earned Lennox the Academy Award for Best Song. In November 2003, Eurythmics played three songs at the 46664 in Cape Town, South Africa, for which Stewart was one of the primary organisers. They played an unplugged version of "Here Comes the Rain Again", "7 Seconds" with Youssou N'Dour and "Sweet Dreams". Stewart collaborated with The Rolling Stones vocalist Mick Jagger on the soundtrack to the movie Alfie, released in 2004, including the critically acclaimed "Old Habits Die Hard", which won a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture.
On 7 November 2005, Eurythmics released Ultimate Collection, a remastered greatest hits package with two new songs. One of them, "I've Got a Life", was released as a single and reached No. 14 on the UK Singles Chart as well as spending three consecutive weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play in the US. Lennox and Stewart appeared on a number of TV shows to promote their new compilation album, which was a Top 5 hit and certified Platinum in the UK. On 14 November 2005, the duo's label, RCA, re-released their eight studio albums in remastered and expanded editions featuring rare B-sides, remixes and unreleased songs. The remasters were made available separately with expanded artwork, and also together in a collector's box set, entitled Boxed. However, the 1984 soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) was not included in this re-release campaign as Virgin Records holds the rights to that album. Also in 2005, Eurythmics were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. In 2007, Lennox resumed her solo career with her fourth album, Songs of Mass Destruction, which was a top 10 success in the UK and the US. In 2009, she released her first solo "greatest hits" package, The Annie Lennox Collection. The same year, Lennox stated that although she and Stewart remain friends, she does not foresee any further Eurythmics projects in the future.
In an interview with Reuters in September 2012, Stewart was quizzed on whether a new Eurythmics album is in the works, to which he replied: "We're not talking about one right now, but never say never." He added that he was considering developing a musical based on the music of Eurythmics.
2014: Reuniting for Beatles tribute concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart performed as a duo for "The Night That Changed America: A Grammy Salute to The Beatles". The event was recorded at the Los Angeles Convention Center on 27 January 2014, the day after the Grammy Awards. They performed The Beatles song "The Fool on the Hill".
2019: Reuniting for Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart, billed as Eurythmics, performed at Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert in aid of his Rainforest Foundation Fund on 9 December 2019 at New York City's Beacon Theatre. The group played "Would I Lie to You?", "Here Comes the Rain Again", and "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", before returning to join in the finale performance of Journey’s "Don't Stop Believin' along with the night's other performers.
Discography
In the Garden (1981)
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) (1983)
Touch (1983)
1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) (1984, soundtrack)
Be Yourself Tonight (1985)
Revenge (1986)
Savage (1987)
We Too Are One (1989)
Peace (1999)
Concerts
Sweet Dreams Tour (1983)
Touch Tour (1983–1984)
Revenge Tour (1986–1987)
Revival Tour (1989–1990)
Peace Tour (1999)
Awards
Billboard Music Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1983
| "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|
|-
| 1984
| rowspan=6|Themselves
| Top Disco Artist – Duo/Group
|
|
|-
| rowspan=9|1985
| Top Artist
|
| rowspan=9|
|-
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist – Duo/Group
|
|-
| Top Dance Club Play Artist
|
|-
| rowspan=2|Be Yourself Tonight
| Top Billboard 200 Album
|
|-
| Top Compact Disk
|
|-
| "Would I Lie to You?"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|-
| "Sexcrime"
| Top Dance Play Single
|
|-
| rowspan=2|1986
| rowspan=2|Themselves
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
| rowspan=2|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
Brit Awards
|-
|1984
|Themselves
|Best British Group
|
|-
|rowspan="2" |1986
|Be Yourself Tonight
|Best British Album
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |Themselves
|rowspan="3" |Best British Group
|
|-
|1987
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |1990
|
|-
|We Too Are One
|Best British Album
|
|-
|"Don't Ask Me Why"
|Best British Video
|
|-
|1999
|Themselves
|Outstanding Contribution to British Music
|
|-
| 2010
| "There Must Be an Angel"
| Live Performance of 30 Years
|
Grammy Awards
|-
| 1984
||Themselves
|Best New Artist
|
|-
| 1985
|Eurythmics Sweet Dreams: The Video Album
|Best Video Album
|
|-
|rowspan="2"| 1986
|"Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (with Aretha Franklin)
|Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
|"Would I Lie to You?"
|rowspan="2"|Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
| 1987
|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
| 1990
|Savage
|rowspan="2"|Best Music Video – Long Form
|
|-
| 1991
|We Two Are One Too
|
MTV Video Music Awards
|-
|1984
|"Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1985
|rowspan=5|"Would I Lie to You?"
|Best Stage Performance
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|Best Choreography
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|Best Group Video
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1987
|rowspan=5|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Most Experimental Video
|
|-
|Best Special Effects
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|1988
|"I Need a Man"
|Best Group Video
|
|-
|"You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart"
|Best Direction
|
Music & Media Year-End Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1987
| Themselves
| Group of the Year
|
|
1984: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Best Contemporary Song for "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)"
2000: Silver Clef Award
2000: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2003: Kindred Spirit Music Award
2005: Inducted into UK Music Hall of Fame
2008: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2009: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2010: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
References
External links
19 Recordings artists
1980 establishments in England
Brit Award winners
New wave duos
English pop music duos
English new wave musical groups
English synth-pop groups
British synth-pop new wave groups
Dance-rock musical groups
Grammy Award winners
Ivor Novello Award winners
Male–female musical duos
Musical groups disestablished in 1990
Musical groups disestablished in 2005
Musical groups established in 1980
Musical groups from London
Musical groups reestablished in 1999
RCA Records artists
Female-fronted musical groups | false | [
"Medusa is one of the three Gorgons in Greek mythology.\n\nMedusa may also refer to:\n\nOther mythological figures\nMedusa, a daughter of Sthenelus (son of Andromeda and Perseus) and Nicippe\nMedusa, a daughter of the Trojan king Priam\nMedusa, a daughter of Pelias\nMedusa, a daughter of Orsilochus\n\nArt and entertainment\n\nFictional characters\nMedusa, a Soul Eater character\nMedusa, a Kamen Rider Wizard character\nMedusa, a military unit in the Jason Bourne novel series\nMedusa, a planet in the TV series Star Maidens\nMadame Medusa, a character in The Rescuers\nMedusae, an alien race in the novel The Legion of Space\nMedusa, an antagonist in the Japanese manga Rosario + Vampire\nRider, a Fate/stay night character\nMedusa (comics), a fictional character, a superhero appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics\nMedusa (DC Comics), a fictional character appearing in DC Comics publications\n Medusa, a character in the Kid Icarus game series\n Medusa, a monster in the Eggerland game series\n\nFilm and TV\n Medusa, a 1973 film starring George Hamilton and Cameron Mitchell\n Medusa, a film production company owned by Fininvest\n Medusa: Dare to Be Truthful, a mockumentary film\n \"Medusa\" (Supergirl), a season 2 episode of the TV series\n\nLiterature\nMedusa, a 1988 novel by Hammond Innes\nMedusa, a 2004 novel by Thomas Thiemeyer\nMedusa (Cussler novel), a 2009 novel by Clive Cussler and Paul Kemprecos\nMedusa (Dibdin novel), a 2003 novel by Michael Dibdin\nMedusa, and Other Poems, by Lady Charlotte Elliot (1878)\n\"Medusa\", a poem by Louise Bogan\nMedusa: A Tiger by the Tail, a 1983 novel by Jack L. Chalker\n\nMusic\n Medusa, a female rap artist affiliated with open-mic workshop Project Blowed, from 1994\n Medusa (band), punk-influenced rock band from the UK, active from 1998\n Medusa (Annie Lennox album), released in 1995\n Medusa (Clan of Xymox album), released in 1986\n Medusa (Paradise Lost album), released in 2017\n Medusa (Trapeze album), released in 1970\n The Medusa, second studio album released in 2002 by New Zealand rock group Tadpole\n \"Medusa,\" a song by Anthrax on the 1985 album Spreading the Disease\n \"Medusa,\" a song by Sweet on the 1974 album Desolation Boulevard\n \"Medusa\", a song by Jolin Tsai on the 2014 album Play\n \"The Medusa\", a song by The Haunted from the 2006 album The Dead Eye\n\nPaintings\n Medusa (Caravaggio)\n Medusa (Leonardo)\n\nPlaces\n Medousa, Xanthi, Greece\n Medusa, New York, United States\n Medusa Lake, another name for Lake Natron, Tanzania\n Medusa Lake (Antarctica)\n\nAstronomy\n Medusa Nebula\n Medusa Galaxy Merger (NGC 4194), pair of interacting galaxies in the constellation Ursa Major\n 149 Medusa, an asteroid\n\nShips\n French frigate Méduse (1810), which inspired several works of art:\nThe Raft of the Medusa, 1818–1819 painting by Théodore Géricault\nDas Floß der Medusa, 1968 oratorio by Hans Werner Henze\nLe Radeau de la Méduse, 1994 French film\nItalian submarine Medusa, several\n HMS Medusa, one of ten ships of the Royal Navy\n SMS Medusa, a Gazelle-class light cruiser built by the Imperial German Navy\n USS Medusa (1869), a Passaic-class coastal monitor\n USS Medusa (AR-1), a fleet repair ship launched in 1923\n MEDUSA, a proposed type of nuclear pulse propulsion for interplanetary and interstellar space travel\n\nRoller coasters\n Medusa (Six Flags Discovery Kingdom), a steel floorless roller coaster\n Medusa Steel Coaster, a hybrid roller coaster in Six Flags México\n Bizarro (Six Flags Great Adventure) at Six Flags Great Adventure, which was formerly known as Medusa\n\nOther uses\n Medusa pepper, a Capsicum annuum cultivar\n MEDUSA, a design software program\n MEDUSA (weapon)\n Operation Medusa, a military operation in Afghanistan\n Medusa piercing\n Medusa (biology) (jellyfish)\n\nSee also\n Madusa, stage name of professional wrestler Debrah Miceli (born 1964)\n Méduse (disambiguation)\n Meduza (disambiguation)\n The Medusa Frequency, a 1987 novel by Russell Hoban",
"Medusa was launched at Whitby in 1813. She spent a number of years as a transport, but from the mid-1820s on she sailed between England and Canada. She was abandoned in a sinking state on 1 January 1834.\n\nCareer\nMedusa first appeared in Lloyd's Register (LR) in 1813 with Hutchinson, master, Barrick, owner, and trade London transport.\n\nIn 1820 Medusa may have participated in the British government's 1820 Settlers scheme to bring settlers to South Africa. She arrived at Simon's Bay on 17 June 1820. However there is no record of any passengers arriving on her.\n\nLloyd's List reported on 23 September 1828 that Medusa, Sampson, master, had saved the crew of Evander at .\n\nFate\nMedusa was lost around 1833. She is no longer listed in Lloyd's Register in 1834. Lloyd's List reported on 7 January 1834 that a Medusa had been abandoned at sea 60 miles off Flamborough Head. On 1 January 1834 Clyde rescued all ten people on board Medusa, of Whitby as she was in a sinking state. The survivors were Captain Wilson, his wife, and eight crew men. Clyde brought them into Grimsby on 4 January.\n\nCitations and references\nCitations\n\nReferences\n \n \n\n1813 ships\nShips built in Whitby\nAge of Sail merchant ships of England\nShips of the 1820 settlers\nMaritime incidents in January 1834"
] |
[
"Eurythmics",
"1990-98: Hiatus and solo careers",
"Why did they go on Hiatus?",
"), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded,",
"Did they put out any solo albums?",
"Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track \"Lily Was Here\" (",
"What did Lennox do at this time?",
"1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva.",
"Did the album win any awards?",
"The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status",
"Did she release any other solo albums?",
"Medusa,",
"Did Medusa win any awards?",
"It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US."
] | C_16f0e54b9b3c4a6e8d82a614cc545917_0 | Did Stewart release any other solo albums? | 7 | other than Lennox, did Stewart release any solo albums? | Eurythmics | After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached no.6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. He also formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983-1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released. In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US. Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful. CANNOTANSWER | Greetings from the Gutter (1995), | Eurythmics were a British pop duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. Stewart and Lennox were both previously in The Tourists, a band which broke up in 1980; Eurythmics were formed later that year in Wagga Wagga, Australia. The duo released their first studio album, In the Garden, in 1981 to little success, but went on to achieve global acclaim when their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), was released in 1983. The title track became a worldwide hit which topped the charts in various countries including the US. The duo went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split up in 1990. By this time, Stewart was a sought-after record producer, while Lennox began a solo recording career in 1992 with her debut album Diva. After almost a decade apart, Eurythmics reunited to record their ninth album, Peace, released in late 1999. They reunited again in 2005 to release the single "I've Got a Life", as part of a new Eurythmics compilation album, Ultimate Collection.
The duo have won an MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist in 1984, the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1987, the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 1999, and in 2005 were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. The Eurythmics have sold an estimated 75 million records worldwide. In 2017, the group was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and were nominated again in 2018.
History
1976–1982: Formation and In the Garden
Lennox and Stewart met in 1975 in a restaurant in London, where Lennox worked at that time. They first played together in 1976 in the punk rock band The Catch. After releasing one single as The Catch in 1977, the band evolved into The Tourists. Stewart and Lennox were also romantically involved. The Tourists achieved some commercial success, but the experience was reportedly an unhappy one. Personal and musical tensions existed within the group, whose main songwriter was Peet Coombes, and legal wranglings happened with the band's management, publishers and record labels. Lennox and Stewart felt the fixed band line-up was an inadequate vehicle to explore their experimental creative leanings and decided their next project should be much more flexible and free from artistic compromise. They were interested in creating pop music, but wanted freedom to experiment with electronics and the avant-garde.
It was in a hotel in Wagga Wagga, Australia, while playing around with a portable mini-synthesizer that Lennox and Stewart decided to become a duo. Calling themselves Eurythmics (after the pedagogical exercise system that Lennox had encountered as a child), they decided to keep themselves as the only permanent members and songwriters, and involve others in the collaboration "on the basis of mutual compatibility and availability". The duo signed to RCA Records. At this time, Lennox and Stewart also split as a couple. During the period that Lennox and Stewart were in The Tourists, and later as Eurythmics, they were managed by Kenny Smith and Sandra Turnbull of Hyper Kinetics Ltd.
They recorded their first album in Cologne with Conny Plank (who had produced the later Tourists sessions). This resulted in the album In the Garden, released in October 1981. The album mixed psychedelic, krautrock and electropop influences, and featured contributions from Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit (of Can), drummer Clem Burke (of Blondie), Robert Görl (of D.A.F.), and flautist Tim Wheater. A couple of the songs were co-written by guitarist Roger Pomphrey (later a TV director). The album was not a commercial success (though the debut single "Never Gonna Cry Again" made the UK charts at No. 63). Lennox and Stewart then activated their new Eurythmics mode of operation by touring the record as a duo, accompanied by backing tracks and electronics, carted around the country by themselves in a horse-box.
During 1982, the duo retreated to Chalk Farm in London and used a bank loan to establish a small eight-track studio above a picture framing factory, giving them freedom to record without having to pay expensive studio fees. They began to employ much more electronics in their music, collaborating with Raynard Faulkner and Adam Williams, recording many tracks in the studio and playing live using various line-up permutations. However, the three new singles they released that year ("This Is the House", "The Walk" and "Love Is a Stranger") all performed badly on initial release in the UK. Although their mode of operation had given them the creative freedom they desired, commercial success still eluded them and the responsibility of personally running so many of their affairs (down to transporting their own stage equipment) took its toll. Lennox apparently suffered at least one nervous breakdown during this period, while Stewart was hospitalised with a collapsed lung.
1983–1984: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and Touch
Eurythmics' commercial breakthrough came with their second album, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), released in January 1983. The successful title track featured a dark and powerful sequenced synth bass line and a dramatic video that introduced the now orange crew-cut Lennox to audiences. The song reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart, becoming one of the year's biggest sellers, and later topped the US Billboard Hot 100. The band's fortunes changed immensely from this moment on, and Lennox quickly became a pop icon, gracing the covers of numerous magazines including Rolling Stone. Their previous single, "Love Is a Stranger", was also re-released and became another chart success. The video for the song saw Lennox in many different character guises, a concept she would employ in various subsequent videos. The album's working title was Invisible Hands (as was a track left off the album), inspiring the name of the British independent company Invisible Hands Music – known for releasing music by Hugh Cornwell, Mick Karn and Hazel O'Connor. The album also featured a cover of the 1968 Sam & Dave hit "Wrap It Up", performed as a duet between Lennox and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti.
The duo quickly recorded a follow-up album, Touch, which was released in November 1983. It became the duo's first No. 1 album in the UK, and also spawned three major hit singles. "Who's That Girl?" was a top 3 hit in the UK, the video depicting Lennox as both a blonde chanteuse and as a gender-bending Elvis Presley clone. It also featured cameo appearances by Hazel O'Connor, Bananarama (including Stewart's future wife, Siobhan Fahey), Kate Garner of Haysi Fantayzee, Thereza Bazar of Dollar, Jay Aston and Cheryl Baker of Bucks Fizz, Kiki Dee, Jacquie O'Sullivan and the gender-bending pop singer Marilyn, who would go on to musical success of his own that same year. The upbeat, calypso-flavoured "Right by Your Side" showed a different side of Eurythmics altogether and also made the Top 10, and "Here Comes the Rain Again" (No. eight in the UK, No. four in the US) was an orchestral/synth ballad (with orchestrations by Michael Kamen).
In 1984 RCA released Touch Dance, an EP of remixes of four of the tracks from Touch, aimed at the club market. The remixes were by prominent New York City producers Francois Kevorkian and John "Jellybean" Benitez. Also released in 1984 was Eurythmics' soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother). Virgin Films had contracted the band to provide a soundtrack for Michael Radford's modern film adaptation of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, Radford later said that the music had been "foisted" on his film against his wishes, and that Virgin had replaced most of Dominic Muldowney's original orchestral score with the Eurythmics soundtrack (including the song "Julia", which was heard during the end credits). Nevertheless, the record was presented as "music derived from the original score of Eurythmics for the Michael Radford film version of Orwell's 1984". Eurythmics charged that they had been misled by the film's producers as well, and the album was withdrawn from the market for a period while matters were litigated. The album's first single, "Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)", was a top 5 hit in the UK, Australia and across Europe, and a major dance success in the United States.
1985–1986: Be Yourself Tonight and new musical direction
The duo's next album, Be Yourself Tonight, was produced in a week in Paris. It showcased much more of a "band style" and a centred sound (with an R&B influence), with real drums, brass, and much more guitar from Stewart. Almost a dozen other musicians were enlisted, including members of Tom Petty's Heartbreakers, guest harmonica from Stevie Wonder, bass guitar from Dean Garcia, string arrangements by Michael Kamen, and Lennox singing duets with Aretha Franklin and Elvis Costello. It continued the duo's transatlantic chart domination in 1985, and contained four hit singles: "Would I Lie to You?" was a US Billboard top five hit and Australian No. one, while "There Must Be an Angel (Playing with My Heart)" (featuring Wonder's harmonica contribution) became their first and only UK No. one single. The feminist anthem "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (a duet with Aretha Franklin, though originally intended for Tina Turner), and "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)" also rode high in the charts. In September 1985, Eurythmics performed "Would I Lie to You?" at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards at the Radio City Music Hall in New York.
1986–1990: Revenge, Savage and We Too Are One
Eurythmics released their next album, Revenge, in 1986. The album continued their move towards a band sound, verging on an AOR-pop/rock sound. Sales continued to be strong in the UK and internationally, but were somewhat slower in the US, though "Missionary Man" reached No. 14 on the US Hot 100 chart and went all the way to No. 1 on the US Album Oriented Rock chart (AOR). Revenge would eventually certify double Platinum in the UK and Gold in the US. The band went on a massive worldwide tour in support of the album, and a live concert video from the Australian leg of the tour was released.
In 1987, Lennox and Stewart released the album Savage. This saw a fairly radical change within the group's sound, being based mainly around programmed samples and drum loops (Lennox would later say that where Revenge was more of a Stewart album in sound, Savage was more of a Lennox one). Lyrically the songs showed an even darker, more obsessive side to Lennox's writing. A video album was also made, directed by Sophie Muller, with a video for each song. This was largely a concept piece, following characters portrayed by Lennox, specifically one of a frustrated housewife-turned-vamp (as exemplified in "Beethoven (I Love to Listen To)", a UK top 30 hit). The brazen, sexually charged rocker "I Need a Man" remains a Eurythmics staple, as does "You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart". Much less commercial than the two previous albums, Savage was mostly ignored in the US, although rock radio in more progressive markets supported "I Need a Man". In the duo's native UK however, the album was a top 10 success and was certified Platinum.
In 1989, Eurythmics released the album We Too Are One, which entered the UK Album Chart at No. 1 (their second No. 1 album after Touch) and gave the duo four UK Top 30 hit singles. The album was a return to the rock/pop sound of their mid-80s albums and was certified Double Platinum in the UK, but was less successful in the US (although the single "Don't Ask Me Why" grazed the Billboard Top 40). Other singles from the album included "Revival", "The King and Queen of America" and "Angel". Accompanying the album, the duo conducted their Revival world tour from 8 September 1989 to 25 January 1990. Parts of the tour (both on and off-stage) were interspersed with promo videos for Eurythmics' 1990 video album We Two Are One Too.
1990–1998: Hiatus and solo careers
After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached No. 6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. A soundtrack of the same name was also released, produced and largely written by Stewart. He formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983–1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released.
In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second No. 1 album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.
Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful.
1999–2005: Peace and Ultimate Collection
In the late 1990s, Eurythmics reunited and recorded a new album, Peace, which was released in 1999. The single "I Saved the World Today" reached No. 11 in the UK Singles Chart, and a remix of "17 Again" gave the duo their first chart-topper on the US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. The band also embarked on a world tour, dubbed the "Peacetour", to support the album. The tour started on 18 September 1999 at Cologne's Kölnarena and ended on 6 December 1999 at the London Docklands Arena (which was filmed and released on video and DVD). All proceeds from the tour went to Greenpeace and Amnesty International. The year 2000 saw numerous European festival appearances by Eurythmics (at Germany's Rock am Ring, among others). In 2001, Stewart performed with U2 for the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert. In 2002, he collaborated with Bryan Ferry on his album Frantic.
In June 2003, Lennox released her third solo album, entitled Bare, which was a top 5 hit in the UK and the US., with three tracks reaching the top of the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. She also recorded the song "Into the West" for Peter Jackson's film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, where it appeared as the closing theme and earned Lennox the Academy Award for Best Song. In November 2003, Eurythmics played three songs at the 46664 in Cape Town, South Africa, for which Stewart was one of the primary organisers. They played an unplugged version of "Here Comes the Rain Again", "7 Seconds" with Youssou N'Dour and "Sweet Dreams". Stewart collaborated with The Rolling Stones vocalist Mick Jagger on the soundtrack to the movie Alfie, released in 2004, including the critically acclaimed "Old Habits Die Hard", which won a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture.
On 7 November 2005, Eurythmics released Ultimate Collection, a remastered greatest hits package with two new songs. One of them, "I've Got a Life", was released as a single and reached No. 14 on the UK Singles Chart as well as spending three consecutive weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play in the US. Lennox and Stewart appeared on a number of TV shows to promote their new compilation album, which was a Top 5 hit and certified Platinum in the UK. On 14 November 2005, the duo's label, RCA, re-released their eight studio albums in remastered and expanded editions featuring rare B-sides, remixes and unreleased songs. The remasters were made available separately with expanded artwork, and also together in a collector's box set, entitled Boxed. However, the 1984 soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) was not included in this re-release campaign as Virgin Records holds the rights to that album. Also in 2005, Eurythmics were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. In 2007, Lennox resumed her solo career with her fourth album, Songs of Mass Destruction, which was a top 10 success in the UK and the US. In 2009, she released her first solo "greatest hits" package, The Annie Lennox Collection. The same year, Lennox stated that although she and Stewart remain friends, she does not foresee any further Eurythmics projects in the future.
In an interview with Reuters in September 2012, Stewart was quizzed on whether a new Eurythmics album is in the works, to which he replied: "We're not talking about one right now, but never say never." He added that he was considering developing a musical based on the music of Eurythmics.
2014: Reuniting for Beatles tribute concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart performed as a duo for "The Night That Changed America: A Grammy Salute to The Beatles". The event was recorded at the Los Angeles Convention Center on 27 January 2014, the day after the Grammy Awards. They performed The Beatles song "The Fool on the Hill".
2019: Reuniting for Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart, billed as Eurythmics, performed at Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert in aid of his Rainforest Foundation Fund on 9 December 2019 at New York City's Beacon Theatre. The group played "Would I Lie to You?", "Here Comes the Rain Again", and "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", before returning to join in the finale performance of Journey’s "Don't Stop Believin' along with the night's other performers.
Discography
In the Garden (1981)
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) (1983)
Touch (1983)
1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) (1984, soundtrack)
Be Yourself Tonight (1985)
Revenge (1986)
Savage (1987)
We Too Are One (1989)
Peace (1999)
Concerts
Sweet Dreams Tour (1983)
Touch Tour (1983–1984)
Revenge Tour (1986–1987)
Revival Tour (1989–1990)
Peace Tour (1999)
Awards
Billboard Music Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1983
| "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|
|-
| 1984
| rowspan=6|Themselves
| Top Disco Artist – Duo/Group
|
|
|-
| rowspan=9|1985
| Top Artist
|
| rowspan=9|
|-
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist – Duo/Group
|
|-
| Top Dance Club Play Artist
|
|-
| rowspan=2|Be Yourself Tonight
| Top Billboard 200 Album
|
|-
| Top Compact Disk
|
|-
| "Would I Lie to You?"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|-
| "Sexcrime"
| Top Dance Play Single
|
|-
| rowspan=2|1986
| rowspan=2|Themselves
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
| rowspan=2|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
Brit Awards
|-
|1984
|Themselves
|Best British Group
|
|-
|rowspan="2" |1986
|Be Yourself Tonight
|Best British Album
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |Themselves
|rowspan="3" |Best British Group
|
|-
|1987
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |1990
|
|-
|We Too Are One
|Best British Album
|
|-
|"Don't Ask Me Why"
|Best British Video
|
|-
|1999
|Themselves
|Outstanding Contribution to British Music
|
|-
| 2010
| "There Must Be an Angel"
| Live Performance of 30 Years
|
Grammy Awards
|-
| 1984
||Themselves
|Best New Artist
|
|-
| 1985
|Eurythmics Sweet Dreams: The Video Album
|Best Video Album
|
|-
|rowspan="2"| 1986
|"Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (with Aretha Franklin)
|Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
|"Would I Lie to You?"
|rowspan="2"|Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
| 1987
|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
| 1990
|Savage
|rowspan="2"|Best Music Video – Long Form
|
|-
| 1991
|We Two Are One Too
|
MTV Video Music Awards
|-
|1984
|"Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1985
|rowspan=5|"Would I Lie to You?"
|Best Stage Performance
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|Best Choreography
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|Best Group Video
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1987
|rowspan=5|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Most Experimental Video
|
|-
|Best Special Effects
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|1988
|"I Need a Man"
|Best Group Video
|
|-
|"You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart"
|Best Direction
|
Music & Media Year-End Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1987
| Themselves
| Group of the Year
|
|
1984: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Best Contemporary Song for "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)"
2000: Silver Clef Award
2000: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2003: Kindred Spirit Music Award
2005: Inducted into UK Music Hall of Fame
2008: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2009: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2010: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
References
External links
19 Recordings artists
1980 establishments in England
Brit Award winners
New wave duos
English pop music duos
English new wave musical groups
English synth-pop groups
British synth-pop new wave groups
Dance-rock musical groups
Grammy Award winners
Ivor Novello Award winners
Male–female musical duos
Musical groups disestablished in 1990
Musical groups disestablished in 2005
Musical groups established in 1980
Musical groups from London
Musical groups reestablished in 1999
RCA Records artists
Female-fronted musical groups | true | [
"Sweethearts of Country Music is a compilation album by American country artists Wynn Stewart and Jan Howard. It was released in 1960 via Challenge Records and was produced by Joe Johnson. It was the debut album releases for both music artists and their only album releases for the Challenge label. A combination of solo and duet recordings by both artists are featured on the package.\n\nBackground, content and release\nSweethearts of Country Music was compilation that featured a collection of songs Stewart and Howard had recorded for the Challenge label. By the release of this album, Stewart and Howard were both newly established artists that were recording on the west coast of the United States. This songs were recorded in a several year span and were packaged on this compilation for their first album release. The songs were produced by Joe Johnson.\n\nThe songs were recorded in the Bakersfield sound style of country music. Sweethearts of Country Music featured songs that recorded as duets by Stewart and Howard. This included their debut single release: \"Yankee Go Gome.\" The pair's one charting single, \"Wrong Company,\" was not featured on the album. It would later be released on a compilation in 2004.\n\nSix additional sides are solo cuts by Stewart. This included his top five country hit, \"Wishful Thinking.\" Four solo cuts by Howard also included. The first being her major hit, \"The One You Slip Around With.\" Many of the album's songs were written by Harlan Howard, the then-husband of Jan Howard. Other songs featured writing credits from Stewart himself. Stewart wrote three songs that were included on the album.\n\nSweethearts of Country Music was released in 1960 via Challenge Records. It was the pair's debut albums in their careers and their only album releases for Challenge. The record was issued as a vinyl LP, containing six songs on each side of the record. The record did not reach any chart positions on Billboard upon its release. This included the Top Country Albums chart.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\nAll credits are adapted from the liner notes of Sweethearts of Country Music.\n\n Jan Howard – lead vocals\n Joe Johnson – producer\n Wynn Stewart – lead vocals\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n1960 albums\nChallenge Records (1950s) albums\nJan Howard albums\nWynn Stewart albums",
"Coast to Coast: Overture and Beginners is a 1974 live album credited to Rod Stewart/Faces. Stewart's practice was not giving concerts as a solo act at the time, but rather appearing jointly with the Faces, thus the dual crediting.\n\nHistory \nThe album presents only three numbers from the previous albums by the Faces, while presenting six from Stewart's solo releases. The two tracks that had not seen the light of day on either were renditions of \"I Wish It Would Rain,\" first made famous by The Temptations, and \"Jealous Guy,\" from John Lennon.\n\nThe performance was recorded with replacement Faces bassist Tetsu Yamauchi, filling in for departed member Ronnie Lane. Lane had left soon after the release of Ooh La La, fed up at the group increasingly being presented as Stewart's backing band. Coast to Coast was recorded live on 17 October 1973 at the Anaheim Convention Center and was mixed at Air Studios in London.\n\nIn an unusual arrangement, LP versions of the album were issued in the United States by Mercury Records (which at the time issued Stewart's solo albums), while cassette and 8-track configurations were issued by Warner Bros. Records, the Faces' erstwhile label—and with whom Stewart would sign as a solo artist following the Faces' demise.\n\nThe back cover photo is actually the Old Boston Garden taken on May 2, 1973.\n\nLong out of print in the United States, Coast to Coast is only available as an import from Japan. The Faces would disband within a year and a half of the album's release.\n\nTrack listing \n\nSide one\n \"It's All Over Now\" (Bobby Womack, Shirley Womack) - 4:38\n \"Cut Across Shorty\" (Wayne Walker, Marijohn Wilkin) - 3:45\n \"Too Bad\" (R. Stewart-R. Wood) / \"Every Picture Tells A Story\" (Rod Stewart, Ronnie Wood) - 7:34\n \"Angel\" (Jimi Hendrix) - 4:28\n \"Stay With Me\" (Stewart, Wood) - 4:50\n\nSide two\n \"I Wish It Would Rain\" (Roger Penzabene, Barrett Strong, Norman Whitfield) - 4:20\n \"I'd Rather Go Blind\" (Billy Foster, Ellington Jordan) - 5:55\n \"Borstal Boys\" (Ian McLagan, Stewart, Wood) / \"Amazing Grace\" (Traditional, arr. D. Throat) - 9:52\n \"Jealous Guy\" (John Lennon) - 4:25\n\nCharts\n\nPersonnel \n Kenney Jones - drums\n Ian McLagan - piano, organ and vocals\n Rod Stewart - lead vocals\n Ronnie Wood - guitars and vocals\n Tetsu Yamauchi - bass\n\nProduction \n Faces – producer\n Gary Kellgren - engineer\n Tom Scott and Tom Fly - assistant engineers\n\nReferences \n\nFaces (band) albums\nRod Stewart live albums\n1974 live albums\nMercury Records live albums\nWarner Records live albums"
] |
[
"Eurythmics",
"1990-98: Hiatus and solo careers",
"Why did they go on Hiatus?",
"), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded,",
"Did they put out any solo albums?",
"Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track \"Lily Was Here\" (",
"What did Lennox do at this time?",
"1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva.",
"Did the album win any awards?",
"The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status",
"Did she release any other solo albums?",
"Medusa,",
"Did Medusa win any awards?",
"It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.",
"Did Stewart release any other solo albums?",
"Greetings from the Gutter (1995),"
] | C_16f0e54b9b3c4a6e8d82a614cc545917_0 | Was it successful? | 8 | Was the album Greetings from the Gutter successful? | Eurythmics | After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached no.6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. He also formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983-1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released. In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US. Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful. CANNOTANSWER | neither was commercially successful. | Eurythmics were a British pop duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. Stewart and Lennox were both previously in The Tourists, a band which broke up in 1980; Eurythmics were formed later that year in Wagga Wagga, Australia. The duo released their first studio album, In the Garden, in 1981 to little success, but went on to achieve global acclaim when their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), was released in 1983. The title track became a worldwide hit which topped the charts in various countries including the US. The duo went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split up in 1990. By this time, Stewart was a sought-after record producer, while Lennox began a solo recording career in 1992 with her debut album Diva. After almost a decade apart, Eurythmics reunited to record their ninth album, Peace, released in late 1999. They reunited again in 2005 to release the single "I've Got a Life", as part of a new Eurythmics compilation album, Ultimate Collection.
The duo have won an MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist in 1984, the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1987, the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 1999, and in 2005 were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. The Eurythmics have sold an estimated 75 million records worldwide. In 2017, the group was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and were nominated again in 2018.
History
1976–1982: Formation and In the Garden
Lennox and Stewart met in 1975 in a restaurant in London, where Lennox worked at that time. They first played together in 1976 in the punk rock band The Catch. After releasing one single as The Catch in 1977, the band evolved into The Tourists. Stewart and Lennox were also romantically involved. The Tourists achieved some commercial success, but the experience was reportedly an unhappy one. Personal and musical tensions existed within the group, whose main songwriter was Peet Coombes, and legal wranglings happened with the band's management, publishers and record labels. Lennox and Stewart felt the fixed band line-up was an inadequate vehicle to explore their experimental creative leanings and decided their next project should be much more flexible and free from artistic compromise. They were interested in creating pop music, but wanted freedom to experiment with electronics and the avant-garde.
It was in a hotel in Wagga Wagga, Australia, while playing around with a portable mini-synthesizer that Lennox and Stewart decided to become a duo. Calling themselves Eurythmics (after the pedagogical exercise system that Lennox had encountered as a child), they decided to keep themselves as the only permanent members and songwriters, and involve others in the collaboration "on the basis of mutual compatibility and availability". The duo signed to RCA Records. At this time, Lennox and Stewart also split as a couple. During the period that Lennox and Stewart were in The Tourists, and later as Eurythmics, they were managed by Kenny Smith and Sandra Turnbull of Hyper Kinetics Ltd.
They recorded their first album in Cologne with Conny Plank (who had produced the later Tourists sessions). This resulted in the album In the Garden, released in October 1981. The album mixed psychedelic, krautrock and electropop influences, and featured contributions from Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit (of Can), drummer Clem Burke (of Blondie), Robert Görl (of D.A.F.), and flautist Tim Wheater. A couple of the songs were co-written by guitarist Roger Pomphrey (later a TV director). The album was not a commercial success (though the debut single "Never Gonna Cry Again" made the UK charts at No. 63). Lennox and Stewart then activated their new Eurythmics mode of operation by touring the record as a duo, accompanied by backing tracks and electronics, carted around the country by themselves in a horse-box.
During 1982, the duo retreated to Chalk Farm in London and used a bank loan to establish a small eight-track studio above a picture framing factory, giving them freedom to record without having to pay expensive studio fees. They began to employ much more electronics in their music, collaborating with Raynard Faulkner and Adam Williams, recording many tracks in the studio and playing live using various line-up permutations. However, the three new singles they released that year ("This Is the House", "The Walk" and "Love Is a Stranger") all performed badly on initial release in the UK. Although their mode of operation had given them the creative freedom they desired, commercial success still eluded them and the responsibility of personally running so many of their affairs (down to transporting their own stage equipment) took its toll. Lennox apparently suffered at least one nervous breakdown during this period, while Stewart was hospitalised with a collapsed lung.
1983–1984: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and Touch
Eurythmics' commercial breakthrough came with their second album, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), released in January 1983. The successful title track featured a dark and powerful sequenced synth bass line and a dramatic video that introduced the now orange crew-cut Lennox to audiences. The song reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart, becoming one of the year's biggest sellers, and later topped the US Billboard Hot 100. The band's fortunes changed immensely from this moment on, and Lennox quickly became a pop icon, gracing the covers of numerous magazines including Rolling Stone. Their previous single, "Love Is a Stranger", was also re-released and became another chart success. The video for the song saw Lennox in many different character guises, a concept she would employ in various subsequent videos. The album's working title was Invisible Hands (as was a track left off the album), inspiring the name of the British independent company Invisible Hands Music – known for releasing music by Hugh Cornwell, Mick Karn and Hazel O'Connor. The album also featured a cover of the 1968 Sam & Dave hit "Wrap It Up", performed as a duet between Lennox and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti.
The duo quickly recorded a follow-up album, Touch, which was released in November 1983. It became the duo's first No. 1 album in the UK, and also spawned three major hit singles. "Who's That Girl?" was a top 3 hit in the UK, the video depicting Lennox as both a blonde chanteuse and as a gender-bending Elvis Presley clone. It also featured cameo appearances by Hazel O'Connor, Bananarama (including Stewart's future wife, Siobhan Fahey), Kate Garner of Haysi Fantayzee, Thereza Bazar of Dollar, Jay Aston and Cheryl Baker of Bucks Fizz, Kiki Dee, Jacquie O'Sullivan and the gender-bending pop singer Marilyn, who would go on to musical success of his own that same year. The upbeat, calypso-flavoured "Right by Your Side" showed a different side of Eurythmics altogether and also made the Top 10, and "Here Comes the Rain Again" (No. eight in the UK, No. four in the US) was an orchestral/synth ballad (with orchestrations by Michael Kamen).
In 1984 RCA released Touch Dance, an EP of remixes of four of the tracks from Touch, aimed at the club market. The remixes were by prominent New York City producers Francois Kevorkian and John "Jellybean" Benitez. Also released in 1984 was Eurythmics' soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother). Virgin Films had contracted the band to provide a soundtrack for Michael Radford's modern film adaptation of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, Radford later said that the music had been "foisted" on his film against his wishes, and that Virgin had replaced most of Dominic Muldowney's original orchestral score with the Eurythmics soundtrack (including the song "Julia", which was heard during the end credits). Nevertheless, the record was presented as "music derived from the original score of Eurythmics for the Michael Radford film version of Orwell's 1984". Eurythmics charged that they had been misled by the film's producers as well, and the album was withdrawn from the market for a period while matters were litigated. The album's first single, "Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)", was a top 5 hit in the UK, Australia and across Europe, and a major dance success in the United States.
1985–1986: Be Yourself Tonight and new musical direction
The duo's next album, Be Yourself Tonight, was produced in a week in Paris. It showcased much more of a "band style" and a centred sound (with an R&B influence), with real drums, brass, and much more guitar from Stewart. Almost a dozen other musicians were enlisted, including members of Tom Petty's Heartbreakers, guest harmonica from Stevie Wonder, bass guitar from Dean Garcia, string arrangements by Michael Kamen, and Lennox singing duets with Aretha Franklin and Elvis Costello. It continued the duo's transatlantic chart domination in 1985, and contained four hit singles: "Would I Lie to You?" was a US Billboard top five hit and Australian No. one, while "There Must Be an Angel (Playing with My Heart)" (featuring Wonder's harmonica contribution) became their first and only UK No. one single. The feminist anthem "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (a duet with Aretha Franklin, though originally intended for Tina Turner), and "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)" also rode high in the charts. In September 1985, Eurythmics performed "Would I Lie to You?" at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards at the Radio City Music Hall in New York.
1986–1990: Revenge, Savage and We Too Are One
Eurythmics released their next album, Revenge, in 1986. The album continued their move towards a band sound, verging on an AOR-pop/rock sound. Sales continued to be strong in the UK and internationally, but were somewhat slower in the US, though "Missionary Man" reached No. 14 on the US Hot 100 chart and went all the way to No. 1 on the US Album Oriented Rock chart (AOR). Revenge would eventually certify double Platinum in the UK and Gold in the US. The band went on a massive worldwide tour in support of the album, and a live concert video from the Australian leg of the tour was released.
In 1987, Lennox and Stewart released the album Savage. This saw a fairly radical change within the group's sound, being based mainly around programmed samples and drum loops (Lennox would later say that where Revenge was more of a Stewart album in sound, Savage was more of a Lennox one). Lyrically the songs showed an even darker, more obsessive side to Lennox's writing. A video album was also made, directed by Sophie Muller, with a video for each song. This was largely a concept piece, following characters portrayed by Lennox, specifically one of a frustrated housewife-turned-vamp (as exemplified in "Beethoven (I Love to Listen To)", a UK top 30 hit). The brazen, sexually charged rocker "I Need a Man" remains a Eurythmics staple, as does "You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart". Much less commercial than the two previous albums, Savage was mostly ignored in the US, although rock radio in more progressive markets supported "I Need a Man". In the duo's native UK however, the album was a top 10 success and was certified Platinum.
In 1989, Eurythmics released the album We Too Are One, which entered the UK Album Chart at No. 1 (their second No. 1 album after Touch) and gave the duo four UK Top 30 hit singles. The album was a return to the rock/pop sound of their mid-80s albums and was certified Double Platinum in the UK, but was less successful in the US (although the single "Don't Ask Me Why" grazed the Billboard Top 40). Other singles from the album included "Revival", "The King and Queen of America" and "Angel". Accompanying the album, the duo conducted their Revival world tour from 8 September 1989 to 25 January 1990. Parts of the tour (both on and off-stage) were interspersed with promo videos for Eurythmics' 1990 video album We Two Are One Too.
1990–1998: Hiatus and solo careers
After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached No. 6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. A soundtrack of the same name was also released, produced and largely written by Stewart. He formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983–1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released.
In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second No. 1 album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.
Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful.
1999–2005: Peace and Ultimate Collection
In the late 1990s, Eurythmics reunited and recorded a new album, Peace, which was released in 1999. The single "I Saved the World Today" reached No. 11 in the UK Singles Chart, and a remix of "17 Again" gave the duo their first chart-topper on the US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. The band also embarked on a world tour, dubbed the "Peacetour", to support the album. The tour started on 18 September 1999 at Cologne's Kölnarena and ended on 6 December 1999 at the London Docklands Arena (which was filmed and released on video and DVD). All proceeds from the tour went to Greenpeace and Amnesty International. The year 2000 saw numerous European festival appearances by Eurythmics (at Germany's Rock am Ring, among others). In 2001, Stewart performed with U2 for the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert. In 2002, he collaborated with Bryan Ferry on his album Frantic.
In June 2003, Lennox released her third solo album, entitled Bare, which was a top 5 hit in the UK and the US., with three tracks reaching the top of the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. She also recorded the song "Into the West" for Peter Jackson's film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, where it appeared as the closing theme and earned Lennox the Academy Award for Best Song. In November 2003, Eurythmics played three songs at the 46664 in Cape Town, South Africa, for which Stewart was one of the primary organisers. They played an unplugged version of "Here Comes the Rain Again", "7 Seconds" with Youssou N'Dour and "Sweet Dreams". Stewart collaborated with The Rolling Stones vocalist Mick Jagger on the soundtrack to the movie Alfie, released in 2004, including the critically acclaimed "Old Habits Die Hard", which won a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture.
On 7 November 2005, Eurythmics released Ultimate Collection, a remastered greatest hits package with two new songs. One of them, "I've Got a Life", was released as a single and reached No. 14 on the UK Singles Chart as well as spending three consecutive weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play in the US. Lennox and Stewart appeared on a number of TV shows to promote their new compilation album, which was a Top 5 hit and certified Platinum in the UK. On 14 November 2005, the duo's label, RCA, re-released their eight studio albums in remastered and expanded editions featuring rare B-sides, remixes and unreleased songs. The remasters were made available separately with expanded artwork, and also together in a collector's box set, entitled Boxed. However, the 1984 soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) was not included in this re-release campaign as Virgin Records holds the rights to that album. Also in 2005, Eurythmics were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. In 2007, Lennox resumed her solo career with her fourth album, Songs of Mass Destruction, which was a top 10 success in the UK and the US. In 2009, she released her first solo "greatest hits" package, The Annie Lennox Collection. The same year, Lennox stated that although she and Stewart remain friends, she does not foresee any further Eurythmics projects in the future.
In an interview with Reuters in September 2012, Stewart was quizzed on whether a new Eurythmics album is in the works, to which he replied: "We're not talking about one right now, but never say never." He added that he was considering developing a musical based on the music of Eurythmics.
2014: Reuniting for Beatles tribute concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart performed as a duo for "The Night That Changed America: A Grammy Salute to The Beatles". The event was recorded at the Los Angeles Convention Center on 27 January 2014, the day after the Grammy Awards. They performed The Beatles song "The Fool on the Hill".
2019: Reuniting for Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart, billed as Eurythmics, performed at Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert in aid of his Rainforest Foundation Fund on 9 December 2019 at New York City's Beacon Theatre. The group played "Would I Lie to You?", "Here Comes the Rain Again", and "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", before returning to join in the finale performance of Journey’s "Don't Stop Believin' along with the night's other performers.
Discography
In the Garden (1981)
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) (1983)
Touch (1983)
1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) (1984, soundtrack)
Be Yourself Tonight (1985)
Revenge (1986)
Savage (1987)
We Too Are One (1989)
Peace (1999)
Concerts
Sweet Dreams Tour (1983)
Touch Tour (1983–1984)
Revenge Tour (1986–1987)
Revival Tour (1989–1990)
Peace Tour (1999)
Awards
Billboard Music Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1983
| "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|
|-
| 1984
| rowspan=6|Themselves
| Top Disco Artist – Duo/Group
|
|
|-
| rowspan=9|1985
| Top Artist
|
| rowspan=9|
|-
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist – Duo/Group
|
|-
| Top Dance Club Play Artist
|
|-
| rowspan=2|Be Yourself Tonight
| Top Billboard 200 Album
|
|-
| Top Compact Disk
|
|-
| "Would I Lie to You?"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|-
| "Sexcrime"
| Top Dance Play Single
|
|-
| rowspan=2|1986
| rowspan=2|Themselves
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
| rowspan=2|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
Brit Awards
|-
|1984
|Themselves
|Best British Group
|
|-
|rowspan="2" |1986
|Be Yourself Tonight
|Best British Album
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |Themselves
|rowspan="3" |Best British Group
|
|-
|1987
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |1990
|
|-
|We Too Are One
|Best British Album
|
|-
|"Don't Ask Me Why"
|Best British Video
|
|-
|1999
|Themselves
|Outstanding Contribution to British Music
|
|-
| 2010
| "There Must Be an Angel"
| Live Performance of 30 Years
|
Grammy Awards
|-
| 1984
||Themselves
|Best New Artist
|
|-
| 1985
|Eurythmics Sweet Dreams: The Video Album
|Best Video Album
|
|-
|rowspan="2"| 1986
|"Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (with Aretha Franklin)
|Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
|"Would I Lie to You?"
|rowspan="2"|Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
| 1987
|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
| 1990
|Savage
|rowspan="2"|Best Music Video – Long Form
|
|-
| 1991
|We Two Are One Too
|
MTV Video Music Awards
|-
|1984
|"Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1985
|rowspan=5|"Would I Lie to You?"
|Best Stage Performance
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|Best Choreography
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|Best Group Video
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1987
|rowspan=5|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Most Experimental Video
|
|-
|Best Special Effects
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|1988
|"I Need a Man"
|Best Group Video
|
|-
|"You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart"
|Best Direction
|
Music & Media Year-End Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1987
| Themselves
| Group of the Year
|
|
1984: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Best Contemporary Song for "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)"
2000: Silver Clef Award
2000: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2003: Kindred Spirit Music Award
2005: Inducted into UK Music Hall of Fame
2008: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2009: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2010: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
References
External links
19 Recordings artists
1980 establishments in England
Brit Award winners
New wave duos
English pop music duos
English new wave musical groups
English synth-pop groups
British synth-pop new wave groups
Dance-rock musical groups
Grammy Award winners
Ivor Novello Award winners
Male–female musical duos
Musical groups disestablished in 1990
Musical groups disestablished in 2005
Musical groups established in 1980
Musical groups from London
Musical groups reestablished in 1999
RCA Records artists
Female-fronted musical groups | true | [
"Merry Legs (1911-1932) was a Tennessee Walking Horse mare who was given foundation registration for her influence as a broodmare. She was also a successful show horse.\n\nLife\nMerry Legs was foaled in April 1911. She was a bay with sabino markings. She was sired by the foundation stallion Black Allan F-1, out of the American Saddlebred mare Nell Dement, registration number F-3, and bred by the early breeder Albert Dement. She was a large mare at maturity, standing high and weighing . Merry Legs was a successful show horse; as a three-year-old, she won the stake class at the Tennessee State Fair. She was also successful as a broodmare, giving birth to 13 foals, among them the well-known Bud Allen, Last Chance, Major Allen, and Merry Boy. For her influence on the breed, she was given the foundation number F-4 when the TWHBEA was formed in 1935. She died in 1932.\n\nReferences\n\nIndividual Tennessee Walking Horses\n1911 animal births\n1932 animal deaths",
"The UCI Road World Championships – Men's team time trial was a world championship for road bicycle racing in the discipline of team time trial (TTT). It is organized by the world governing body, the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI).\n\nNational teams (1962–1994)\nA championship for national teams was introduced in 1962 and held until 1994. It was held annually, except that from 1972 onward, the TTT was not held in Olympic years. There were 4 riders per team on a route around 100 kilometres long. Italy is the most successful nation with seven victories.\n\nMedal winners\n\nMedals by nation\n\nMost successful riders\n\nUCI teams (2012–2018)\nThere was a long break until a championship for trade teams was introduced in 2012. There were 6 riders per team. The championship was held up to 2018.\n\nMedal winners\n\nMost successful teams\n\nMost successful riders\n\nReferences \n \n \n\n \nMen's Team Time Trial\nRecurring sporting events established in 1962\nUCI World Tour races\nMen's road bicycle races\nLists of UCI Road World Championships medalists\nRecurring sporting events disestablished in 2018"
] |
[
"Eurythmics",
"1990-98: Hiatus and solo careers",
"Why did they go on Hiatus?",
"), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded,",
"Did they put out any solo albums?",
"Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track \"Lily Was Here\" (",
"What did Lennox do at this time?",
"1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva.",
"Did the album win any awards?",
"The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status",
"Did she release any other solo albums?",
"Medusa,",
"Did Medusa win any awards?",
"It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.",
"Did Stewart release any other solo albums?",
"Greetings from the Gutter (1995),",
"Was it successful?",
"neither was commercially successful."
] | C_16f0e54b9b3c4a6e8d82a614cc545917_0 | Did he release any other albums? | 9 | Did Stewart release any other albums, other than Greetings from the Gutter? | Eurythmics | After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached no.6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. He also formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983-1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released. In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at no.1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second number one album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US. Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful. CANNOTANSWER | Sly-Fi (1998), | Eurythmics were a British pop duo consisting of members Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart. Stewart and Lennox were both previously in The Tourists, a band which broke up in 1980; Eurythmics were formed later that year in Wagga Wagga, Australia. The duo released their first studio album, In the Garden, in 1981 to little success, but went on to achieve global acclaim when their second album Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), was released in 1983. The title track became a worldwide hit which topped the charts in various countries including the US. The duo went on to release a string of hit singles and albums before they split up in 1990. By this time, Stewart was a sought-after record producer, while Lennox began a solo recording career in 1992 with her debut album Diva. After almost a decade apart, Eurythmics reunited to record their ninth album, Peace, released in late 1999. They reunited again in 2005 to release the single "I've Got a Life", as part of a new Eurythmics compilation album, Ultimate Collection.
The duo have won an MTV Video Music Award for Best New Artist in 1984, the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1987, the Brit Award for Outstanding Contribution to Music in 1999, and in 2005 were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. The Eurythmics have sold an estimated 75 million records worldwide. In 2017, the group was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and were nominated again in 2018.
History
1976–1982: Formation and In the Garden
Lennox and Stewart met in 1975 in a restaurant in London, where Lennox worked at that time. They first played together in 1976 in the punk rock band The Catch. After releasing one single as The Catch in 1977, the band evolved into The Tourists. Stewart and Lennox were also romantically involved. The Tourists achieved some commercial success, but the experience was reportedly an unhappy one. Personal and musical tensions existed within the group, whose main songwriter was Peet Coombes, and legal wranglings happened with the band's management, publishers and record labels. Lennox and Stewart felt the fixed band line-up was an inadequate vehicle to explore their experimental creative leanings and decided their next project should be much more flexible and free from artistic compromise. They were interested in creating pop music, but wanted freedom to experiment with electronics and the avant-garde.
It was in a hotel in Wagga Wagga, Australia, while playing around with a portable mini-synthesizer that Lennox and Stewart decided to become a duo. Calling themselves Eurythmics (after the pedagogical exercise system that Lennox had encountered as a child), they decided to keep themselves as the only permanent members and songwriters, and involve others in the collaboration "on the basis of mutual compatibility and availability". The duo signed to RCA Records. At this time, Lennox and Stewart also split as a couple. During the period that Lennox and Stewart were in The Tourists, and later as Eurythmics, they were managed by Kenny Smith and Sandra Turnbull of Hyper Kinetics Ltd.
They recorded their first album in Cologne with Conny Plank (who had produced the later Tourists sessions). This resulted in the album In the Garden, released in October 1981. The album mixed psychedelic, krautrock and electropop influences, and featured contributions from Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit (of Can), drummer Clem Burke (of Blondie), Robert Görl (of D.A.F.), and flautist Tim Wheater. A couple of the songs were co-written by guitarist Roger Pomphrey (later a TV director). The album was not a commercial success (though the debut single "Never Gonna Cry Again" made the UK charts at No. 63). Lennox and Stewart then activated their new Eurythmics mode of operation by touring the record as a duo, accompanied by backing tracks and electronics, carted around the country by themselves in a horse-box.
During 1982, the duo retreated to Chalk Farm in London and used a bank loan to establish a small eight-track studio above a picture framing factory, giving them freedom to record without having to pay expensive studio fees. They began to employ much more electronics in their music, collaborating with Raynard Faulkner and Adam Williams, recording many tracks in the studio and playing live using various line-up permutations. However, the three new singles they released that year ("This Is the House", "The Walk" and "Love Is a Stranger") all performed badly on initial release in the UK. Although their mode of operation had given them the creative freedom they desired, commercial success still eluded them and the responsibility of personally running so many of their affairs (down to transporting their own stage equipment) took its toll. Lennox apparently suffered at least one nervous breakdown during this period, while Stewart was hospitalised with a collapsed lung.
1983–1984: Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) and Touch
Eurythmics' commercial breakthrough came with their second album, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), released in January 1983. The successful title track featured a dark and powerful sequenced synth bass line and a dramatic video that introduced the now orange crew-cut Lennox to audiences. The song reached No. 2 on the UK Singles Chart, becoming one of the year's biggest sellers, and later topped the US Billboard Hot 100. The band's fortunes changed immensely from this moment on, and Lennox quickly became a pop icon, gracing the covers of numerous magazines including Rolling Stone. Their previous single, "Love Is a Stranger", was also re-released and became another chart success. The video for the song saw Lennox in many different character guises, a concept she would employ in various subsequent videos. The album's working title was Invisible Hands (as was a track left off the album), inspiring the name of the British independent company Invisible Hands Music – known for releasing music by Hugh Cornwell, Mick Karn and Hazel O'Connor. The album also featured a cover of the 1968 Sam & Dave hit "Wrap It Up", performed as a duet between Lennox and Green Gartside of Scritti Politti.
The duo quickly recorded a follow-up album, Touch, which was released in November 1983. It became the duo's first No. 1 album in the UK, and also spawned three major hit singles. "Who's That Girl?" was a top 3 hit in the UK, the video depicting Lennox as both a blonde chanteuse and as a gender-bending Elvis Presley clone. It also featured cameo appearances by Hazel O'Connor, Bananarama (including Stewart's future wife, Siobhan Fahey), Kate Garner of Haysi Fantayzee, Thereza Bazar of Dollar, Jay Aston and Cheryl Baker of Bucks Fizz, Kiki Dee, Jacquie O'Sullivan and the gender-bending pop singer Marilyn, who would go on to musical success of his own that same year. The upbeat, calypso-flavoured "Right by Your Side" showed a different side of Eurythmics altogether and also made the Top 10, and "Here Comes the Rain Again" (No. eight in the UK, No. four in the US) was an orchestral/synth ballad (with orchestrations by Michael Kamen).
In 1984 RCA released Touch Dance, an EP of remixes of four of the tracks from Touch, aimed at the club market. The remixes were by prominent New York City producers Francois Kevorkian and John "Jellybean" Benitez. Also released in 1984 was Eurythmics' soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother). Virgin Films had contracted the band to provide a soundtrack for Michael Radford's modern film adaptation of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four. However, Radford later said that the music had been "foisted" on his film against his wishes, and that Virgin had replaced most of Dominic Muldowney's original orchestral score with the Eurythmics soundtrack (including the song "Julia", which was heard during the end credits). Nevertheless, the record was presented as "music derived from the original score of Eurythmics for the Michael Radford film version of Orwell's 1984". Eurythmics charged that they had been misled by the film's producers as well, and the album was withdrawn from the market for a period while matters were litigated. The album's first single, "Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)", was a top 5 hit in the UK, Australia and across Europe, and a major dance success in the United States.
1985–1986: Be Yourself Tonight and new musical direction
The duo's next album, Be Yourself Tonight, was produced in a week in Paris. It showcased much more of a "band style" and a centred sound (with an R&B influence), with real drums, brass, and much more guitar from Stewart. Almost a dozen other musicians were enlisted, including members of Tom Petty's Heartbreakers, guest harmonica from Stevie Wonder, bass guitar from Dean Garcia, string arrangements by Michael Kamen, and Lennox singing duets with Aretha Franklin and Elvis Costello. It continued the duo's transatlantic chart domination in 1985, and contained four hit singles: "Would I Lie to You?" was a US Billboard top five hit and Australian No. one, while "There Must Be an Angel (Playing with My Heart)" (featuring Wonder's harmonica contribution) became their first and only UK No. one single. The feminist anthem "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (a duet with Aretha Franklin, though originally intended for Tina Turner), and "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)" also rode high in the charts. In September 1985, Eurythmics performed "Would I Lie to You?" at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards at the Radio City Music Hall in New York.
1986–1990: Revenge, Savage and We Too Are One
Eurythmics released their next album, Revenge, in 1986. The album continued their move towards a band sound, verging on an AOR-pop/rock sound. Sales continued to be strong in the UK and internationally, but were somewhat slower in the US, though "Missionary Man" reached No. 14 on the US Hot 100 chart and went all the way to No. 1 on the US Album Oriented Rock chart (AOR). Revenge would eventually certify double Platinum in the UK and Gold in the US. The band went on a massive worldwide tour in support of the album, and a live concert video from the Australian leg of the tour was released.
In 1987, Lennox and Stewart released the album Savage. This saw a fairly radical change within the group's sound, being based mainly around programmed samples and drum loops (Lennox would later say that where Revenge was more of a Stewart album in sound, Savage was more of a Lennox one). Lyrically the songs showed an even darker, more obsessive side to Lennox's writing. A video album was also made, directed by Sophie Muller, with a video for each song. This was largely a concept piece, following characters portrayed by Lennox, specifically one of a frustrated housewife-turned-vamp (as exemplified in "Beethoven (I Love to Listen To)", a UK top 30 hit). The brazen, sexually charged rocker "I Need a Man" remains a Eurythmics staple, as does "You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart". Much less commercial than the two previous albums, Savage was mostly ignored in the US, although rock radio in more progressive markets supported "I Need a Man". In the duo's native UK however, the album was a top 10 success and was certified Platinum.
In 1989, Eurythmics released the album We Too Are One, which entered the UK Album Chart at No. 1 (their second No. 1 album after Touch) and gave the duo four UK Top 30 hit singles. The album was a return to the rock/pop sound of their mid-80s albums and was certified Double Platinum in the UK, but was less successful in the US (although the single "Don't Ask Me Why" grazed the Billboard Top 40). Other singles from the album included "Revival", "The King and Queen of America" and "Angel". Accompanying the album, the duo conducted their Revival world tour from 8 September 1989 to 25 January 1990. Parts of the tour (both on and off-stage) were interspersed with promo videos for Eurythmics' 1990 video album We Two Are One Too.
1990–1998: Hiatus and solo careers
After strenuous years of touring and recording (Eurythmics had released eight studio albums in eight years), a rift had developed between the duo and Eurythmics disbanded, although no formal notice was given. Stewart began writing film soundtracks and had a big international hit in 1990 with the instrumental track "Lily Was Here" (featuring saxophonist Candy Dulfer). The single reached No. 6 in the UK and the Top 20 throughout much of Europe, as well as in Australia and the US. A soundtrack of the same name was also released, produced and largely written by Stewart. He formed a band called The Spiritual Cowboys, releasing two albums with this group in the early 1990s. Lennox took time off from her career to have a baby and to consider a life after Eurythmics. Accordingly, the duo had very little communication with each other from 1991 to 1998. In 1991, Eurythmics' Greatest Hits collection was released, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and spending a total of 10 weeks at that position, as well as becoming a massive worldwide seller. New remixes of "Sweet Dreams" and "Love Is a Stranger" were also released as singles at this time. During 1993, a live album entitled Live 1983–1989 featuring recordings from various years throughout Eurythmics' career was also released.
In 1992, Lennox released her first solo album, Diva. The album was a critical and popular success, entering the UK album chart at No. 1 and achieving quadruple platinum status (more than any Eurythmics studio album had done), as well as producing a string of five hit singles. She followed this up in 1995 with her second album, Medusa, an album of cover versions. It became her second No. 1 album in the UK, reaching double platinum status both there and in the US.
Stewart, meanwhile, released the solo albums Greetings from the Gutter (1995), and Sly-Fi (1998), but neither was commercially successful.
1999–2005: Peace and Ultimate Collection
In the late 1990s, Eurythmics reunited and recorded a new album, Peace, which was released in 1999. The single "I Saved the World Today" reached No. 11 in the UK Singles Chart, and a remix of "17 Again" gave the duo their first chart-topper on the US Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. The band also embarked on a world tour, dubbed the "Peacetour", to support the album. The tour started on 18 September 1999 at Cologne's Kölnarena and ended on 6 December 1999 at the London Docklands Arena (which was filmed and released on video and DVD). All proceeds from the tour went to Greenpeace and Amnesty International. The year 2000 saw numerous European festival appearances by Eurythmics (at Germany's Rock am Ring, among others). In 2001, Stewart performed with U2 for the America: A Tribute to Heroes benefit concert. In 2002, he collaborated with Bryan Ferry on his album Frantic.
In June 2003, Lennox released her third solo album, entitled Bare, which was a top 5 hit in the UK and the US., with three tracks reaching the top of the US Billboard Hot Dance Music/Club Play chart. She also recorded the song "Into the West" for Peter Jackson's film The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, where it appeared as the closing theme and earned Lennox the Academy Award for Best Song. In November 2003, Eurythmics played three songs at the 46664 in Cape Town, South Africa, for which Stewart was one of the primary organisers. They played an unplugged version of "Here Comes the Rain Again", "7 Seconds" with Youssou N'Dour and "Sweet Dreams". Stewart collaborated with The Rolling Stones vocalist Mick Jagger on the soundtrack to the movie Alfie, released in 2004, including the critically acclaimed "Old Habits Die Hard", which won a Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song from a Motion Picture.
On 7 November 2005, Eurythmics released Ultimate Collection, a remastered greatest hits package with two new songs. One of them, "I've Got a Life", was released as a single and reached No. 14 on the UK Singles Chart as well as spending three consecutive weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Dance Music/Club Play in the US. Lennox and Stewart appeared on a number of TV shows to promote their new compilation album, which was a Top 5 hit and certified Platinum in the UK. On 14 November 2005, the duo's label, RCA, re-released their eight studio albums in remastered and expanded editions featuring rare B-sides, remixes and unreleased songs. The remasters were made available separately with expanded artwork, and also together in a collector's box set, entitled Boxed. However, the 1984 soundtrack album 1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) was not included in this re-release campaign as Virgin Records holds the rights to that album. Also in 2005, Eurythmics were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame. In 2007, Lennox resumed her solo career with her fourth album, Songs of Mass Destruction, which was a top 10 success in the UK and the US. In 2009, she released her first solo "greatest hits" package, The Annie Lennox Collection. The same year, Lennox stated that although she and Stewart remain friends, she does not foresee any further Eurythmics projects in the future.
In an interview with Reuters in September 2012, Stewart was quizzed on whether a new Eurythmics album is in the works, to which he replied: "We're not talking about one right now, but never say never." He added that he was considering developing a musical based on the music of Eurythmics.
2014: Reuniting for Beatles tribute concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart performed as a duo for "The Night That Changed America: A Grammy Salute to The Beatles". The event was recorded at the Los Angeles Convention Center on 27 January 2014, the day after the Grammy Awards. They performed The Beatles song "The Fool on the Hill".
2019: Reuniting for Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart, billed as Eurythmics, performed at Sting's 30th We'll Be Together benefit concert in aid of his Rainforest Foundation Fund on 9 December 2019 at New York City's Beacon Theatre. The group played "Would I Lie to You?", "Here Comes the Rain Again", and "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", before returning to join in the finale performance of Journey’s "Don't Stop Believin' along with the night's other performers.
Discography
In the Garden (1981)
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This) (1983)
Touch (1983)
1984 (For the Love of Big Brother) (1984, soundtrack)
Be Yourself Tonight (1985)
Revenge (1986)
Savage (1987)
We Too Are One (1989)
Peace (1999)
Concerts
Sweet Dreams Tour (1983)
Touch Tour (1983–1984)
Revenge Tour (1986–1987)
Revival Tour (1989–1990)
Peace Tour (1999)
Awards
Billboard Music Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1983
| "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|
|-
| 1984
| rowspan=6|Themselves
| Top Disco Artist – Duo/Group
|
|
|-
| rowspan=9|1985
| Top Artist
|
| rowspan=9|
|-
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist – Duo/Group
|
|-
| Top Dance Club Play Artist
|
|-
| rowspan=2|Be Yourself Tonight
| Top Billboard 200 Album
|
|-
| Top Compact Disk
|
|-
| "Would I Lie to You?"
| Top Hot 100 Song
|
|-
| "Sexcrime"
| Top Dance Play Single
|
|-
| rowspan=2|1986
| rowspan=2|Themselves
| Top Billboard 200 Artist
|
| rowspan=2|
|-
| Top Hot 100 Artist
|
Brit Awards
|-
|1984
|Themselves
|Best British Group
|
|-
|rowspan="2" |1986
|Be Yourself Tonight
|Best British Album
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |Themselves
|rowspan="3" |Best British Group
|
|-
|1987
|
|-
|rowspan="3" |1990
|
|-
|We Too Are One
|Best British Album
|
|-
|"Don't Ask Me Why"
|Best British Video
|
|-
|1999
|Themselves
|Outstanding Contribution to British Music
|
|-
| 2010
| "There Must Be an Angel"
| Live Performance of 30 Years
|
Grammy Awards
|-
| 1984
||Themselves
|Best New Artist
|
|-
| 1985
|Eurythmics Sweet Dreams: The Video Album
|Best Video Album
|
|-
|rowspan="2"| 1986
|"Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves" (with Aretha Franklin)
|Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
|"Would I Lie to You?"
|rowspan="2"|Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal
|
|-
| 1987
|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
| 1990
|Savage
|rowspan="2"|Best Music Video – Long Form
|
|-
| 1991
|We Two Are One Too
|
MTV Video Music Awards
|-
|1984
|"Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
|Best New Artist
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1985
|rowspan=5|"Would I Lie to You?"
|Best Stage Performance
|
|-
|Best Overall Performance
|
|-
|Best Choreography
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|Best Group Video
|
|-
|rowspan=5|1987
|rowspan=5|"Missionary Man"
|
|-
|Best Concept Video
|
|-
|Most Experimental Video
|
|-
|Best Special Effects
|
|-
|Best Editing
|
|-
|rowspan=2|1988
|"I Need a Man"
|Best Group Video
|
|-
|"You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart"
|Best Direction
|
Music & Media Year-End Awards
!Ref.
|-
| 1987
| Themselves
| Group of the Year
|
|
1984: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Songwriters of the Year
1987: Ivor Novello Award – Best Contemporary Song for "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back)"
2000: Silver Clef Award
2000: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2003: Kindred Spirit Music Award
2005: Inducted into UK Music Hall of Fame
2008: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2009: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
2010: ASCAP Award for "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)"
References
External links
19 Recordings artists
1980 establishments in England
Brit Award winners
New wave duos
English pop music duos
English new wave musical groups
English synth-pop groups
British synth-pop new wave groups
Dance-rock musical groups
Grammy Award winners
Ivor Novello Award winners
Male–female musical duos
Musical groups disestablished in 1990
Musical groups disestablished in 2005
Musical groups established in 1980
Musical groups from London
Musical groups reestablished in 1999
RCA Records artists
Female-fronted musical groups | true | [
"West Coast Bad Boyz, Vol. 1: Anotha Level of the Game is the first compilation album released by No Limit Records. It was originally released on August 9, 1994, but was later re-released on July 22, 1997. Due to it being a re-release, the album couldn't make it to the Billboard 200 or any other regular charts, but it did make it to #1 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Catalog Albums. Due to a beef between Master P and King George, Two songs that featured George [Locked Up and Peace 2 Da Streets] were not included on the 1997 re-release.\n\nTrack listing \nWest Coast Bad Boyz, Vol. 1: Anotha Level of the Game\n\nReferences\n\nHip hop compilation albums\n1994 compilation albums\nNo Limit Records compilation albums\nPriority Records compilation albums\nGangsta rap compilation albums",
"World Famous Classics: 1993–1998 is the first of three greatest hits albums by hip hop group The Beatnuts. It was released by Sony BMG in 1999 two weeks after the release of The Beatnuts' most commercially successful album, A Musical Massacre. It contains songs from The Beatnuts' first three albums, as well as its two EPs. The album does not feature any exclusive songs. World Famous Classics did not chart upon release, and is currently out of print.\n\nTrack listing\n\nReferences\n\nThe Beatnuts albums\n1999 greatest hits albums"
] |
[
"Algonquin Round Table",
"No Sirree!"
] | C_b6a9e4af8dc54cd7abeb132612c7e77e_0 | How did no sirree come about? | 1 | How did No Sirree! by the Algonquin Round Table come about? | Algonquin Round Table | Given the literary and theatrical activities of the Round Table members, it was perhaps inevitable that they would write and stage their own revue. No Sirree!, staged for one night only in April 1922, was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff. No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, which served as something of a salon for Round Tablers away from the Algonquin. Acts included: "Opening Chorus" featuring Woollcott, Toohey, Kaufman, Connelly, Adams and Benchley with violinist Jascha Heifetz providing offstage, off-key accompaniment; "He Who Gets Flapped", a musical number featuring the song "The Everlastin' Ingenue Blues" written by Dorothy Parker and performed by Robert Sherwood accompanied by "chorus girls" including Tallulah Bankhead, Helen Hayes, Ruth Gillmore, Lenore Ulric and Mary Brandon; "Zowie, or the Curse of an Akins Heart"; "The Greasy Hag, an O'Neill Play in One Act" with Kaufman, Connelly and Woollcott; and "Mr. Whim Passes By--An A. A. Milne Play." The only item of note to emerge from No Sirree! was Robert Benchley's contribution, The Treasurer's Report. Benchley's disjointed parody so delighted those in attendance that Irving Berlin hired Benchley in 1923 to deliver the Report as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue for $500 a week. In 1928, Report was later made into a short sound film in the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system by Fox Film Corporation. The film marked the beginning of a second career for Benchley in Hollywood. With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" Vicious Circle production open to the public with material performed by professional actors. Kaufman and Connelly funded the revue, named The Forty-niners. The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, running for just 15 performances. CANNOTANSWER | No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, | The Algonquin Round Table was a group of New York City writers, critics, actors, and wits. Gathering initially as part of a practical joke, members of "The Vicious Circle", as they dubbed themselves, met for lunch each day at the Algonquin Hotel from 1919 until roughly 1929. At these luncheons they engaged in wisecracks, wordplay, and witticisms that, through the newspaper columns of Round Table members, were disseminated across the country.
Daily association with each other, both at the luncheons and outside of them, inspired members of the Circle to collaborate creatively. The entire group worked together successfully only once, however, to create a revue called No Sirree! which helped launch a Hollywood career for Round Tabler Robert Benchley.
In its ten years of association, the Round Table and a number of its members acquired national reputations, both for their contributions to literature and for their sparkling wit. Although some of their contemporaries, and later in life even some of its members, disparaged the group, its reputation has endured long after its dissolution.
Origin
The group that would become the Round Table began meeting in June 1919 as the result of a practical joke carried out by theatrical press agent John Peter Toohey. Toohey, annoyed at The New York Times drama critic Alexander Woollcott for refusing to plug one of Toohey's clients (Eugene O'Neill) in his column, organized a luncheon supposedly to welcome Woollcott back from World War I, where he had been a correspondent for Stars and Stripes. Instead, Toohey used the occasion to poke fun at Woollcott on a number of fronts. Woollcott's enjoyment of the joke and the success of the event prompted Toohey to suggest that the group in attendance meet at the Algonquin each day for lunch.
The group first gathered in the Algonquin's Pergola Room (later called the Oak Room) at a long rectangular table. As they increased in number, Algonquin manager Frank Case moved them to the Rose Room and a round table. Initially the group called itself "The Board" and the luncheons "Board meetings". After being assigned a waiter named Luigi, the group re-christened itself "Luigi Board". Finally, they became "The Vicious Circle" although "The Round Table" gained wide currency after a caricature by cartoonist Edmund Duffy of the Brooklyn Eagle portrayed the group sitting at a round table and wearing armor.
Membership
Charter members of the Round Table included:
Franklin Pierce Adams, columnist
Robert Benchley, humorist and actor
Heywood Broun, columnist and sportswriter (married to Ruth Hale)
Marc Connelly, playwright
Ruth Hale, freelance writer who worked for women's rights
George S. Kaufman, playwright and director
Dorothy Parker, critic, poet, short-story writer, and screenwriter
Brock Pemberton, Broadway producer
Murdock Pemberton, Broadway publicist, writer
Harold Ross, The New Yorker editor
Robert E. Sherwood, author and playwright
John Peter Toohey, Broadway publicist
Alexander Woollcott, critic and journalist
Membership was not official or fixed for so many others who moved in and out of the Circle. Some of these included:
Tallulah Bankhead, actress
Norman Bel Geddes, stage and industrial designer
Noël Coward, playwright
Blyth Daly, actress
Edna Ferber, author and playwright
Eva Le Gallienne, actress
Margalo Gillmore, actress
Jane Grant, journalist and feminist (married to Harold Ross)
Beatrice Kaufman, editor and playwright (married to George S. Kaufman)
Margaret Leech, writer and historian
Herman J. Mankiewicz, screenwriter
Harpo Marx, comedian and film star
Neysa McMein, magazine illustrator
Alice Duer Miller, writer
Donald Ogden Stewart, playwright and screenwriter
Frank Sullivan, journalist and humorist
Deems Taylor, composer
Estelle Winwood, actress and comedian
Peggy Wood, actress
Activities
In addition to the daily luncheons, members of the Round Table worked and associated with each other almost constantly. The group was devoted to games, including cribbage and poker. The group had its own poker club, the Thanatopsis Literary and Inside Straight Club, which met at the hotel on Saturday nights. Regulars at the game included Kaufman, Adams, Broun, Ross and Woollcott, with non-Round Tablers Herbert Bayard Swope, silk merchant Paul Hyde Bonner, baking heir Raoul Fleischmann, actor Harpo Marx, and writer Ring Lardner sometimes sitting in. The group also played charades (which they called simply "The Game") and the "I can give you a sentence" game, which spawned Dorothy Parker's memorable sentence using the word horticulture: "You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think."
Members often visited Neshobe Island, a private island co-owned by several "Algonks"—but governed by Woollcott as a "benevolent tyrant", as his biographer Samuel Hopkins Adams charitably put it—located on several acres in the middle of Lake Bomoseen in Vermont. There they would engage in their usual array of games including Wink murder, which they called simply "Murder", plus croquet.
A number of Round Tablers were inveterate practical jokers, constantly pulling pranks on one another. As time went on the jokes became ever more elaborate. Harold Ross and Jane Grant once spent weeks playing a particularly memorable joke on Woollcott involving a prized portrait of himself. They had several copies made, each slightly more askew than the last, and would periodically secretly swap them out and then later comment to Woollcott "What on earth is wrong with your portrait?" until Woollcott was beside himself. Eventually they returned the original portrait.
No Sirree!
Given the literary and theatrical activities of the Round Table members, it was perhaps inevitable that they would write and stage their own revue. No Sirree!, staged for one night only in April 1922, was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff.
No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, which served as something of a salon for Round Tablers away from the Algonquin. Acts included: "Opening Chorus" featuring Woollcott, Toohey, Kaufman, Connelly, Adams and Benchley with violinist Jascha Heifetz providing offstage, off-key accompaniment; "He Who Gets Flapped", a musical number featuring the song "The Everlastin' Ingenue Blues" written by Dorothy Parker and performed by Robert Sherwood accompanied by "chorus girls" including Tallulah Bankhead, Helen Hayes, Ruth Gillmore, Lenore Ulric and Mary Brandon; "Zowie, or the Curse of an Akins Heart"; "The Greasy Hag, an O'Neill Play in One Act" with Kaufman, Connelly and Woollcott; and "Mr. Whim Passes By—An A. A. Milne Play."
The only item of note to emerge from No Sirree! was Robert Benchley's contribution, The Treasurer's Report. Benchley's disjointed parody so delighted those in attendance that Irving Berlin hired Benchley in 1923 to deliver the Report as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue for $500 a week. In 1928, Report was later made into a short sound film in the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system by Fox Film Corporation. The film marked the beginning of a second career for Benchley in Hollywood.
With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" Vicious Circle production open to the public with material performed by professional actors. Kaufman and Connelly funded the revue, named The Forty-niners. The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, running for just 15 performances.
Decline
As members of the Round Table moved into ventures outside New York City, inevitably the group drifted apart. By the early 1930s the Vicious Circle was broken. Edna Ferber said she realized it when she arrived at the Rose Room for lunch one day in 1932 and found the group's table occupied by a family from Kansas. Frank Case was asked what happened to the group. He shrugged and replied, "What became of the reservoir at Fifth Avenue and Forty-Second Street? These things do not last forever." Some members of the group remained friends after its dissolution. Parker and Benchley in particular remained close up until his death in 1945, although her political leanings did strain their relationship. Others, as the group itself would come to understand when it gathered following Woollcott's death in 1943, simply realized that they had nothing to say to one another.
Public response and legacy
Because a number of the members of the Round Table had regular newspaper columns, the activities and quips of various Round Table members were reported in the national press. This brought Round Tablers widely into the public consciousness as renowned wits.
Not all of their contemporaries were fans of the group. Their critics accused them of logrolling, or exchanging favorable plugs of one another's works, and of rehearsing their witticisms in advance. James Thurber (who lived in the hotel) was a detractor of the group, accusing them of being too consumed by their elaborate practical jokes. H. L. Mencken, who was much admired by many in the Circle, was also a critic, commenting to fellow writer Anita Loos that "their ideals were those of a vaudeville actor, one who is extremely 'in the know' and inordinately trashy".
The group showed up in the 1923 best-seller Black Oxen by Gertrude Atherton. She sarcastically described a group she called "the Sophisticates":
Groucho Marx, brother of Round Table associate Harpo, was never comfortable amidst the viciousness of the Vicious Circle. Therein he remarked "The price of admission is a serpent's tongue and a half-concealed stiletto." Even some members of the Round Table disparaged it later in life. Dorothy Parker in particular criticized the group.
Despite Parker's bleak assessment and while it is true that some members of the Round Table are perhaps now "famous for being famous" instead of for their literary output, Round Table members and associates contributed to the literary landscape, including Pulitzer Prize-winning work by Circle members Kaufman, Connelly and Sherwood (who won four) and by associate Ferber and the legacy of Ross's New Yorker. Others made lasting contributions to the realms of stage and screen — Tallulah Bankhead and Eva Le Gallienne became Broadway greats and the films of Harpo and Benchley remain popular; and Parker has remained renowned for her short stories and literary reviews.
The Algonquin Round Table, as well as the number of other literary and theatrical greats who lodged there, helped earn the Algonquin Hotel its status as a New York City Historic Landmark. The hotel was so designated in 1987. In 1996 the hotel was designated a national literary landmark by the Friends of Libraries USA based on the contributions of "The Round Table Wits". The organization's bronze plaque is attached to the front of the hotel.
Although the Rose Room was removed from the Algonquin in a 1998 remodel, the hotel paid tribute to the group by commissioning and hanging the painting A Vicious Circle by Natalie Ascencios, depicting the Round Table and also created a replica of the original table. The hotel occasionally stages an original musical production, The Talk of the Town, in the Oak Room. Its latest production started September 11, 2007 and ran through the end of the year.
A film about the members, The Ten-Year Lunch (1987), won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
The dramatic film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994) recounts the Round Table from the perspective of Dorothy Parker.
In popular culture
Portions of the 1981 film Rich and Famous were set in the Algonquin and one of the film's characters, Liz Hamilton (played by Jacqueline Bisset), refers to the Round Table during the film.
The Algonquin Round Table was featured in "The Young Indiana Jones and the Scandal of 1920", a 1993 episode of the TV series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, in which the title character meets the group and attends at least two lunches. Wonderful Nonsense - The Algonquin Round Table is a documentary produced for the DVD release of that film in 2008.
In season 2, episode 4 of Seinfeld entitled “The Phone Message” (1991), Jerry tells Donna, the woman he is seeing at the time: "Boy, I bet you got a regular Algonquin round table there", after Donna says she discussed a Dockers commercial with friends.
The 1994 film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle concerns Dorothy Parker and her relationship with Robert Benchley and the larger group.
In 2009, Robert Benchley's grandson, Nat Benchley, and co-editor Kevin C. Fitzpatrick published The Lost Algonquin Round Table, a collection of the early writings of the group. Benchley's grandson Peter Benchley wrote the famous shark novel Jaws upon which the Steven Spielberg film is based.
See also
References
External links
Algonquin Round Table historical site History notes and news since 1999
Algonquin Round Table at PBS's American Masters
American literary movements
American humorists
Culture of Manhattan
Literary circles
20th-century American literature | true | [
"\"Mixed Emotions\" is a popular song by Stuart F. Louchheim, published in 1951.\n\nThe best-known version of the song was recorded by Rosemary Clooney on Columbia Records in 1951. It reached number 22 in the United States.\n\nThe song was covered by Ella Fitzgerald, as one side of a single whose other side was also a cover of a Rosemary Clooney hit, \"Come On-a My House,\" on Decca Records (catalog number 27680). An instrumental version was created by Earl Grant on his album, Yes Sirree!\n\nDinah Washington recorded the song twice, once in the early 1950s, and again in 1961.\n\nAnita Bryant released a version of the song that was the B-side to her 1960 hit \"Paper Roses\".\n\nReferences\n\n1951 songs\nRosemary Clooney songs\nElla Fitzgerald songs\nDinah Washington songs\nAnita Bryant songs",
"Ruth Emily Gillmore (26 October 1899 - 12 February 1976) was an English-born American stage actress.\n\nEarly years \nGillmore was the daughter of Frank Gillmore, former president of Actors' Equity, and actress Laura MacGillivray and the sister of actress Margalo Gillmore. Her great-aunt was the British actor-manager Sarah Thorne, and her great-uncles were the actors Thomas Thorne and George Thorne. She was a fourth-generation actor on her father's side,\n\nCareer \nGillmore's first professional appearance was as an unborn child in Maurice Maeterlinck's The Betrothal in New York City in 1918. Her later theatrical appearances included Edie Upton in The Robbery (1921), Jeanne in The Nest (1922), The '49ers (1922), [[Algonquin Round Table#No_Sir>ree.21|No Sirree!]] (1922), Gail Carlton in No More Frontiers (1931), and Mrs Howard in The Farmer Takes a Wife (1934-5).\n\nShe married theatre producer Max Sonino in Florence in Italy. They met when he produced the 1931 play No More Frontiers, in which she had appeared. Together they translated the Italian plays Finding Oneself (1933) by Luigi Pirandello, and Giovacchino Forzano's Gutlibi and The Bells of San Lucio. Their daughter was Mildred Sonino.\n\nGillmore taught speech and drama at the Buckley School.\n\nPersonal life and death \nWith her sister Margalo Gillmore she was a member of the Algonquin Round Table.\n\nGillmore died in Nantucket, Massachusetts, on February 12, 1976, aged 76.\n\nReferences\n\n1899 births\n1976 deaths\nActresses from London\nAmerican stage actresses\nBritish emigrants to the United States\nActresses from New York City\n20th-century American actresses\nAlgonquin Round Table\n20th-century English women\n20th-century English people"
] |
[
"Algonquin Round Table",
"No Sirree!",
"How did no sirree come about?",
"No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein,"
] | C_b6a9e4af8dc54cd7abeb132612c7e77e_0 | Who said it first? | 2 | Who said No Sirree! at the studio of Neysa McMein first? | Algonquin Round Table | Given the literary and theatrical activities of the Round Table members, it was perhaps inevitable that they would write and stage their own revue. No Sirree!, staged for one night only in April 1922, was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff. No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, which served as something of a salon for Round Tablers away from the Algonquin. Acts included: "Opening Chorus" featuring Woollcott, Toohey, Kaufman, Connelly, Adams and Benchley with violinist Jascha Heifetz providing offstage, off-key accompaniment; "He Who Gets Flapped", a musical number featuring the song "The Everlastin' Ingenue Blues" written by Dorothy Parker and performed by Robert Sherwood accompanied by "chorus girls" including Tallulah Bankhead, Helen Hayes, Ruth Gillmore, Lenore Ulric and Mary Brandon; "Zowie, or the Curse of an Akins Heart"; "The Greasy Hag, an O'Neill Play in One Act" with Kaufman, Connelly and Woollcott; and "Mr. Whim Passes By--An A. A. Milne Play." The only item of note to emerge from No Sirree! was Robert Benchley's contribution, The Treasurer's Report. Benchley's disjointed parody so delighted those in attendance that Irving Berlin hired Benchley in 1923 to deliver the Report as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue for $500 a week. In 1928, Report was later made into a short sound film in the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system by Fox Film Corporation. The film marked the beginning of a second career for Benchley in Hollywood. With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" Vicious Circle production open to the public with material performed by professional actors. Kaufman and Connelly funded the revue, named The Forty-niners. The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, running for just 15 performances. CANNOTANSWER | was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff. | The Algonquin Round Table was a group of New York City writers, critics, actors, and wits. Gathering initially as part of a practical joke, members of "The Vicious Circle", as they dubbed themselves, met for lunch each day at the Algonquin Hotel from 1919 until roughly 1929. At these luncheons they engaged in wisecracks, wordplay, and witticisms that, through the newspaper columns of Round Table members, were disseminated across the country.
Daily association with each other, both at the luncheons and outside of them, inspired members of the Circle to collaborate creatively. The entire group worked together successfully only once, however, to create a revue called No Sirree! which helped launch a Hollywood career for Round Tabler Robert Benchley.
In its ten years of association, the Round Table and a number of its members acquired national reputations, both for their contributions to literature and for their sparkling wit. Although some of their contemporaries, and later in life even some of its members, disparaged the group, its reputation has endured long after its dissolution.
Origin
The group that would become the Round Table began meeting in June 1919 as the result of a practical joke carried out by theatrical press agent John Peter Toohey. Toohey, annoyed at The New York Times drama critic Alexander Woollcott for refusing to plug one of Toohey's clients (Eugene O'Neill) in his column, organized a luncheon supposedly to welcome Woollcott back from World War I, where he had been a correspondent for Stars and Stripes. Instead, Toohey used the occasion to poke fun at Woollcott on a number of fronts. Woollcott's enjoyment of the joke and the success of the event prompted Toohey to suggest that the group in attendance meet at the Algonquin each day for lunch.
The group first gathered in the Algonquin's Pergola Room (later called the Oak Room) at a long rectangular table. As they increased in number, Algonquin manager Frank Case moved them to the Rose Room and a round table. Initially the group called itself "The Board" and the luncheons "Board meetings". After being assigned a waiter named Luigi, the group re-christened itself "Luigi Board". Finally, they became "The Vicious Circle" although "The Round Table" gained wide currency after a caricature by cartoonist Edmund Duffy of the Brooklyn Eagle portrayed the group sitting at a round table and wearing armor.
Membership
Charter members of the Round Table included:
Franklin Pierce Adams, columnist
Robert Benchley, humorist and actor
Heywood Broun, columnist and sportswriter (married to Ruth Hale)
Marc Connelly, playwright
Ruth Hale, freelance writer who worked for women's rights
George S. Kaufman, playwright and director
Dorothy Parker, critic, poet, short-story writer, and screenwriter
Brock Pemberton, Broadway producer
Murdock Pemberton, Broadway publicist, writer
Harold Ross, The New Yorker editor
Robert E. Sherwood, author and playwright
John Peter Toohey, Broadway publicist
Alexander Woollcott, critic and journalist
Membership was not official or fixed for so many others who moved in and out of the Circle. Some of these included:
Tallulah Bankhead, actress
Norman Bel Geddes, stage and industrial designer
Noël Coward, playwright
Blyth Daly, actress
Edna Ferber, author and playwright
Eva Le Gallienne, actress
Margalo Gillmore, actress
Jane Grant, journalist and feminist (married to Harold Ross)
Beatrice Kaufman, editor and playwright (married to George S. Kaufman)
Margaret Leech, writer and historian
Herman J. Mankiewicz, screenwriter
Harpo Marx, comedian and film star
Neysa McMein, magazine illustrator
Alice Duer Miller, writer
Donald Ogden Stewart, playwright and screenwriter
Frank Sullivan, journalist and humorist
Deems Taylor, composer
Estelle Winwood, actress and comedian
Peggy Wood, actress
Activities
In addition to the daily luncheons, members of the Round Table worked and associated with each other almost constantly. The group was devoted to games, including cribbage and poker. The group had its own poker club, the Thanatopsis Literary and Inside Straight Club, which met at the hotel on Saturday nights. Regulars at the game included Kaufman, Adams, Broun, Ross and Woollcott, with non-Round Tablers Herbert Bayard Swope, silk merchant Paul Hyde Bonner, baking heir Raoul Fleischmann, actor Harpo Marx, and writer Ring Lardner sometimes sitting in. The group also played charades (which they called simply "The Game") and the "I can give you a sentence" game, which spawned Dorothy Parker's memorable sentence using the word horticulture: "You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think."
Members often visited Neshobe Island, a private island co-owned by several "Algonks"—but governed by Woollcott as a "benevolent tyrant", as his biographer Samuel Hopkins Adams charitably put it—located on several acres in the middle of Lake Bomoseen in Vermont. There they would engage in their usual array of games including Wink murder, which they called simply "Murder", plus croquet.
A number of Round Tablers were inveterate practical jokers, constantly pulling pranks on one another. As time went on the jokes became ever more elaborate. Harold Ross and Jane Grant once spent weeks playing a particularly memorable joke on Woollcott involving a prized portrait of himself. They had several copies made, each slightly more askew than the last, and would periodically secretly swap them out and then later comment to Woollcott "What on earth is wrong with your portrait?" until Woollcott was beside himself. Eventually they returned the original portrait.
No Sirree!
Given the literary and theatrical activities of the Round Table members, it was perhaps inevitable that they would write and stage their own revue. No Sirree!, staged for one night only in April 1922, was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff.
No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, which served as something of a salon for Round Tablers away from the Algonquin. Acts included: "Opening Chorus" featuring Woollcott, Toohey, Kaufman, Connelly, Adams and Benchley with violinist Jascha Heifetz providing offstage, off-key accompaniment; "He Who Gets Flapped", a musical number featuring the song "The Everlastin' Ingenue Blues" written by Dorothy Parker and performed by Robert Sherwood accompanied by "chorus girls" including Tallulah Bankhead, Helen Hayes, Ruth Gillmore, Lenore Ulric and Mary Brandon; "Zowie, or the Curse of an Akins Heart"; "The Greasy Hag, an O'Neill Play in One Act" with Kaufman, Connelly and Woollcott; and "Mr. Whim Passes By—An A. A. Milne Play."
The only item of note to emerge from No Sirree! was Robert Benchley's contribution, The Treasurer's Report. Benchley's disjointed parody so delighted those in attendance that Irving Berlin hired Benchley in 1923 to deliver the Report as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue for $500 a week. In 1928, Report was later made into a short sound film in the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system by Fox Film Corporation. The film marked the beginning of a second career for Benchley in Hollywood.
With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" Vicious Circle production open to the public with material performed by professional actors. Kaufman and Connelly funded the revue, named The Forty-niners. The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, running for just 15 performances.
Decline
As members of the Round Table moved into ventures outside New York City, inevitably the group drifted apart. By the early 1930s the Vicious Circle was broken. Edna Ferber said she realized it when she arrived at the Rose Room for lunch one day in 1932 and found the group's table occupied by a family from Kansas. Frank Case was asked what happened to the group. He shrugged and replied, "What became of the reservoir at Fifth Avenue and Forty-Second Street? These things do not last forever." Some members of the group remained friends after its dissolution. Parker and Benchley in particular remained close up until his death in 1945, although her political leanings did strain their relationship. Others, as the group itself would come to understand when it gathered following Woollcott's death in 1943, simply realized that they had nothing to say to one another.
Public response and legacy
Because a number of the members of the Round Table had regular newspaper columns, the activities and quips of various Round Table members were reported in the national press. This brought Round Tablers widely into the public consciousness as renowned wits.
Not all of their contemporaries were fans of the group. Their critics accused them of logrolling, or exchanging favorable plugs of one another's works, and of rehearsing their witticisms in advance. James Thurber (who lived in the hotel) was a detractor of the group, accusing them of being too consumed by their elaborate practical jokes. H. L. Mencken, who was much admired by many in the Circle, was also a critic, commenting to fellow writer Anita Loos that "their ideals were those of a vaudeville actor, one who is extremely 'in the know' and inordinately trashy".
The group showed up in the 1923 best-seller Black Oxen by Gertrude Atherton. She sarcastically described a group she called "the Sophisticates":
Groucho Marx, brother of Round Table associate Harpo, was never comfortable amidst the viciousness of the Vicious Circle. Therein he remarked "The price of admission is a serpent's tongue and a half-concealed stiletto." Even some members of the Round Table disparaged it later in life. Dorothy Parker in particular criticized the group.
Despite Parker's bleak assessment and while it is true that some members of the Round Table are perhaps now "famous for being famous" instead of for their literary output, Round Table members and associates contributed to the literary landscape, including Pulitzer Prize-winning work by Circle members Kaufman, Connelly and Sherwood (who won four) and by associate Ferber and the legacy of Ross's New Yorker. Others made lasting contributions to the realms of stage and screen — Tallulah Bankhead and Eva Le Gallienne became Broadway greats and the films of Harpo and Benchley remain popular; and Parker has remained renowned for her short stories and literary reviews.
The Algonquin Round Table, as well as the number of other literary and theatrical greats who lodged there, helped earn the Algonquin Hotel its status as a New York City Historic Landmark. The hotel was so designated in 1987. In 1996 the hotel was designated a national literary landmark by the Friends of Libraries USA based on the contributions of "The Round Table Wits". The organization's bronze plaque is attached to the front of the hotel.
Although the Rose Room was removed from the Algonquin in a 1998 remodel, the hotel paid tribute to the group by commissioning and hanging the painting A Vicious Circle by Natalie Ascencios, depicting the Round Table and also created a replica of the original table. The hotel occasionally stages an original musical production, The Talk of the Town, in the Oak Room. Its latest production started September 11, 2007 and ran through the end of the year.
A film about the members, The Ten-Year Lunch (1987), won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
The dramatic film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994) recounts the Round Table from the perspective of Dorothy Parker.
In popular culture
Portions of the 1981 film Rich and Famous were set in the Algonquin and one of the film's characters, Liz Hamilton (played by Jacqueline Bisset), refers to the Round Table during the film.
The Algonquin Round Table was featured in "The Young Indiana Jones and the Scandal of 1920", a 1993 episode of the TV series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, in which the title character meets the group and attends at least two lunches. Wonderful Nonsense - The Algonquin Round Table is a documentary produced for the DVD release of that film in 2008.
In season 2, episode 4 of Seinfeld entitled “The Phone Message” (1991), Jerry tells Donna, the woman he is seeing at the time: "Boy, I bet you got a regular Algonquin round table there", after Donna says she discussed a Dockers commercial with friends.
The 1994 film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle concerns Dorothy Parker and her relationship with Robert Benchley and the larger group.
In 2009, Robert Benchley's grandson, Nat Benchley, and co-editor Kevin C. Fitzpatrick published The Lost Algonquin Round Table, a collection of the early writings of the group. Benchley's grandson Peter Benchley wrote the famous shark novel Jaws upon which the Steven Spielberg film is based.
See also
References
External links
Algonquin Round Table historical site History notes and news since 1999
Algonquin Round Table at PBS's American Masters
American literary movements
American humorists
Culture of Manhattan
Literary circles
20th-century American literature | true | [
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"\"Who Said\" is a song by American recording artist and actress Miley Cyrus. She is performing as Hannah Montana – the alter ego of Miley Stewart, a character she plays on the Disney Channel television series Hannah Montana. The song was written by Matthew Gerrard, Robbie Nevil, and Jay Landers and produced by Gerrard. It was released on July 11, 2006 as the second single by Walt Disney Records from the series' first soundtrack, Hannah Montana. \"Who Said\" bears teen pop aspects musically, while its lyrics are about individualism.\n\nIn the United States, the song peaked at number eighty-three on the Billboard Hot 100 and within the top seventy on the Pop 100. Its appearance on the Billboard Hot 100 made Cyrus the first act to have seven songs appear on the chart in the same week. A music video for \"Who Said\" was released, taken from footage of a concert performance.\n\nBackground and composition\n\n\"Who Said\" was composed by Matthew Gerrard with the aid of Robbie Nevil and Jay Landers. Gerrard co-wrote a total of six songs on Hannah Montana while Nevil co-wrote four and Landers two. A karaoke version appears on Disney's Karaoke Series: Hannah Montana (2007), while a remixed version appears on Hits Remixed (2008). The song first premiered on Radio Disney on March 10, 2006 in order to promote the series and was afterward released as a single from Hannah Montana on July 11, 2006 to digital retailers. The album artwork for the release was the same as the soundtrack's.\n\n\"Who Said\" is pop rock song with a length of three minutes and fifteen seconds. The song incorporates various teen pop styles within its music, according to Allmusic. The song is set in common time and has a moderate tempo of 120 beats per minute. It is written in the key of E major and Cyrus' vocals span two octaves, from B3 to C♯5. \"Who Said\" follows the chord progression of E–A. Chris William of Entertainment Weekly perceived the lyrics of \"Who Said\" pertained to individualism, noting the lines \"I'm individual / I'm not like anyone\".\n\nReception\n\nCritical reception\nChris William of Entertainment Weekly described \"Who Said\"'s style as a simultaneous mimic of the styles of Avril Lavigne, Ashlee Simpson, and Britney Spears, which he felt contracted its lyrical theme.\n\nChart performance\nAs it was not released as a single, \"Who Said\" received exclusive airplay on Radio Disney, thus its chart appearances consisted mainly of digital downloads. On the week ending August 5, 2006, the song debuted at number ninety-two on the Billboard Hot 100; succeeding the appearance, the song dropped from the chart. Following the release of the Hannah Montana soundtrack, the song entered Billboards Hot Digital Songs Chart at number forty-four, which led to a reappearance on the Billboard Hot 100 on the week ending November 11, 2006. \"Who Said\" re-entered the Billboard Hot 100 at its peak of eighty-three, thus becoming one of the songs to make Cyrus the female act with the most songs charting in the same week. The record was later duplicated by Taylor Swift. The song also peaked at number sixty-three on the now-defunct Pop 100 Chart. \"Who Said\" peaked at number sixty-five on the Hot Canadian Digital Singles chart.\n\nLive performances\n\nCyrus, costumed as Montana, first performed \"Who Said\", along with six other songs, at the concert taping for the first season of Hannah Montana. In the performance, Cyrus dressed in a white tank top embroidered with a rhinestone cross, blue jeans with a loose, black miniskirt on top of it, black leather boots, and silver leather jacket. It began with Cyrus entering from behind a huge, illuminated sign that spelled \"Hannah Montana\". She then roamed throughout the stage singing the number. The performance was later released as the song's music video on April 10, 2006 on Disney Channel. Cyrus also performed the song on twenty dates in the fall of 2006, when she opened for the Cheetah Girls' 2006 and 2007 concert tour The Party's Just Begun Tour.\n\nTrack listingsU.S. Digital Download\"Who Said\" (Radio Edit) – 3:17U.S. iTunes Digital Download'\n\"Who Said\" (Radio Edit) – 3:17\n\"Radio Disney Interview\" – 1:25\n\nCharts\n\nReferences\n\n2006 songs\nHannah Montana songs\nSongs from television series\nSongs written by Matthew Gerrard\nSongs written by Robbie Nevil\nWalt Disney Records singles\nSongs written by Jay Landers\nSong recordings produced by Matthew Gerrard"
] |
[
"Algonquin Round Table",
"No Sirree!",
"How did no sirree come about?",
"No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein,",
"Who said it first?",
"was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff."
] | C_b6a9e4af8dc54cd7abeb132612c7e77e_0 | was it a success? | 3 | Was No Sirree! a success of the European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff? | Algonquin Round Table | Given the literary and theatrical activities of the Round Table members, it was perhaps inevitable that they would write and stage their own revue. No Sirree!, staged for one night only in April 1922, was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff. No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, which served as something of a salon for Round Tablers away from the Algonquin. Acts included: "Opening Chorus" featuring Woollcott, Toohey, Kaufman, Connelly, Adams and Benchley with violinist Jascha Heifetz providing offstage, off-key accompaniment; "He Who Gets Flapped", a musical number featuring the song "The Everlastin' Ingenue Blues" written by Dorothy Parker and performed by Robert Sherwood accompanied by "chorus girls" including Tallulah Bankhead, Helen Hayes, Ruth Gillmore, Lenore Ulric and Mary Brandon; "Zowie, or the Curse of an Akins Heart"; "The Greasy Hag, an O'Neill Play in One Act" with Kaufman, Connelly and Woollcott; and "Mr. Whim Passes By--An A. A. Milne Play." The only item of note to emerge from No Sirree! was Robert Benchley's contribution, The Treasurer's Report. Benchley's disjointed parody so delighted those in attendance that Irving Berlin hired Benchley in 1923 to deliver the Report as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue for $500 a week. In 1928, Report was later made into a short sound film in the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system by Fox Film Corporation. The film marked the beginning of a second career for Benchley in Hollywood. With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" Vicious Circle production open to the public with material performed by professional actors. Kaufman and Connelly funded the revue, named The Forty-niners. The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, running for just 15 performances. CANNOTANSWER | With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" | The Algonquin Round Table was a group of New York City writers, critics, actors, and wits. Gathering initially as part of a practical joke, members of "The Vicious Circle", as they dubbed themselves, met for lunch each day at the Algonquin Hotel from 1919 until roughly 1929. At these luncheons they engaged in wisecracks, wordplay, and witticisms that, through the newspaper columns of Round Table members, were disseminated across the country.
Daily association with each other, both at the luncheons and outside of them, inspired members of the Circle to collaborate creatively. The entire group worked together successfully only once, however, to create a revue called No Sirree! which helped launch a Hollywood career for Round Tabler Robert Benchley.
In its ten years of association, the Round Table and a number of its members acquired national reputations, both for their contributions to literature and for their sparkling wit. Although some of their contemporaries, and later in life even some of its members, disparaged the group, its reputation has endured long after its dissolution.
Origin
The group that would become the Round Table began meeting in June 1919 as the result of a practical joke carried out by theatrical press agent John Peter Toohey. Toohey, annoyed at The New York Times drama critic Alexander Woollcott for refusing to plug one of Toohey's clients (Eugene O'Neill) in his column, organized a luncheon supposedly to welcome Woollcott back from World War I, where he had been a correspondent for Stars and Stripes. Instead, Toohey used the occasion to poke fun at Woollcott on a number of fronts. Woollcott's enjoyment of the joke and the success of the event prompted Toohey to suggest that the group in attendance meet at the Algonquin each day for lunch.
The group first gathered in the Algonquin's Pergola Room (later called the Oak Room) at a long rectangular table. As they increased in number, Algonquin manager Frank Case moved them to the Rose Room and a round table. Initially the group called itself "The Board" and the luncheons "Board meetings". After being assigned a waiter named Luigi, the group re-christened itself "Luigi Board". Finally, they became "The Vicious Circle" although "The Round Table" gained wide currency after a caricature by cartoonist Edmund Duffy of the Brooklyn Eagle portrayed the group sitting at a round table and wearing armor.
Membership
Charter members of the Round Table included:
Franklin Pierce Adams, columnist
Robert Benchley, humorist and actor
Heywood Broun, columnist and sportswriter (married to Ruth Hale)
Marc Connelly, playwright
Ruth Hale, freelance writer who worked for women's rights
George S. Kaufman, playwright and director
Dorothy Parker, critic, poet, short-story writer, and screenwriter
Brock Pemberton, Broadway producer
Murdock Pemberton, Broadway publicist, writer
Harold Ross, The New Yorker editor
Robert E. Sherwood, author and playwright
John Peter Toohey, Broadway publicist
Alexander Woollcott, critic and journalist
Membership was not official or fixed for so many others who moved in and out of the Circle. Some of these included:
Tallulah Bankhead, actress
Norman Bel Geddes, stage and industrial designer
Noël Coward, playwright
Blyth Daly, actress
Edna Ferber, author and playwright
Eva Le Gallienne, actress
Margalo Gillmore, actress
Jane Grant, journalist and feminist (married to Harold Ross)
Beatrice Kaufman, editor and playwright (married to George S. Kaufman)
Margaret Leech, writer and historian
Herman J. Mankiewicz, screenwriter
Harpo Marx, comedian and film star
Neysa McMein, magazine illustrator
Alice Duer Miller, writer
Donald Ogden Stewart, playwright and screenwriter
Frank Sullivan, journalist and humorist
Deems Taylor, composer
Estelle Winwood, actress and comedian
Peggy Wood, actress
Activities
In addition to the daily luncheons, members of the Round Table worked and associated with each other almost constantly. The group was devoted to games, including cribbage and poker. The group had its own poker club, the Thanatopsis Literary and Inside Straight Club, which met at the hotel on Saturday nights. Regulars at the game included Kaufman, Adams, Broun, Ross and Woollcott, with non-Round Tablers Herbert Bayard Swope, silk merchant Paul Hyde Bonner, baking heir Raoul Fleischmann, actor Harpo Marx, and writer Ring Lardner sometimes sitting in. The group also played charades (which they called simply "The Game") and the "I can give you a sentence" game, which spawned Dorothy Parker's memorable sentence using the word horticulture: "You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think."
Members often visited Neshobe Island, a private island co-owned by several "Algonks"—but governed by Woollcott as a "benevolent tyrant", as his biographer Samuel Hopkins Adams charitably put it—located on several acres in the middle of Lake Bomoseen in Vermont. There they would engage in their usual array of games including Wink murder, which they called simply "Murder", plus croquet.
A number of Round Tablers were inveterate practical jokers, constantly pulling pranks on one another. As time went on the jokes became ever more elaborate. Harold Ross and Jane Grant once spent weeks playing a particularly memorable joke on Woollcott involving a prized portrait of himself. They had several copies made, each slightly more askew than the last, and would periodically secretly swap them out and then later comment to Woollcott "What on earth is wrong with your portrait?" until Woollcott was beside himself. Eventually they returned the original portrait.
No Sirree!
Given the literary and theatrical activities of the Round Table members, it was perhaps inevitable that they would write and stage their own revue. No Sirree!, staged for one night only in April 1922, was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff.
No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, which served as something of a salon for Round Tablers away from the Algonquin. Acts included: "Opening Chorus" featuring Woollcott, Toohey, Kaufman, Connelly, Adams and Benchley with violinist Jascha Heifetz providing offstage, off-key accompaniment; "He Who Gets Flapped", a musical number featuring the song "The Everlastin' Ingenue Blues" written by Dorothy Parker and performed by Robert Sherwood accompanied by "chorus girls" including Tallulah Bankhead, Helen Hayes, Ruth Gillmore, Lenore Ulric and Mary Brandon; "Zowie, or the Curse of an Akins Heart"; "The Greasy Hag, an O'Neill Play in One Act" with Kaufman, Connelly and Woollcott; and "Mr. Whim Passes By—An A. A. Milne Play."
The only item of note to emerge from No Sirree! was Robert Benchley's contribution, The Treasurer's Report. Benchley's disjointed parody so delighted those in attendance that Irving Berlin hired Benchley in 1923 to deliver the Report as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue for $500 a week. In 1928, Report was later made into a short sound film in the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system by Fox Film Corporation. The film marked the beginning of a second career for Benchley in Hollywood.
With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" Vicious Circle production open to the public with material performed by professional actors. Kaufman and Connelly funded the revue, named The Forty-niners. The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, running for just 15 performances.
Decline
As members of the Round Table moved into ventures outside New York City, inevitably the group drifted apart. By the early 1930s the Vicious Circle was broken. Edna Ferber said she realized it when she arrived at the Rose Room for lunch one day in 1932 and found the group's table occupied by a family from Kansas. Frank Case was asked what happened to the group. He shrugged and replied, "What became of the reservoir at Fifth Avenue and Forty-Second Street? These things do not last forever." Some members of the group remained friends after its dissolution. Parker and Benchley in particular remained close up until his death in 1945, although her political leanings did strain their relationship. Others, as the group itself would come to understand when it gathered following Woollcott's death in 1943, simply realized that they had nothing to say to one another.
Public response and legacy
Because a number of the members of the Round Table had regular newspaper columns, the activities and quips of various Round Table members were reported in the national press. This brought Round Tablers widely into the public consciousness as renowned wits.
Not all of their contemporaries were fans of the group. Their critics accused them of logrolling, or exchanging favorable plugs of one another's works, and of rehearsing their witticisms in advance. James Thurber (who lived in the hotel) was a detractor of the group, accusing them of being too consumed by their elaborate practical jokes. H. L. Mencken, who was much admired by many in the Circle, was also a critic, commenting to fellow writer Anita Loos that "their ideals were those of a vaudeville actor, one who is extremely 'in the know' and inordinately trashy".
The group showed up in the 1923 best-seller Black Oxen by Gertrude Atherton. She sarcastically described a group she called "the Sophisticates":
Groucho Marx, brother of Round Table associate Harpo, was never comfortable amidst the viciousness of the Vicious Circle. Therein he remarked "The price of admission is a serpent's tongue and a half-concealed stiletto." Even some members of the Round Table disparaged it later in life. Dorothy Parker in particular criticized the group.
Despite Parker's bleak assessment and while it is true that some members of the Round Table are perhaps now "famous for being famous" instead of for their literary output, Round Table members and associates contributed to the literary landscape, including Pulitzer Prize-winning work by Circle members Kaufman, Connelly and Sherwood (who won four) and by associate Ferber and the legacy of Ross's New Yorker. Others made lasting contributions to the realms of stage and screen — Tallulah Bankhead and Eva Le Gallienne became Broadway greats and the films of Harpo and Benchley remain popular; and Parker has remained renowned for her short stories and literary reviews.
The Algonquin Round Table, as well as the number of other literary and theatrical greats who lodged there, helped earn the Algonquin Hotel its status as a New York City Historic Landmark. The hotel was so designated in 1987. In 1996 the hotel was designated a national literary landmark by the Friends of Libraries USA based on the contributions of "The Round Table Wits". The organization's bronze plaque is attached to the front of the hotel.
Although the Rose Room was removed from the Algonquin in a 1998 remodel, the hotel paid tribute to the group by commissioning and hanging the painting A Vicious Circle by Natalie Ascencios, depicting the Round Table and also created a replica of the original table. The hotel occasionally stages an original musical production, The Talk of the Town, in the Oak Room. Its latest production started September 11, 2007 and ran through the end of the year.
A film about the members, The Ten-Year Lunch (1987), won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
The dramatic film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994) recounts the Round Table from the perspective of Dorothy Parker.
In popular culture
Portions of the 1981 film Rich and Famous were set in the Algonquin and one of the film's characters, Liz Hamilton (played by Jacqueline Bisset), refers to the Round Table during the film.
The Algonquin Round Table was featured in "The Young Indiana Jones and the Scandal of 1920", a 1993 episode of the TV series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, in which the title character meets the group and attends at least two lunches. Wonderful Nonsense - The Algonquin Round Table is a documentary produced for the DVD release of that film in 2008.
In season 2, episode 4 of Seinfeld entitled “The Phone Message” (1991), Jerry tells Donna, the woman he is seeing at the time: "Boy, I bet you got a regular Algonquin round table there", after Donna says she discussed a Dockers commercial with friends.
The 1994 film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle concerns Dorothy Parker and her relationship with Robert Benchley and the larger group.
In 2009, Robert Benchley's grandson, Nat Benchley, and co-editor Kevin C. Fitzpatrick published The Lost Algonquin Round Table, a collection of the early writings of the group. Benchley's grandson Peter Benchley wrote the famous shark novel Jaws upon which the Steven Spielberg film is based.
See also
References
External links
Algonquin Round Table historical site History notes and news since 1999
Algonquin Round Table at PBS's American Masters
American literary movements
American humorists
Culture of Manhattan
Literary circles
20th-century American literature | true | [
"Sixteen ships of the Royal Navy have been named HMS Success, whilst another was planned:\n\n was a 34-gun ship, previously the French ship Jules. She was captured in 1650, renamed HMS Old Success in 1660 and sold in 1662.\n HMS Success was a 24-gun ship launched in 1655 as . She was renamed HMS Success in 1660 and was wrecked in 1680.\n was a 6-gun fireship purchased in 1672 that foundered in 1673.\n was a store hulk purchased in 1692 and sunk as a breakwater in 1707.\n was a 10-gun sloop purchased in 1709 that the French captured in 1710 off Lisbon.\n was a 24-gun storeship launched in 1709, hulked in 1730, and sold in 1748. \n was a 20-gun sixth rate launched in 1712, converted to a fireship in 1739, and sold in 1743.\n was a 14-gun sloop launched in 1736; her fate is unknown.\n was a 24-gun sixth rate launched in 1740 and broken up in 1779.\n was a 14-gun ketch launched in 1754. Her fate is unknown.\n was a 32-gun fifth rate launched in 1781 that the French captured in 1801 but that the British recaptured the same year. She became a convict ship in 1814 and was broken up in 1820.\n was a 3-gun gunvessel, previously in use as a barge. She was purchased in 1797 and sold in 1802.\n was a 28 gun sixth rate launched in 1825, and captained by James Stirling in his journey to Western Australia. She was used for harbour service from 1832 and was broken up 1849.\n HMS Success was to have been a wood screw sloop. She was ordered but not laid down and was cancelled in 1863.\n was a launched in 1901 and wrecked in 1914.\n HMS Success was an launched in 1918. She was transferred to the Royal Australian Navy in 1919 and was sold in 1937.\n was an S-class destroyer launched in 1943. She was transferred to the Royal Norwegian Navy later that year and renamed . She was broken up in 1959.\n\nSee also\n , two ships of the Royal Australian Navy.\n\nCitations and references\nCitations\n\nReferences\n \n\nRoyal Navy ship names",
"HMAS Success was an Admiralty destroyer of the Royal Australian Navy (RAN). Built for the Royal Navy during World War I, the ship was not completed until 1919, and spent less than eight months in British service before being transferred to the RAN at the start of 1920. The destroyer's career was uneventful, with almost all of it spent in Australian waters. Success was decommissioned in 1930, and was sold for ship breaking in 1937.\n\nDesign and construction\n\nSuccess was built to the Admiralty design of the S-class destroyer, which was designed and built as part of the British emergency war programme. The destroyer had a displacement of 1,075 tons, a length of overall and between perpendiculars, and a beam of . The propulsion machinery consisted of three Yarrow boilers feeding Brown-Curtis turbines, which supplied to the ship's two propeller shafts. Success had a maximum speed of , and a range of at . The ship's company was made up of 6 officers and 93 sailors.\n\nThe destroyer's primary armament consisted of three QF 4-inch Mark IV guns. These were supplemented by a 2-pounder pom-pom, two 9.5-inch howitzer bomb throwers, five .303 inch machine guns (a mix of Lewis and Maxim guns), two twin 21-inch torpedo tube sets, two depth charge throwers, and two depth charge chutes.\n\nSuccess was laid down by William Doxford and Sons Limited at their Sunderland shipyard in 1917. The destroyer was launched on 29 June 1918, and completed on 15 April 1919. The ship was briefly commissioned into the Royal Navy in April 1919, but was quickly marked for transfer to the RAN, along with four sister ships. Success was commissioned into the RAN on 27 January 1920.\n\nOperational history\n\nSuccess and three of her sister ships sailed for Australia on 20 February, visiting ports in the Mediterranean, India, Singapore, and the Netherlands East Indies before reaching Sydney on 29 April. Success operated in Australian waters until 6 October 1921, when she was placed in reserve. The destroyer was reactivated on 1 December 1925. In late May 1926, Success visited Port Moresby.\n\nDecommissioning and fate\nSuccess paid off on 21 May 1930. She was sold to Penguins Limited for ship breaking in 1937.\n\nCitations\n\nReferences\n\nS-class destroyers (1917) of the Royal Australian Navy\nShips built on the River Wear\n1918 ships"
] |
[
"Algonquin Round Table",
"No Sirree!",
"How did no sirree come about?",
"No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein,",
"Who said it first?",
"was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff.",
"was it a success?",
"With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an \"official\""
] | C_b6a9e4af8dc54cd7abeb132612c7e77e_0 | did they duplicate it? | 4 | Did the Algonquin Round Tablers duplicate No Sirree!? | Algonquin Round Table | Given the literary and theatrical activities of the Round Table members, it was perhaps inevitable that they would write and stage their own revue. No Sirree!, staged for one night only in April 1922, was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff. No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, which served as something of a salon for Round Tablers away from the Algonquin. Acts included: "Opening Chorus" featuring Woollcott, Toohey, Kaufman, Connelly, Adams and Benchley with violinist Jascha Heifetz providing offstage, off-key accompaniment; "He Who Gets Flapped", a musical number featuring the song "The Everlastin' Ingenue Blues" written by Dorothy Parker and performed by Robert Sherwood accompanied by "chorus girls" including Tallulah Bankhead, Helen Hayes, Ruth Gillmore, Lenore Ulric and Mary Brandon; "Zowie, or the Curse of an Akins Heart"; "The Greasy Hag, an O'Neill Play in One Act" with Kaufman, Connelly and Woollcott; and "Mr. Whim Passes By--An A. A. Milne Play." The only item of note to emerge from No Sirree! was Robert Benchley's contribution, The Treasurer's Report. Benchley's disjointed parody so delighted those in attendance that Irving Berlin hired Benchley in 1923 to deliver the Report as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue for $500 a week. In 1928, Report was later made into a short sound film in the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system by Fox Film Corporation. The film marked the beginning of a second career for Benchley in Hollywood. With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" Vicious Circle production open to the public with material performed by professional actors. Kaufman and Connelly funded the revue, named The Forty-niners. The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, running for just 15 performances. CANNOTANSWER | The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, | The Algonquin Round Table was a group of New York City writers, critics, actors, and wits. Gathering initially as part of a practical joke, members of "The Vicious Circle", as they dubbed themselves, met for lunch each day at the Algonquin Hotel from 1919 until roughly 1929. At these luncheons they engaged in wisecracks, wordplay, and witticisms that, through the newspaper columns of Round Table members, were disseminated across the country.
Daily association with each other, both at the luncheons and outside of them, inspired members of the Circle to collaborate creatively. The entire group worked together successfully only once, however, to create a revue called No Sirree! which helped launch a Hollywood career for Round Tabler Robert Benchley.
In its ten years of association, the Round Table and a number of its members acquired national reputations, both for their contributions to literature and for their sparkling wit. Although some of their contemporaries, and later in life even some of its members, disparaged the group, its reputation has endured long after its dissolution.
Origin
The group that would become the Round Table began meeting in June 1919 as the result of a practical joke carried out by theatrical press agent John Peter Toohey. Toohey, annoyed at The New York Times drama critic Alexander Woollcott for refusing to plug one of Toohey's clients (Eugene O'Neill) in his column, organized a luncheon supposedly to welcome Woollcott back from World War I, where he had been a correspondent for Stars and Stripes. Instead, Toohey used the occasion to poke fun at Woollcott on a number of fronts. Woollcott's enjoyment of the joke and the success of the event prompted Toohey to suggest that the group in attendance meet at the Algonquin each day for lunch.
The group first gathered in the Algonquin's Pergola Room (later called the Oak Room) at a long rectangular table. As they increased in number, Algonquin manager Frank Case moved them to the Rose Room and a round table. Initially the group called itself "The Board" and the luncheons "Board meetings". After being assigned a waiter named Luigi, the group re-christened itself "Luigi Board". Finally, they became "The Vicious Circle" although "The Round Table" gained wide currency after a caricature by cartoonist Edmund Duffy of the Brooklyn Eagle portrayed the group sitting at a round table and wearing armor.
Membership
Charter members of the Round Table included:
Franklin Pierce Adams, columnist
Robert Benchley, humorist and actor
Heywood Broun, columnist and sportswriter (married to Ruth Hale)
Marc Connelly, playwright
Ruth Hale, freelance writer who worked for women's rights
George S. Kaufman, playwright and director
Dorothy Parker, critic, poet, short-story writer, and screenwriter
Brock Pemberton, Broadway producer
Murdock Pemberton, Broadway publicist, writer
Harold Ross, The New Yorker editor
Robert E. Sherwood, author and playwright
John Peter Toohey, Broadway publicist
Alexander Woollcott, critic and journalist
Membership was not official or fixed for so many others who moved in and out of the Circle. Some of these included:
Tallulah Bankhead, actress
Norman Bel Geddes, stage and industrial designer
Noël Coward, playwright
Blyth Daly, actress
Edna Ferber, author and playwright
Eva Le Gallienne, actress
Margalo Gillmore, actress
Jane Grant, journalist and feminist (married to Harold Ross)
Beatrice Kaufman, editor and playwright (married to George S. Kaufman)
Margaret Leech, writer and historian
Herman J. Mankiewicz, screenwriter
Harpo Marx, comedian and film star
Neysa McMein, magazine illustrator
Alice Duer Miller, writer
Donald Ogden Stewart, playwright and screenwriter
Frank Sullivan, journalist and humorist
Deems Taylor, composer
Estelle Winwood, actress and comedian
Peggy Wood, actress
Activities
In addition to the daily luncheons, members of the Round Table worked and associated with each other almost constantly. The group was devoted to games, including cribbage and poker. The group had its own poker club, the Thanatopsis Literary and Inside Straight Club, which met at the hotel on Saturday nights. Regulars at the game included Kaufman, Adams, Broun, Ross and Woollcott, with non-Round Tablers Herbert Bayard Swope, silk merchant Paul Hyde Bonner, baking heir Raoul Fleischmann, actor Harpo Marx, and writer Ring Lardner sometimes sitting in. The group also played charades (which they called simply "The Game") and the "I can give you a sentence" game, which spawned Dorothy Parker's memorable sentence using the word horticulture: "You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think."
Members often visited Neshobe Island, a private island co-owned by several "Algonks"—but governed by Woollcott as a "benevolent tyrant", as his biographer Samuel Hopkins Adams charitably put it—located on several acres in the middle of Lake Bomoseen in Vermont. There they would engage in their usual array of games including Wink murder, which they called simply "Murder", plus croquet.
A number of Round Tablers were inveterate practical jokers, constantly pulling pranks on one another. As time went on the jokes became ever more elaborate. Harold Ross and Jane Grant once spent weeks playing a particularly memorable joke on Woollcott involving a prized portrait of himself. They had several copies made, each slightly more askew than the last, and would periodically secretly swap them out and then later comment to Woollcott "What on earth is wrong with your portrait?" until Woollcott was beside himself. Eventually they returned the original portrait.
No Sirree!
Given the literary and theatrical activities of the Round Table members, it was perhaps inevitable that they would write and stage their own revue. No Sirree!, staged for one night only in April 1922, was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff.
No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, which served as something of a salon for Round Tablers away from the Algonquin. Acts included: "Opening Chorus" featuring Woollcott, Toohey, Kaufman, Connelly, Adams and Benchley with violinist Jascha Heifetz providing offstage, off-key accompaniment; "He Who Gets Flapped", a musical number featuring the song "The Everlastin' Ingenue Blues" written by Dorothy Parker and performed by Robert Sherwood accompanied by "chorus girls" including Tallulah Bankhead, Helen Hayes, Ruth Gillmore, Lenore Ulric and Mary Brandon; "Zowie, or the Curse of an Akins Heart"; "The Greasy Hag, an O'Neill Play in One Act" with Kaufman, Connelly and Woollcott; and "Mr. Whim Passes By—An A. A. Milne Play."
The only item of note to emerge from No Sirree! was Robert Benchley's contribution, The Treasurer's Report. Benchley's disjointed parody so delighted those in attendance that Irving Berlin hired Benchley in 1923 to deliver the Report as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue for $500 a week. In 1928, Report was later made into a short sound film in the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system by Fox Film Corporation. The film marked the beginning of a second career for Benchley in Hollywood.
With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" Vicious Circle production open to the public with material performed by professional actors. Kaufman and Connelly funded the revue, named The Forty-niners. The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, running for just 15 performances.
Decline
As members of the Round Table moved into ventures outside New York City, inevitably the group drifted apart. By the early 1930s the Vicious Circle was broken. Edna Ferber said she realized it when she arrived at the Rose Room for lunch one day in 1932 and found the group's table occupied by a family from Kansas. Frank Case was asked what happened to the group. He shrugged and replied, "What became of the reservoir at Fifth Avenue and Forty-Second Street? These things do not last forever." Some members of the group remained friends after its dissolution. Parker and Benchley in particular remained close up until his death in 1945, although her political leanings did strain their relationship. Others, as the group itself would come to understand when it gathered following Woollcott's death in 1943, simply realized that they had nothing to say to one another.
Public response and legacy
Because a number of the members of the Round Table had regular newspaper columns, the activities and quips of various Round Table members were reported in the national press. This brought Round Tablers widely into the public consciousness as renowned wits.
Not all of their contemporaries were fans of the group. Their critics accused them of logrolling, or exchanging favorable plugs of one another's works, and of rehearsing their witticisms in advance. James Thurber (who lived in the hotel) was a detractor of the group, accusing them of being too consumed by their elaborate practical jokes. H. L. Mencken, who was much admired by many in the Circle, was also a critic, commenting to fellow writer Anita Loos that "their ideals were those of a vaudeville actor, one who is extremely 'in the know' and inordinately trashy".
The group showed up in the 1923 best-seller Black Oxen by Gertrude Atherton. She sarcastically described a group she called "the Sophisticates":
Groucho Marx, brother of Round Table associate Harpo, was never comfortable amidst the viciousness of the Vicious Circle. Therein he remarked "The price of admission is a serpent's tongue and a half-concealed stiletto." Even some members of the Round Table disparaged it later in life. Dorothy Parker in particular criticized the group.
Despite Parker's bleak assessment and while it is true that some members of the Round Table are perhaps now "famous for being famous" instead of for their literary output, Round Table members and associates contributed to the literary landscape, including Pulitzer Prize-winning work by Circle members Kaufman, Connelly and Sherwood (who won four) and by associate Ferber and the legacy of Ross's New Yorker. Others made lasting contributions to the realms of stage and screen — Tallulah Bankhead and Eva Le Gallienne became Broadway greats and the films of Harpo and Benchley remain popular; and Parker has remained renowned for her short stories and literary reviews.
The Algonquin Round Table, as well as the number of other literary and theatrical greats who lodged there, helped earn the Algonquin Hotel its status as a New York City Historic Landmark. The hotel was so designated in 1987. In 1996 the hotel was designated a national literary landmark by the Friends of Libraries USA based on the contributions of "The Round Table Wits". The organization's bronze plaque is attached to the front of the hotel.
Although the Rose Room was removed from the Algonquin in a 1998 remodel, the hotel paid tribute to the group by commissioning and hanging the painting A Vicious Circle by Natalie Ascencios, depicting the Round Table and also created a replica of the original table. The hotel occasionally stages an original musical production, The Talk of the Town, in the Oak Room. Its latest production started September 11, 2007 and ran through the end of the year.
A film about the members, The Ten-Year Lunch (1987), won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
The dramatic film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994) recounts the Round Table from the perspective of Dorothy Parker.
In popular culture
Portions of the 1981 film Rich and Famous were set in the Algonquin and one of the film's characters, Liz Hamilton (played by Jacqueline Bisset), refers to the Round Table during the film.
The Algonquin Round Table was featured in "The Young Indiana Jones and the Scandal of 1920", a 1993 episode of the TV series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, in which the title character meets the group and attends at least two lunches. Wonderful Nonsense - The Algonquin Round Table is a documentary produced for the DVD release of that film in 2008.
In season 2, episode 4 of Seinfeld entitled “The Phone Message” (1991), Jerry tells Donna, the woman he is seeing at the time: "Boy, I bet you got a regular Algonquin round table there", after Donna says she discussed a Dockers commercial with friends.
The 1994 film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle concerns Dorothy Parker and her relationship with Robert Benchley and the larger group.
In 2009, Robert Benchley's grandson, Nat Benchley, and co-editor Kevin C. Fitzpatrick published The Lost Algonquin Round Table, a collection of the early writings of the group. Benchley's grandson Peter Benchley wrote the famous shark novel Jaws upon which the Steven Spielberg film is based.
See also
References
External links
Algonquin Round Table historical site History notes and news since 1999
Algonquin Round Table at PBS's American Masters
American literary movements
American humorists
Culture of Manhattan
Literary circles
20th-century American literature | true | [
"Duplicate poker is a variant of the card game poker. Duplicate poker is based on the principles of duplicate bridge, but it also incorporates some of the rules of pot limit and no limit Texas hold'em.\n\nWhile the game is more conducive to an automated online format because of pre-set decks and the scoring mechanic, duplicate poker has also been played in a live format. The first duplicate poker tournament was held in April 2007 at the Cherokee Casino in Tulsa, Oklahoma.\n\nDuplicatepoker.com, the first poker room to use the format, closed down on October 5, 2008, citing the global financial crisis as the reason for the removal of services.\n\nDuplicate poker versus standard poker\nDuplicate poker is a game in which there are two or more tables, each consisting of the same number of players. Each table uses hands dealt from an identically sequenced deck of cards. Each player holds the same hand as the person seated in identical seats at the other tables. Duplicate Poker was first devised by Californians Bruce Altshuler and Danny Kleinman who memorialized their concept in a lengthy article in Card Player Magazine in August of 1993. The article indicated that for Duplicate Poker to work in a multi-table format, each table had to have the same number of seats with no sit outs on any hand which could distort the final results. The winner would be the player who either won the most chips on a set number of hands and who lost the least amount of chips if the seat had a negative expectation. In theory, a player could win a duplicate poker tournament without winning many hands by avoiding big losses on hands that those holding the same cards at other tables play more recklessly. Under the original concept, Duplicate Poker was envisioned as a Limit game. A no limit or pot limit stake could only work at Duplicate Poker if the chips are re-set after every hand. A set number of hands are played in each round. In a multi-table tournament, the players can be assigned to different tables sitting at different seats after each round. Under Altshuler's and Kleinman's concept, a duplicate hold em team game could be held with a team of 4-9 members of each team each sitting at a different seat at a different table, and the team which ends up with the most chips would win.\n\nDuplicate poker can be played in Hold Em or Omaha where the final hands are fixed, but not in Stud, where a fold alters the order of the cards.\n\nThe principal difference from playing standard poker is duplicate poker's measure of results, which are between players sitting at corresponding seats at other tables. Player performance is measured relatively to other players sitting in their parallel seat. The object of duplicate poker is to win more chips than your opponents sitting in corresponding seats at other tables. The winner is the player who has accumulated the best total difference in chips vs. the players in the same seat at the other tables. Conceivably, even a player who loses chips overall can win at the game if that player loses fewer chips than his opponents.\n\nUnder the format originally devised by Altshuler and Kleinman in their Card Player article, the team game would consist of up to 8 members, each team player sitting at a different seat at each of the tables. The number of tables would correspond to the number of players on each of the teams. Determining the result of the duplicate team is simple. The team with the most chips at the end of the event is the winner. Again, a limit stake format was envisioned for the team concept.\n\nSkillBet poker\nSkillBet.com launched in July 2012. In this version, two players, sitting at two identical tables, are dealt the same poker hand. They both play against the same five computer opponents. If one player wins $10 with a particular hand, but his opponent wins $15 with the same hand in the same situation, then he’s been outplayed to the tune of $5 for that hand and owes his opponent $5.\n\nDuplicate Poker Nation's Cup\nIn 2011, the International Federation of Poker (IFP) announced the \"Duplicate Poker Nation's Cup.\" From around the world, 72 players made up 12 national teams played within the isolation of the London Eye pods, ensuring that no information could be shared between tables. Those national teams were USA, UK, France, Spain, Germany, Brazil, Denmark, Japan, Ireland, Holland, Australia, plus a team from Zynga.\n\nRecognition as a sport - 'Match Poker' \nIn April 2010, IFP secured provisional membership of the International Mind Sports Association (IMSA) at IMSA's annual congress in Dubai.\n\nIn the years following the 2011 Duplicate Poker Nation's Cup, the IFP renamed their version of duplicate poker to 'Match Poker'. Their goal then became to \"promote poker and its Match Poker™ variation as a skill game and a mind sport\". Essentially the same game, the IFP describes Match Poker as \"a team sport incorporating regular Texas Hold’em. Albeit typically with a pot-limit pre-flop and no-limit post-flop structure.\" This team game was conceptually similar to that which was described by Altshuler and Kleinman in their 1993 article in Card Player Magazine.\n\nOn October 2, 2017, Match Poker gained recognition as a sport. It now holds Observer Status with the Global Association of International Sports Federations (GAISF). In response to this, the IFP changed its name to the IFMP, to recognise that they are now proponents of the specific version of duplicate poker they call Match Poker.\n\nInternational Match Poker championships have been run by the IFMP since 2011, with the sport gaining popularity most notably in India via the Match Indian Poker League, launched jointly by the IFMP and Viann Industries Ltd (Raj Kundra's company).\n\nUnder the authority of the IFMP, a team in Australia is now developing a mobile application called MATCHPOKER Online. The app will allow people to play duplicate poker (in the form of Match Poker) against players around the world on their personal devices. The app is expected to launch in beta phase in late 2020.\n\nAI Poker \nDuplicate poker has been used when testing the artificial intellegence poker programs Polaris (poker bot), Claudico and Libratus. These programs play heads-up Texas Hold'em. Each hand was played twice, with the AI getting each set of cards once, against a different human opponent.\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\nHow to play Duplicate Poker Official Video from IFP\n\nPoker variants",
"Duplicate Scrabble is a variant of the board game Scrabble where all the players are faced with the same board and letters at the same time and must play the highest scoring word they can find. Although duplicate is rarely played at competition level in English, it is the most popular form of the game in French and is also played in other languages, such as Romanian and Dutch. The largest French Scrabble festivals can attract over 2000 people and some individual tournaments can count over 1000 participants per game. Although not popular for competitions in English, the computer game Scrabble 2005 contains a duplicate version allowing up to 16 players to play on the same board at once. It was also used on the UK TV game show TV Scrabble as one of the rounds.\n\nHistory\nDuplicate Scrabble was invented by Hippolyte Wouters circa 1970, a Belgian lawyer who spoke French as his first language. In 1972 he organised and participated the first French World Scrabble Championships in Cannes, France. Although only 8 players participated in this tournament, a World Championship has been organised every year since 1972 in a different city in several different countries, most recently in Tours, France, where 274 people participated.\n\nDue to the nature of duplicate, there is almost no limit to the number of players who can participate in a single game, and at the biggest international festivals, some games are played by more than 1000 people simultaneously. In French, duplicate is practised in France, Belgium, Canada, Switzerland, Senegal, Benin, Tunisia, Lebanon and many other countries.\n\nDuplicate Scrabble has been part of the Romanian national championship since 1981.\n\nRules\n\nThe rules of duplicate Scrabble can vary between different languages and different associations. Some of the general principles of duplicate are\n\n The arbiter draws seven random tiles at the start of the game. He announces them to the players who draw the same seven letters. The players are given an allotted time to write their chosen word on a slip of paper which will be collected by a runner and handed to an arbiter. The player is obligated to record the score and the position of his word, and the highest scoring word is placed on the board. Hence every player is faced with the same situation at the same time, and no player has any advantage because of the letters selections.\n An invalid word scores zero points.\n There must always be at least one vowel and one consonant. If the seven letters do not contain one vowel and one consonant, they are put back in the bag and seven new letters are chosen. If there are no more consonants or no more vowels in the bag, the game ends.\n At the end of the game, the player who has scored the most points is declared the winner. This score can also be expressed as a percentage (by dividing by the total of all the best plays) or as a negative, for example 790 out of 800 would be -10 (or 98.75%).\n\nVariations\n Thinking time To make the game more difficult, the thinking time can be reduced. The standard thinking time in French is 3 minutes. Similar to chess, blitz games are played where the player only has 1 minute to make his moves. \"Semi-rapid\" games are also played with two minutes to make a move.\n Number of players Duplicate Scrabble can be played in pairs where the two players agree on which solution they will submit. The French World Scrabble Championship by pairs has been played every year since 1975. A duplicate pairs competition is also part of the Romanian national championship.\n\nSee also\nDuplicate bridge\nScrabble variants\n\nReferences\n\nBoard games introduced in 1970\nScrabble variants"
] |
[
"Algonquin Round Table",
"No Sirree!",
"How did no sirree come about?",
"No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein,",
"Who said it first?",
"was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff.",
"was it a success?",
"With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an \"official\"",
"did they duplicate it?",
"The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure,"
] | C_b6a9e4af8dc54cd7abeb132612c7e77e_0 | why was it a failure? | 5 | Why was the revue opened in November 1922 by the Algonquin Round Tablers a failure? | Algonquin Round Table | Given the literary and theatrical activities of the Round Table members, it was perhaps inevitable that they would write and stage their own revue. No Sirree!, staged for one night only in April 1922, was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff. No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, which served as something of a salon for Round Tablers away from the Algonquin. Acts included: "Opening Chorus" featuring Woollcott, Toohey, Kaufman, Connelly, Adams and Benchley with violinist Jascha Heifetz providing offstage, off-key accompaniment; "He Who Gets Flapped", a musical number featuring the song "The Everlastin' Ingenue Blues" written by Dorothy Parker and performed by Robert Sherwood accompanied by "chorus girls" including Tallulah Bankhead, Helen Hayes, Ruth Gillmore, Lenore Ulric and Mary Brandon; "Zowie, or the Curse of an Akins Heart"; "The Greasy Hag, an O'Neill Play in One Act" with Kaufman, Connelly and Woollcott; and "Mr. Whim Passes By--An A. A. Milne Play." The only item of note to emerge from No Sirree! was Robert Benchley's contribution, The Treasurer's Report. Benchley's disjointed parody so delighted those in attendance that Irving Berlin hired Benchley in 1923 to deliver the Report as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue for $500 a week. In 1928, Report was later made into a short sound film in the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system by Fox Film Corporation. The film marked the beginning of a second career for Benchley in Hollywood. With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" Vicious Circle production open to the public with material performed by professional actors. Kaufman and Connelly funded the revue, named The Forty-niners. The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, running for just 15 performances. CANNOTANSWER | running for just 15 performances. | The Algonquin Round Table was a group of New York City writers, critics, actors, and wits. Gathering initially as part of a practical joke, members of "The Vicious Circle", as they dubbed themselves, met for lunch each day at the Algonquin Hotel from 1919 until roughly 1929. At these luncheons they engaged in wisecracks, wordplay, and witticisms that, through the newspaper columns of Round Table members, were disseminated across the country.
Daily association with each other, both at the luncheons and outside of them, inspired members of the Circle to collaborate creatively. The entire group worked together successfully only once, however, to create a revue called No Sirree! which helped launch a Hollywood career for Round Tabler Robert Benchley.
In its ten years of association, the Round Table and a number of its members acquired national reputations, both for their contributions to literature and for their sparkling wit. Although some of their contemporaries, and later in life even some of its members, disparaged the group, its reputation has endured long after its dissolution.
Origin
The group that would become the Round Table began meeting in June 1919 as the result of a practical joke carried out by theatrical press agent John Peter Toohey. Toohey, annoyed at The New York Times drama critic Alexander Woollcott for refusing to plug one of Toohey's clients (Eugene O'Neill) in his column, organized a luncheon supposedly to welcome Woollcott back from World War I, where he had been a correspondent for Stars and Stripes. Instead, Toohey used the occasion to poke fun at Woollcott on a number of fronts. Woollcott's enjoyment of the joke and the success of the event prompted Toohey to suggest that the group in attendance meet at the Algonquin each day for lunch.
The group first gathered in the Algonquin's Pergola Room (later called the Oak Room) at a long rectangular table. As they increased in number, Algonquin manager Frank Case moved them to the Rose Room and a round table. Initially the group called itself "The Board" and the luncheons "Board meetings". After being assigned a waiter named Luigi, the group re-christened itself "Luigi Board". Finally, they became "The Vicious Circle" although "The Round Table" gained wide currency after a caricature by cartoonist Edmund Duffy of the Brooklyn Eagle portrayed the group sitting at a round table and wearing armor.
Membership
Charter members of the Round Table included:
Franklin Pierce Adams, columnist
Robert Benchley, humorist and actor
Heywood Broun, columnist and sportswriter (married to Ruth Hale)
Marc Connelly, playwright
Ruth Hale, freelance writer who worked for women's rights
George S. Kaufman, playwright and director
Dorothy Parker, critic, poet, short-story writer, and screenwriter
Brock Pemberton, Broadway producer
Murdock Pemberton, Broadway publicist, writer
Harold Ross, The New Yorker editor
Robert E. Sherwood, author and playwright
John Peter Toohey, Broadway publicist
Alexander Woollcott, critic and journalist
Membership was not official or fixed for so many others who moved in and out of the Circle. Some of these included:
Tallulah Bankhead, actress
Norman Bel Geddes, stage and industrial designer
Noël Coward, playwright
Blyth Daly, actress
Edna Ferber, author and playwright
Eva Le Gallienne, actress
Margalo Gillmore, actress
Jane Grant, journalist and feminist (married to Harold Ross)
Beatrice Kaufman, editor and playwright (married to George S. Kaufman)
Margaret Leech, writer and historian
Herman J. Mankiewicz, screenwriter
Harpo Marx, comedian and film star
Neysa McMein, magazine illustrator
Alice Duer Miller, writer
Donald Ogden Stewart, playwright and screenwriter
Frank Sullivan, journalist and humorist
Deems Taylor, composer
Estelle Winwood, actress and comedian
Peggy Wood, actress
Activities
In addition to the daily luncheons, members of the Round Table worked and associated with each other almost constantly. The group was devoted to games, including cribbage and poker. The group had its own poker club, the Thanatopsis Literary and Inside Straight Club, which met at the hotel on Saturday nights. Regulars at the game included Kaufman, Adams, Broun, Ross and Woollcott, with non-Round Tablers Herbert Bayard Swope, silk merchant Paul Hyde Bonner, baking heir Raoul Fleischmann, actor Harpo Marx, and writer Ring Lardner sometimes sitting in. The group also played charades (which they called simply "The Game") and the "I can give you a sentence" game, which spawned Dorothy Parker's memorable sentence using the word horticulture: "You can lead a horticulture but you can't make her think."
Members often visited Neshobe Island, a private island co-owned by several "Algonks"—but governed by Woollcott as a "benevolent tyrant", as his biographer Samuel Hopkins Adams charitably put it—located on several acres in the middle of Lake Bomoseen in Vermont. There they would engage in their usual array of games including Wink murder, which they called simply "Murder", plus croquet.
A number of Round Tablers were inveterate practical jokers, constantly pulling pranks on one another. As time went on the jokes became ever more elaborate. Harold Ross and Jane Grant once spent weeks playing a particularly memorable joke on Woollcott involving a prized portrait of himself. They had several copies made, each slightly more askew than the last, and would periodically secretly swap them out and then later comment to Woollcott "What on earth is wrong with your portrait?" until Woollcott was beside himself. Eventually they returned the original portrait.
No Sirree!
Given the literary and theatrical activities of the Round Table members, it was perhaps inevitable that they would write and stage their own revue. No Sirree!, staged for one night only in April 1922, was a take-off of a then-popular European touring revue called La Chauve-Souris, directed by Nikita Balieff.
No Sirree! had its genesis at the studio of Neysa McMein, which served as something of a salon for Round Tablers away from the Algonquin. Acts included: "Opening Chorus" featuring Woollcott, Toohey, Kaufman, Connelly, Adams and Benchley with violinist Jascha Heifetz providing offstage, off-key accompaniment; "He Who Gets Flapped", a musical number featuring the song "The Everlastin' Ingenue Blues" written by Dorothy Parker and performed by Robert Sherwood accompanied by "chorus girls" including Tallulah Bankhead, Helen Hayes, Ruth Gillmore, Lenore Ulric and Mary Brandon; "Zowie, or the Curse of an Akins Heart"; "The Greasy Hag, an O'Neill Play in One Act" with Kaufman, Connelly and Woollcott; and "Mr. Whim Passes By—An A. A. Milne Play."
The only item of note to emerge from No Sirree! was Robert Benchley's contribution, The Treasurer's Report. Benchley's disjointed parody so delighted those in attendance that Irving Berlin hired Benchley in 1923 to deliver the Report as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue for $500 a week. In 1928, Report was later made into a short sound film in the Fox Movietone sound-on-film system by Fox Film Corporation. The film marked the beginning of a second career for Benchley in Hollywood.
With the success of No Sirree! the Round Tablers hoped to duplicate it with an "official" Vicious Circle production open to the public with material performed by professional actors. Kaufman and Connelly funded the revue, named The Forty-niners. The revue opened in November 1922 and was a failure, running for just 15 performances.
Decline
As members of the Round Table moved into ventures outside New York City, inevitably the group drifted apart. By the early 1930s the Vicious Circle was broken. Edna Ferber said she realized it when she arrived at the Rose Room for lunch one day in 1932 and found the group's table occupied by a family from Kansas. Frank Case was asked what happened to the group. He shrugged and replied, "What became of the reservoir at Fifth Avenue and Forty-Second Street? These things do not last forever." Some members of the group remained friends after its dissolution. Parker and Benchley in particular remained close up until his death in 1945, although her political leanings did strain their relationship. Others, as the group itself would come to understand when it gathered following Woollcott's death in 1943, simply realized that they had nothing to say to one another.
Public response and legacy
Because a number of the members of the Round Table had regular newspaper columns, the activities and quips of various Round Table members were reported in the national press. This brought Round Tablers widely into the public consciousness as renowned wits.
Not all of their contemporaries were fans of the group. Their critics accused them of logrolling, or exchanging favorable plugs of one another's works, and of rehearsing their witticisms in advance. James Thurber (who lived in the hotel) was a detractor of the group, accusing them of being too consumed by their elaborate practical jokes. H. L. Mencken, who was much admired by many in the Circle, was also a critic, commenting to fellow writer Anita Loos that "their ideals were those of a vaudeville actor, one who is extremely 'in the know' and inordinately trashy".
The group showed up in the 1923 best-seller Black Oxen by Gertrude Atherton. She sarcastically described a group she called "the Sophisticates":
Groucho Marx, brother of Round Table associate Harpo, was never comfortable amidst the viciousness of the Vicious Circle. Therein he remarked "The price of admission is a serpent's tongue and a half-concealed stiletto." Even some members of the Round Table disparaged it later in life. Dorothy Parker in particular criticized the group.
Despite Parker's bleak assessment and while it is true that some members of the Round Table are perhaps now "famous for being famous" instead of for their literary output, Round Table members and associates contributed to the literary landscape, including Pulitzer Prize-winning work by Circle members Kaufman, Connelly and Sherwood (who won four) and by associate Ferber and the legacy of Ross's New Yorker. Others made lasting contributions to the realms of stage and screen — Tallulah Bankhead and Eva Le Gallienne became Broadway greats and the films of Harpo and Benchley remain popular; and Parker has remained renowned for her short stories and literary reviews.
The Algonquin Round Table, as well as the number of other literary and theatrical greats who lodged there, helped earn the Algonquin Hotel its status as a New York City Historic Landmark. The hotel was so designated in 1987. In 1996 the hotel was designated a national literary landmark by the Friends of Libraries USA based on the contributions of "The Round Table Wits". The organization's bronze plaque is attached to the front of the hotel.
Although the Rose Room was removed from the Algonquin in a 1998 remodel, the hotel paid tribute to the group by commissioning and hanging the painting A Vicious Circle by Natalie Ascencios, depicting the Round Table and also created a replica of the original table. The hotel occasionally stages an original musical production, The Talk of the Town, in the Oak Room. Its latest production started September 11, 2007 and ran through the end of the year.
A film about the members, The Ten-Year Lunch (1987), won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature.
The dramatic film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle (1994) recounts the Round Table from the perspective of Dorothy Parker.
In popular culture
Portions of the 1981 film Rich and Famous were set in the Algonquin and one of the film's characters, Liz Hamilton (played by Jacqueline Bisset), refers to the Round Table during the film.
The Algonquin Round Table was featured in "The Young Indiana Jones and the Scandal of 1920", a 1993 episode of the TV series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, in which the title character meets the group and attends at least two lunches. Wonderful Nonsense - The Algonquin Round Table is a documentary produced for the DVD release of that film in 2008.
In season 2, episode 4 of Seinfeld entitled “The Phone Message” (1991), Jerry tells Donna, the woman he is seeing at the time: "Boy, I bet you got a regular Algonquin round table there", after Donna says she discussed a Dockers commercial with friends.
The 1994 film Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle concerns Dorothy Parker and her relationship with Robert Benchley and the larger group.
In 2009, Robert Benchley's grandson, Nat Benchley, and co-editor Kevin C. Fitzpatrick published The Lost Algonquin Round Table, a collection of the early writings of the group. Benchley's grandson Peter Benchley wrote the famous shark novel Jaws upon which the Steven Spielberg film is based.
See also
References
External links
Algonquin Round Table historical site History notes and news since 1999
Algonquin Round Table at PBS's American Masters
American literary movements
American humorists
Culture of Manhattan
Literary circles
20th-century American literature | true | [
"Easy Touch is a cover album released by Mary Wells on 51 West Records. After the commercial failure of her previous album, In and Out of Love, Epic Records relegated her to the 51 West subsidiary to finish the rest of her contract with them. The album included covers of hits by Frankie Lymon, Stevie Wonder, Melissa Manchester, The Carpenters and Donna Summer. The album, like her previous, was a commercial failure and no singles were released to promote it.\n\nTrack listing\n \"Boy from New York City\" – 3:16\n \"Slow Hand\" – 3:45\n \"Why Do Fools Fall in Love\" - 2:57\n \"Reunited\" - 4:04\n \"If You Really Love Me\" - 3:06\n \"Fame\" - 3:53\n \"Don't Cry Out Loud\" - 3:58\n \"Dim All the Lights\" - 4:00\n \"Touch Me When We're Dancing\" - 3:17\n \"I've Never Been to Me - 3:26\n\nReferences\n\n1982 albums\nCovers albums\nMary Wells albums",
"\"Must Be A Reason Why\" is a song by American MC J. Pearl, released as a single in the United Kingdom on August 2, 2011 and in other European countries on October 3, 2011. The single features vocals from British singer Shayne Ward.\n\nBackground\n\"Must Be A Reason Why\" was produced by Lucas Secon, and was written by Secon, Chris Brann and Mintman. The song samples Wamdue Project's 1997 dance track, \"King of My Castle\". The track was originally recorded with American artist Britney Spears as the featured vocalist, and Ward as the main vocalist. Spears was subsequently replaced with J. Pearl and the track was to be included on Ward's third studio album, Obsession. The single was announced for release in January 2011, but prior to its release, Ward was dropped from his record label, Syco Records, preventing the release occurring. However, Pearl's record label, Simply Delicious, offered to release the single on Ward's behalf if he let Pearl be credited as the main vocalist. Ward agreed, and thus, the track was remixed by producer Guy Kastav, and prepared for release in August 2011. The single was later issued across Europe on October 3, 2011, with Italy being the only country to receive a physical release.\n\nMusic video\nThe music video for \"Must Be A Reason Why\" was shot at Portland Place, London, and directed by director Andy Hylton. It premiered on June 15, 2011, via Simply Delicious' YouTube account, at a total length of two minutes and forty seconds. The video consists of Pearl and Ward searching for each other in a nightclub, and performing the song amongst the crowd. The video received its first television airplay on Starz on Friday, June 17, 2011.\n\nTrack listing\n\n Digital download\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Guy Katsav Radio Edit) - 2:36\n\n Digital download - Extended Mix\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Guy Katsav Extended Mix) - 5:46\n\n Digital download - Afrojack Mixes\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Afrojack Radio Edit) - 3:26\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Afrojack Club Remix) - 7:27\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Afrojack Dub) - 6:28\n\n 'Digital download - Remixes EP\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Afrojack Club Remix) - 7:27\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Funky Stepz Dirty Dub) - 4:17\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Guy Katsav Extended Mix) - 5:46\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Costi Forza Mainstream Version) - 5:07\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Rivaz Club Remix) - 6:18\n\n Italian Maxi CD single\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Guy Katsav Radio Edit) - 2:36\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Afrojack Radio Edit) - 3:26\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Rivaz Radio Edit) - 3:11\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Costi Forza Mainstream Version) - 5:07\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Afrojack Club Remix) - 7:27\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Rivaz Club Remix) - 6:18\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Guy Katsav Extended Mix) - 5:46\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Costi Forza Extended Club Edit) - 7:05\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Afrojack Dub) - 6:28\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Funky Stepz Dirty Dub) - 4:17\n \"Must Be A Reason Why\" (Music Video) - 2:40\n\nCharts\n\nRelease history\n\nReferences\n\n2011 singles\nShayne Ward songs\nSongs written by Lucas Secon"
] |
[
"Carl Switzer",
"Personal life"
] | C_78202db6c019496eaf52f5cddf28794e_0 | what songs did Switzer produce? | 1 | What songs did Carl Switzer produce? | Carl Switzer | In early 1954, Switzer went on a blind date with Diantha (Dian) Collingwood, heiress of grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain. Collingwood had moved with her mother and sister to California in 1953 because her sister wanted to become an actress. Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later. In 1956, with his money running out and Diantha pregnant, his mother-in-law offered them a farm near Pretty Prairie, Kansas, west of Wichita. Their son, Justin Lance Collingwood Switzer (now Eldridge), was born that year. They divorced in 1957. In 1987, former Our Gang co-star George "Spanky" McFarland recalled a meeting with Switzer when they spoke about the farm: The last time I saw Carl was 1957. It was a tough time for me--and him. I was starting a tour of theme parks and county fairs in the Midwest. Carl had married this girl whose father owned a pretty good size farm near Wichita. When I came through town, he heard about it and called. He told me he was helping to run the farm, but he finally had to put a radio on the tractor while he was out there plowing. Knowing Carl, I knew that wasn't going to last. He may have come from Paris, Illinois, but he wasn't a farmer! We hadn't seen each other since we left the 'Gang.' So we had lunch. We talked about all the things you'd expect. And then I never saw him again. He looked pretty much the same. He was just Carl Switzer--kind of cocky, a little antsy--and I thought to myself he hadn't changed that much. He still talked big. He just grew up. In January 1958 Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm. The gunman was never caught. That December he was arrested in Sequoia National Forest for cutting down 15 pine trees; he was sentenced to a year's probation and ordered to pay a $225 fine. CANNOTANSWER | CANNOTANSWER | false | [
"Carl Dean Switzer (August 8, 1927 – January 21, 1959) was an American singer, child actor, dog breeder and guide. He was best known for his role as Alfalfa in the short subjects series Our Gang.\n\nSwitzer began his career as a child actor in the mid-1930s appearing in the Our Gang short subjects series as Alfalfa, one of the series' most popular and best-remembered characters. After leaving the series in 1940, Switzer struggled to find substantial roles owing to typecasting. As an adult, he appeared mainly in bit parts and B-movies. He later became a dog breeder and hunting guide.\n\nSwitzer married in 1954 and had one son before divorcing his wife in 1957. He was fatally shot by an acquaintance in a dispute over money in January 1959.\n\nEarly life and family\nSwitzer was born in Paris, Illinois, the youngest of four children born to Gladys Carrie Shanks (1904–1997) and George Frederick \"Fred\" Switzer (1905–1960). The oldest brother died in 1922. A sister Janice was born in 1923 and a brother Harold was born in 1925. Of Scottish and German ancestry, he was named Carl Dean after a member of the Switzer family and many relatives on his grandmother's side (respectively). He and his brother Harold became famous in their hometown for their musical talent and performances. Both sang and could play a number of instruments.\n\nCareer\n\nOur Gang\n\nIn 1934, the Switzers traveled to California to visit family. While sightseeing, they went to Hal Roach Studios. Following a public tour, 8-year-old Harold and 6-year-old Carl entered the Hal Roach Studio's open-to-the-public cafeteria, the Our Gang Café, and began an impromptu performance. Producer Hal Roach was present and was impressed. He signed both brothers to appear in Our Gang. Harold was given two nicknames, \"Slim\" and \"Deadpan\", while Carl was dubbed \"Alfalfa\".\n\nThe brothers first appeared in the 1935 Our Gang short Beginner's Luck. By the end of the year, Alfalfa was one of the main characters, while Harold had been relegated to the background. Although Carl was an experienced singer and musician, his character Alfalfa was often called upon to sing off-key renditions of popular songs for comic effect, most often those of Bing Crosby. Alfalfa also sported a cowlick.\n\nBy the end of 1937, Switzer's \"Alfalfa\" had surpassed the series' nominal star, George \"Spanky\" McFarland, in popularity. While the boys got along, their fathers argued constantly over their sons' screen time and salaries. Switzer's best friend among the Our Gang actors was Tommy Bond, who played his on-screen nemesis \"Butch\". In Bond's words, he and Switzer became good friends because \"neither of us could replace the other since we played opposites.\" However, Switzer was known for being abrasive and difficult on the set. He would often play cruel jokes on the other actors and hold up filming with his antics.\n\nAdult years\n\nSwitzer's tenure on Our Gang ended in 1940, when he was twelve. His first role after leaving the series was as a Boy Scout in I Love You Again (1940) starring William Powell and Myrna Loy. He then co-starred in the 1941 comedy Reg'lar Fellers. The next year, he had a supporting role in Mrs. Wiggs of the Cabbage Patch. Switzer continued to appear in films in various supporting roles, including in Johnny Doughboy (1942), Going My Way (1944), and The Great Mike (1944). Switzer had an uncredited role as Auggie in the 1943 film The Human Comedy. Switzer's last starring roles were in a brief series of imitation Bowery Boys films. He reprised his \"Alfalfa\" character, complete with comically sour vocals, in PRC's Gas House Kids comedies in 1946 and 1947. By this time Switzer was downplaying his earlier Our Gang work. In his 1946 resume, he referred to the films generically as \"M-G-M short product\".\n\nSwitzer had small parts in both the 1946 Christmas film It's a Wonderful Life as Mary Hatch's (Donna Reed) date at a high school dance in the film's beginning and again in the 1948 film On Our Merry Way as the mayor's son, a trumpet player in a fixed musical talent contest. In 1952, he played a busboy in the film Pat and Mike starring Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn. In the 1954 musical film White Christmas, his photo was used to depict \"Freckle-Faced Haynes, the Dog-Faced Boy\", an army buddy of lead characters Wallace and Davis (played by Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye) who was also the brother of the female leads the Haynes Sisters (played by Rosemary Clooney and Vera-Ellen).\n\nIn the 1950s, Switzer turned to television. Between 1952 and 1955, he made six appearances on The Roy Rogers Show. He also guest-starred in an episode of the American science fiction anthology series Science Fiction Theatre and The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show. In 1953 and 1954, Switzer co-starred in three William A. Wellman-directed films: Island in the Sky and The High and the Mighty, both starring John Wayne, and Track of the Cat, starring Robert Mitchum. In 1956, he co-starred in The Bowery Boys film Dig That Uranium followed by a bit part as a Hebrew slave in Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments. Switzer's final film role was in the 1958 drama The Defiant Ones.\n\nBesides acting, Switzer bred and trained hunting dogs and guided hunting expeditions. Among his notable clients were Roy Rogers and Dale Evans (Switzer's son's godparents), James Stewart, and Henry Fonda.\n\nPersonal life\nIn early 1954, Switzer went on a blind date with Diantha Collingwood (1930–2004), also known as Dian or Diana, the daughter of Lelo and Faye Collingwood and heiress of grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain. Collingwood had moved with her mother and sister to California in 1953 because her sister wanted to become an actress. Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later. In 1956, with his money running out and Diantha pregnant, his mother-in-law offered them a farm near Pretty Prairie, Kansas. Their son, Justin Lance Collingwood Switzer (later Justin Lance Collingwood Elridge) was born that year. They divorced in 1957 and Diantha married Richard Rosswell \"Ross\" Elridge (1933–2007), who adopted and raised Lance as his own, and had two other children by him, sons Chris and Lee Elridge.\n\nIn 1987, former Our Gang co-star George \"Spanky\" McFarland recalled a meeting with Switzer when they spoke about the farm:\n\nIn January 1958, Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm. However, the gunman was never caught. Later that December, Switzer was arrested in Sequoia National Forest for cutting down 15 pine trees he had intended to illegally sell as Christmas trees. He was sentenced to one year's probation. Switzer was also ordered to pay a $225 fine (more than $ today).\n\nDeath\n\nIn the midst of his legal and financial woes, Switzer agreed to train a hunting dog, a Treeing Walker Coonhound, for Moses Samuel \"Bud\" Stiltz. Stiltz was a longtime friend and sometime business partner, whom Switzer had met while working with Roy Rogers on various productions at the Corriganville Movie Ranch. While in Switzer's possession, the dog ran off, to chase after a bear. Stiltz was unsympathetic towards Switzer, firm in his demands that the former child star must either return his dog or pay him the equivalent of the dog's value. Unable to produce cash to settle the debt, Switzer took out ads in newspapers and put up fliers, offering a reward for the safe return of the animal. Eventually, the dog was located and brought to the bar where Switzer was working at the time. The rescuer was rewarded with $35 in cash and $15 in alcoholic beverages, the equivalent of about $450 in 2020. The loss of his $50 did not sit well with Switzer. During an emotional conversation with his friend, 37-year-old unit still photographer Jack Piott, that took place a few days later, the two decided that Stiltz should reimburse Switzer the finder's fee. Their argument was that the dog was Stiltz's and not Switzer's. The two soon arrived at Stiltz's home in Mission Hills, at 10400 Columbus Avenue. Stiltz shared the home with his wife, Rita Corrigan, and his step-children. Switzer and Piott intended to demand money of Stiltz. Though differing accounts of the event exist, all agree that Stiltz was struck over the left side of his head with a glass clock. He later retreated to his room to retrieve a .38-caliber revolver, which Switzer wrestled him for. Their struggle caused the gun to discharge and almost shoot Tom Corrigan, Stiltz's 14-year-old step-son.\n\nStiltz's account of the event was one of self-defense, testifying that Switzer had banged on his front door, yelling \"Let me in, or I'll kick in the door.\" The threat was followed by a struggle that began with one of the men, Switzer or Piott, striking Stiltz with the clock. This prompted Stiltz to retrieve his firearm, which Switzer grabbed for. The gun discharged accidentally, almost shooting Corrigan. Switzer then, according to Stiltz, threatened him with a knife and yelled, \"I'm going to kill you!\" Stiltz fired and shot Switzer in the groin, damaging an artery that caused massive internal bleeding. Switzer was dead when he arrived at the hospital.\n\nTom Corrigan's account differed significantly from his step-father's. He told investigators that Stiltz shot Switzer as he and Piott were leaving. After the gun's accidental discharge that almost hit Corrigan, Switzer, according to Corrigan, had a moment of clarity about the situation. He turned to Piott and said they needed to leave. The two were headed for the door when Stiltz then fired the fatal shot. Switzer never drew a knife, as Stiltz had claimed he had. However, Corrigan was never called to testify at the coroner's inquest, and Stiltz testified in his favor. His testimony was taken to be truthful, despite physical evidence that contradicted his account and his past perjury conviction. Years later, Corrigan stood by what he told officers had happened that night, and said his step-father did not have to kill Switzer.\n\nControversy\nThe shooting was judged to be self-defense. During the inquest regarding Switzer's death, it was revealed that what was reported as a \"hunting knife\" was in fact a penknife. It had been found by crime scene investigators under his body.\n\nOver 42 years later, however, on January 25, 2001, a third witness came forward and gave his version. Tom Corrigan, son of Western movie star Ray \"Crash\" Corrigan and stepson of Moses Stiltz, was a child who was present the night Switzer was killed. \"It was more like murder,\" Corrigan told reporters. He said he heard the knock on the front door, and Switzer said \"Western Union for Bud Stiltz.\" Corrigan's mother, Rita Corrigan, opened the door to find a drunk Switzer, complaining about a perceived month-old debt and demanding repayment. Corrigan said Switzer entered the house first, followed by Jack Piott. Switzer said he was going to beat up Stiltz, and Stiltz confronted Switzer with a .38-caliber revolver in his hand. Corrigan said that Switzer grabbed the revolver and Stiltz and Switzer struggled over it. He said Piott broke a glass-domed clock over Stiltz's head, causing Stiltz's eye to swell shut. During the struggle, a shot was fired into the ceiling and Corrigan was struck in the leg by a fragment. Corrigan said his two younger sisters ran to a neighbor's house to call for help. \"Well, we shot Tommy, enough of this,\" he said he recalled Switzer saying, just before Switzer and Piott started to leave the house.\n\nCorrigan said he had just stepped out the front door when he heard, but did not witness, a second shot behind him. He said he then turned and saw Switzer sliding down the wall with a surprised look on his face after Stiltz had shot him. Corrigan said he saw a closed penknife at Switzer's side, which he presumed fell out of his pocket or his hand. He said he then saw his stepfather shove Piott against the kitchen counter and threaten to kill him too. Corrigan said they heard emergency sirens as Piott begged for his life, and that he thought this was the only reason Stiltz did not kill Piott. Corrigan said his stepfather lied in his account of the event before the coroner's jury.\n\nCorrigan said a Los Angeles Police Department detective interviewed him and asked if he would testify before the judge. Corrigan said he agreed to, but he was never called before the court. \"He didn't have to kill him,\" Corrigan said decades later.\n\nMoses Stiltz died in 1983 at the age of 62.\n\nBurial\nCarl Switzer was interred at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood, California. Because he died the same day as Cecil B. DeMille, his death received only minor notice in most newspapers, as DeMille's obituary dominated the columns. Coincidentally, Switzer appeared as a slave (uncredited) in the last film for which DeMille was credited as a director, The Ten Commandments.\n\nSwitzer's gravestone features the square and compasses of Freemasonry and an image of a hunting dog, reflecting his dog-training hunting-guide interests at the time of his death.\n\nSelected filmography\n\nSee also\n\nReferences\n\nFurther reading\n Best, Marc. Those Endearing Young Charms: Child Performers of the Screen. South Brunswick and New York: Barnes & Co., 1971, pp. 245–250.\n Dye, David. Child and Youth Actors: Filmography of Their Entire Careers, 1914–1985. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., 1988, pp. 223–225.\n Holmstrom, John. The Moving Picture Boy: An International Encyclopaedia from 1895 to 1995. Norwich, Michael Russell, 1996, pp. 145–146.\n\nDocumentary\n \"The Life and Death of Carl \"Alfalfa\" Switzer,\" Grave Explorations, via YouTube, July 2, 2020.\n\nExternal links\n\n \n \n \n Carl Switzer at The Crime Library\n\n1927 births\n1959 deaths\n1959 murders in the United States\n20th-century American male actors\n20th-century American singers\nAmerican child singers\nAmerican male child actors\nAmerican male film actors\nAmerican male television actors\nAmerican people of German descent\nAmerican people of Scottish descent\nHal Roach Studios actors\nBurials at Hollywood Forever Cemetery\nDeaths by firearm in California\nMale actors from Illinois\nPeople from Paris, Illinois\nPeople murdered in Los Angeles\nOur Gang",
"Switzer is the surname of the following people\n\nBarbara Switzer (born 1940), English trade unionist\nBarry Switzer (born 1937), American football coach\nBill Switzer (born 1984), Canadian actor\nBob Switzer (1914–1997), American inventor of fluorescent paint\nCarl Switzer (1927–1959), American actor and singer\nCarroll O. Switzer (1908–1960), American judge and politician\nGeorge Switzer (born 1973), English footballer\nGeorge Switzer (mineralogist) (1915–2008), American mineralogist\nHarold Switzer (1925–1967), American child actor and child singer\nJon Switzer (born 1979), former baseball player\nKathrine Switzer (born 1947), American author\nKyle Switzer (born 1985), Canadian actor\nMary E. Switzer (1900–1971), American social reformer\nMichael Switzer, American film and television director\nPeter Switzer (born 1954), Australian business and financial commentator\nRichard Switzer (born 1995), American film producer\nRick Switzer (born 1944), Canadian sculptor\nRobert M. Switzer (1863–1952), U.S. Representative from Ohio\nRyan Switzer (born 1994), American football wide receiver\nStephen Switzer (1682–1745), English garden designer and writer\nTom Switzer (born 1971), Australian newspaper editor\nVeryl Switzer (born 1932), American football player\nWilliam Switzer (1920–1969), politician from Alberta, Canada",
"Switzer may refer to:\n\nPlaces\nSwitzer, Kentucky\nSwitzer, South Carolina\nSwitzer, West Virginia\nSwitzers, New Zealand, the former name of the town of Waikaia, New Zealand\nSwitzer Canyon, San Diego, California\nBarry Switzer Center, University of Oklahoma\nMary Switzer Building, Washington D.C.\nNicholas Switzer House\n\nOther uses\nA person from Switzerland\nSpecifically, one of the Swiss mercenaries\nSwitzer (surname)\nSwitzer Unlimited, Canadian talk show television series\nSkinner v. Switzer, a legal dispute that was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court\nSwitzer's Asylum, homes for the elderly\n\nSee also\nWilliam A. Switzer Provincial Park, Alberta, Canada\nSchweitzer, a surname\nSchweizer (disambiguation)\nSwiss (disambiguation)"
] |
|
[
"Carl Switzer",
"Personal life",
"what songs did Switzer produce?",
"I don't know."
] | C_78202db6c019496eaf52f5cddf28794e_0 | Whats so important about Switzer's personal life? | 2 | Whats so important about Carl Switzer's personal life? | Carl Switzer | In early 1954, Switzer went on a blind date with Diantha (Dian) Collingwood, heiress of grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain. Collingwood had moved with her mother and sister to California in 1953 because her sister wanted to become an actress. Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later. In 1956, with his money running out and Diantha pregnant, his mother-in-law offered them a farm near Pretty Prairie, Kansas, west of Wichita. Their son, Justin Lance Collingwood Switzer (now Eldridge), was born that year. They divorced in 1957. In 1987, former Our Gang co-star George "Spanky" McFarland recalled a meeting with Switzer when they spoke about the farm: The last time I saw Carl was 1957. It was a tough time for me--and him. I was starting a tour of theme parks and county fairs in the Midwest. Carl had married this girl whose father owned a pretty good size farm near Wichita. When I came through town, he heard about it and called. He told me he was helping to run the farm, but he finally had to put a radio on the tractor while he was out there plowing. Knowing Carl, I knew that wasn't going to last. He may have come from Paris, Illinois, but he wasn't a farmer! We hadn't seen each other since we left the 'Gang.' So we had lunch. We talked about all the things you'd expect. And then I never saw him again. He looked pretty much the same. He was just Carl Switzer--kind of cocky, a little antsy--and I thought to myself he hadn't changed that much. He still talked big. He just grew up. In January 1958 Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm. The gunman was never caught. That December he was arrested in Sequoia National Forest for cutting down 15 pine trees; he was sentenced to a year's probation and ordered to pay a $225 fine. CANNOTANSWER | Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm. | false | [
"Robert C. Switzer (19 May 1914 – 20 August 1997) was an American inventor, businessman and environmentalist. Switzer was co-inventor of the first black light fluorescent paint along with his brother Joseph Switzer and the inventor of the Magnaglo process for nondestructive flaw-detection in machined parts. The brothers founded the Day-Glo Color Corp. in 1946 to develop and manufacture fluorescent paints, pigments and other products.\n\nBiography\n\nEarly life\nSwitzer was born in Fromberg, Montana, to parents Maud (Slocum) and Emmet Switzer and was raised in Berkeley California. In 1932, he received a scholarship from the Scaife Scholarship Foundation of Oakland, California, so he attended the College of Chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, in hopes of becoming a physician.\n\nDuring the summer of 1933, while working to unload tomatoes from a freight car at a H. J. Heinz Company laboratory in Berkeley, California, Switzer fell and suffered several serious injuries, including a skull fracture and severed optic nerve. Medical doctors told him to stay in a dark room until he recovered his eyesight, a period which lasted several months.\n\nCareer\nWhile convalescing from his injuries, Switzer and his brother Joseph searched for fluorescent materials, which Joseph had read about and wished to use in his amateur magic shows. The brothers inspected various products from their father's pharmacy, using a black light to identify fluorescent compounds. After Bob's recovery, the brothers continued to experiment with these, mixing them with shellac and eventually succeeding in producing the first black light fluorescent paints. They founded the Fluor-S-Art Co. in 1934 to develop and market their products for advertising displays.\n\nThe brothers moved their company to Cleveland, Ohio, to partner with Continental Lithograph, a subsidiary of Warner Brothers Pictures, that specialized in movie posters and advertisements. They developed and tested new applications for their fluorescent paints, including lithography, make-up, and fabric dyes.\n\nIn 1938, Switzer invented Zyglo and Magnaglo, two nondestructive testing processes that use fluorescent dyes to identify defects in machined parts. The dyes penetrate small defects and are seen when inspecting the parts under black light.\n\nDuring World War II, the company developed daylight fluorescent pigments, which are highly visible in daylight. Bob produced the first piece of high-visibility clothing by dyeing his wife's wedding dress.\n\nPersonal life and legacy\nSwitzer married his wife Patricia (a Berkeley native) in 1936. The couple had three children. Switzer died in 1997 at his home in Shaker Heights, Ohio from complications from Parkinson's disease. He was 83 years old\n\nWhen Day-Glo Color Corp. was sold to Nalco in 1985, Bob and his wife used the proceeds to establish the Robert and Patricia Switzer Foundation to fund students working on applied environmental problem solving.\n\nIn 2009, \"The Day-Glo Brothers,\" a children's book about Bob and Joseph Switzer's invention of fluorescent materials, was published by author Chris Barton and illustrator Tony Persiani.\n\nReferences\n\nThe Guardian, How the world turned Day-Glo\nDay-Glo Color Corporation website\nRobert and Patricia Switzer Foundation biography\n\n1914 births\n1997 deaths\nUniversity of California, Berkeley alumni\nNeurological disease deaths in Ohio\nDeaths from Parkinson's disease\nPeople from Shaker Heights, Ohio\n20th-century American inventors",
"George Switzer (born 13 October 1973) is an English former footballer most famous for being part of Manchester United's 1992 FA Youth Cup-winning team. A left-back, Switzer played for Darlington, Hyde United, Salford City, Irlam and AFC Monton before his retirement in 2013.\n\nCareer\nBorn in Salford, Lancashire, Switzer began his career as a youth player at Manchester United, having joined the club in 1982 after being spotted playing for the local Barrhill Lads Club when he was only eight years old. Switzer was part of the United youth team that won the FA Youth Cup in 1992, playing with future United stars such as Gary Neville, Ryan Giggs, David Beckham and Paul Scholes. Following on from this success, Switzer was offered a professional contract with the Red Devils; however, unlike his team-mates, who received multi-year deals, Switzer was only offered one year. Switzer was released at the end of the 1992–93 season.\n\nSwitzer then signed for Darlington on a free transfer in July 1993. However, Switzer only played for the Quakers for one season, failing to hold down a regular place, before being given another free transfer in the summer of 1994. He then signed for Hyde United in the Northern Premier League, and played for them for six years from 1994 to 2000, making over 200 appearances for the East Manchester team. Since then, Switzer has played for Salford City, but left his home-town club in 2006 to sign for Irlam. After a short time there, he signed for AFC Monton.\n\nPersonal life\nOutside of football, Switzer has had a number of careers, including working as an optical technician for Dolland & Aitchison at their factory in Salford, and driving a van for a Manchester courier firm.\n\nReferences\n\n1973 births\nLiving people\nFootballers from Salford\nEnglish footballers\nAssociation football defenders\nManchester United F.C. players\nDarlington F.C. players\nHyde United F.C. players\nSalford City F.C. players\nIrlam F.C. players\nEnglish Football League players\nNorthern Premier League players",
"Kathrine Virginia Switzer (born January 5, 1947) is an American marathon runner, author, and television commentator.\n\nIn 1967, she became the first woman to run the Boston Marathon as an officially registered competitor. During her run, race manager Jock Semple assaulted Switzer, trying to grab her bib number and stop her from competing. After knocking down Switzer's trainer and fellow runner Arnie Briggs when he tried to protect her, Semple was shoved to the ground by Switzer's boyfriend, Thomas Miller, who was running with her, and she completed the race.\n\nThe AAU banned women from competing in races against men as a result of her run, and it was not until 1972 that the Boston Marathon established an official women's race.\n\nLife and career\nSwitzer was born in Amberg, Germany, the daughter of a major in the United States Army. Her family returned to the United States in 1949. She graduated from George C. Marshall High School in Fairfax County, Virginia, then attended Lynchburg College. She transferred to Syracuse University in 1967, where she studied journalism and English literature. She earned a bachelor's degree there in 1968 and a master's degree in 1972.\n\n1967 Boston Marathon\nAfter Switzer's coach, Arnie Briggs, insisted a marathon was too far for a \"fragile woman\" to run, he conceded: \"If any woman could do it, you could, but you would have to prove it to me. If you ran the distance in practice, I’d be the first to take you to Boston.\" Switzer trained with him for the 1967 Boston Marathon, which she completed under entry number 261 as a member of the Syracuse Harriers athletic club. As a result of her run, the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) barred women from taking part in races with men. It took five more years before the Boston Marathon ran its first official women's race. Her finishing time of approximately 4 hours and 20 minutes was nearly an hour behind the first female finisher, Roberta \"Bobbi\" Gibb, who had been refused a race registration and was not attacked during the race.\n\nHaving checked that the rule book for the marathon made no mention of gender, Switzer registered using her official AAU number, the full race fee, and a properly acquired certificate of fitness. She signed the form \"as I always sign my name, K.V. Switzer.\" She also stated that her name had been misspelled on her birth certificate, so she often used her initials to avoid confusion.\nSwitzer's father was supportive of his daughter's entry into the race, and on race day, other runners assembling for the start greeted her with support and enthusiasm, leading her to feel \"very welcome\".\n\nHowever, race officials opposed women competing in the marathon, and photographs of race manager Jock Semple attempting to rip Switzer's number off were widespread in the media.\n\nSemple repeatedly assaulted Switzer during the race in an attempt to remove her bib number and prevent her from continuing to compete. In her memoir, she wrote:\n\nSemple knocked down Switzer's coach and fellow competitor, Arnie Briggs, when Briggs attempted to protect Switzer.\nSemple succeeded in removing one of Switzer's gloves and only stopped his attacks when Switzer's boyfriend, Tom Miller, a 235-pound ex-football player and nationally ranked hammer thrower who was running with her, knocked him to the ground. Photographs taken of the incident made world headlines. Semple complained in a 1968 interview about Miller's success in stopping his assault, saying, \"That guy's a hammer thrower, for cripes' sake!\"\n\nSemple later claimed that Switzer had been issued a number through an \"oversight\" in the entry screening process.\n\nBoston Athletic Association director Will Cloney—who had rejected Gibb's entry into the 1966 Boston Marathon, claimed that women were physiologically incapable of running 26 miles—was asked his opinion of Switzer competing in the race. Although the rule book made no mention of gender and Switzer had a valid race registration, Cloney said: \"Women can't run in the Marathon because the rules forbid it. Unless we have rules, society will be in chaos. I don't make the rules, but I try to carry them out. We have no space in the Marathon for any unauthorized person, even a man. If that girl were my daughter, I would spank her.\"\n\nBecause of Switzer's official entry into and completion of the marathon, the AAU barred women from all competitions with male runners, with violators losing the right to compete in any race. Switzer, with other female runners, tried to convince the Boston Athletic Association to allow women to participate in the marathon. Finally, in 1972, the Boston Marathon established an official women's race.\n\nAccording to Switzer, she understood the gravity of her participation and accomplishment:\n\nLater competition, work, and honors\n\nSwitzer was the women's winner of the 1974 New York City Marathon, with a time of 3:07:29 (59th overall). Her personal best time is 2:51:37, at Boston in 1975.\n\nSwitzer was named Female Runner of the Decade (1967–77) by Runner's World Magazine. She later became a television commentator for marathons, starting with the 1984 Olympic women's marathon, and received an Emmy Award for her work. In 1979, the Supersisters trading card set was produced and distributed; one of the cards featured Switzer's name and picture.\n\nSwitzer wrote Running and Walking for Women over 40 in 1997. She released her memoir, Marathon Woman, in April 2007, on the 40th anniversary of her first running of the Boston Marathon. In April 2008, Marathon Woman won the Billie Award for journalism for its portrayal of women in sports.\n\nSwitzer has said that when she attends the Boston Marathon, she is glad to see other female runners:\n\nShe was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 2011 for creating a social revolution by empowering women around the world through running. Since 1967, she has worked to improve running opportunities for women.\n\nIn 2015, Switzer launched a global non-profit called 261 Fearless with an ambassador program, club training system, and events. 261 Fearless uses running as a means to empower women to overcome life obstacles and embrace healthy living.\n\nFor the 2017 Boston Marathon—her ninth time running the race, and the 50th anniversary of her first time—she was assigned bib number 261, the same number she had been assigned in 1967. She was placed in wave 1 and corral 1 and finished in 4:44:31. She was leading a team of runners from 261 Fearless, and rather than being the only woman officially in the race like in 1967, she was joined by over 13,700 women—almost half of the total runners. That same year, the Boston Athletic Association announced it would not assign bib number 261 to any future runners, as an honor for Switzer.\n\nAlso in 2017, she ran the New York City Marathon for the first time since 1974; she finished in 4:48:21.\n\nIn May 2018, Switzer was the commencement speaker at the 164th commencement of Syracuse University, and received an honorary doctorate of humane letters degree.\n\nPersonal life\nIn 1968, Switzer married Tom Miller, the man who had put an end to Semple's attack in 1967. They divorced in 1973. Switzer married and divorced public relations executive Philip Schaub. She married British-born runner and author Roger Robinson in 1987.\n\nSwitzer eventually made amends with Semple after he changed his mind with regard to women in sports. The two became close friends, and she last visited him shortly before Semple's death in 1988.\n\nAchievements\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\n \n Kathrine Switzer Non Profit Organisation 261 Fearless\n Bettman Archives image of Semple and Switzer at the 1973 Boston Marathon\n Marathon Women - Morning Edition, NPR (April 15, 2002)\n Interview with \"ATHLETE\" (film) director David Lam\n Kathrine Switzer Documentary produced by Makers: Women Who Make America\n Chapter of her book\n Excerpt from Runner's World\n\n1947 births\nLiving people\nAmerican female long-distance runners\nBoston Marathon\nNew York City Marathon female winners\nSports Emmy Award winners\nAmerican feminists\n21st-century American women"
] |
|
[
"Carl Switzer",
"Personal life",
"what songs did Switzer produce?",
"I don't know.",
"Whats so important about Switzer's personal life?",
"Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm."
] | C_78202db6c019496eaf52f5cddf28794e_0 | how did he overcome this tragedy? | 3 | How did Carl Switzer overcome being shot? | Carl Switzer | In early 1954, Switzer went on a blind date with Diantha (Dian) Collingwood, heiress of grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain. Collingwood had moved with her mother and sister to California in 1953 because her sister wanted to become an actress. Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later. In 1956, with his money running out and Diantha pregnant, his mother-in-law offered them a farm near Pretty Prairie, Kansas, west of Wichita. Their son, Justin Lance Collingwood Switzer (now Eldridge), was born that year. They divorced in 1957. In 1987, former Our Gang co-star George "Spanky" McFarland recalled a meeting with Switzer when they spoke about the farm: The last time I saw Carl was 1957. It was a tough time for me--and him. I was starting a tour of theme parks and county fairs in the Midwest. Carl had married this girl whose father owned a pretty good size farm near Wichita. When I came through town, he heard about it and called. He told me he was helping to run the farm, but he finally had to put a radio on the tractor while he was out there plowing. Knowing Carl, I knew that wasn't going to last. He may have come from Paris, Illinois, but he wasn't a farmer! We hadn't seen each other since we left the 'Gang.' So we had lunch. We talked about all the things you'd expect. And then I never saw him again. He looked pretty much the same. He was just Carl Switzer--kind of cocky, a little antsy--and I thought to myself he hadn't changed that much. He still talked big. He just grew up. In January 1958 Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm. The gunman was never caught. That December he was arrested in Sequoia National Forest for cutting down 15 pine trees; he was sentenced to a year's probation and ordered to pay a $225 fine. CANNOTANSWER | The gunman was never caught. | false | [
"\"Tragedy\" is a single by the Finnish rock band Hanoi Rocks, from the album Bangkok Shocks, Saigon Shakes, Hanoi Rocks, but \"Tragedy\" was released a little before the release of the album. \"Tragedy\" and its B-side, \"Café Avenue\", are the most well-known songs from Hanoi Rocks's early career.\n\n\"Tragedy\" was written by the band's guitarist Andy McCoy when he was 15 or 16. The lyrics basically deal with a typical teen story of a first love and how one imagines it will last forever. At some point it all collapses and it feels that the world is breaking. The result is a \"tragedy\" and tears. The song is very energetic and has a fast tempo. It is also melodic, even though the guitar parts are a punk style. \"Tragedy\" was recorded at Park Studios outside Stockholm at the Bangkok Shocks, Saigon Shakes, Hanoi Rocks recordings.\n\n\"Café Avenue\" talks about Hanoi Rocks's individualist-attitude and how it doesn't matter how you look and who you are. The song also features a story told from the point of view of a character who lives a rough, young and wild life, but eventually has to turn to prostitution to earn money. The story is largely inspired by Hanoi Rocks's own life on the streets of Stockholm, where people thought the band were homosexual prostitutes because of their glam rock-look. This song was also recorded at Park Studios outside Stockholm at the Bangkok Shocks, Saigon Shakes, Hanoi Rocks recordings. \"Café Avenue\" wasn't released on an album until 1982's Self Destruction Blues.\n\nOn the Japanese single, the song \"Don't Never Leave Me\" was used as the B-side. The song was later reworked in to a hit-version titled \"Don't You Ever Leave Me\", which is featured on the album Two Steps from the Move.\n\nTrack listing\n\nPersonnel\n\nMichael Monroe - lead vocals\nAndy McCoy - lead guitar, backing vocals\nNasty Suicide - rhythm guitar, backing vocals\nSam Yaffa - bass\nGyp Casino - drums\n\nReferences \n\nHanoi Rocks songs\n1981 songs\nSongs written by Andy McCoy",
"Koba drama was written in 1958–59 by Raymond Williams. It was published in the 1966 edition of Modern Tragedy. The 1979 edition of Modern Tragedy does not include it.\n\nThe play involves fictitious characters, but parallels the life of Joseph Stalin. Characters include Peter, Max and George, along with Joseph - later Koba - and Jordan, based on Vladimir Lenin. It takes a mixed view of the Stalin-character: \n\nLUKE: What we have really to face is how all this happened, how we became strong.\nMARK: It was not only Koba. In many ways he made us weaker.\nLUKE: But in other ways stronger. \n \n(Act Two, Scene VII).\n\nRaymond Williams's later thoughts on the play and the wider question of the Soviet Union can be found in Politics and Letters; Part V, Chapter 3.\n\nBritish plays\n1958 plays",
"Revengers Tragedy is a 2003 album by Chumbawamba which served as the soundtrack to the 2003 film adaptation of the 1606 play The Revenger's Tragedy.\n\nTrack listing\nAll songs written and produced by Chumbawamba\n\n Liverpool: Drive with Care - 5:13\n He Did Assault My Brother! - 3:23\n That Eternal Eye - 1:36\n The Very Core of Lust - 2:17\n Villain! Strumpet! Slapper! - 2:17\n Blurred - 1:50\n Lullaby Demons - 4:04\n A Slavish Duke Is Baser Than His Slaves - 3:11\n Sweet Angel of Revenge 5:06\n Ambition - 5:42\n Don't Try This at Home (Revengers Version) 3:28\n\nReferences\n\nChumbawamba albums\n2003 soundtrack albums\nComedy-drama film soundtracks"
] |
|
[
"Carl Switzer",
"Personal life",
"what songs did Switzer produce?",
"I don't know.",
"Whats so important about Switzer's personal life?",
"Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm.",
"how did he overcome this tragedy?",
"The gunman was never caught."
] | C_78202db6c019496eaf52f5cddf28794e_0 | when did this tragedy happen? | 4 | When did Carl Switzer get shot? | Carl Switzer | In early 1954, Switzer went on a blind date with Diantha (Dian) Collingwood, heiress of grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain. Collingwood had moved with her mother and sister to California in 1953 because her sister wanted to become an actress. Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later. In 1956, with his money running out and Diantha pregnant, his mother-in-law offered them a farm near Pretty Prairie, Kansas, west of Wichita. Their son, Justin Lance Collingwood Switzer (now Eldridge), was born that year. They divorced in 1957. In 1987, former Our Gang co-star George "Spanky" McFarland recalled a meeting with Switzer when they spoke about the farm: The last time I saw Carl was 1957. It was a tough time for me--and him. I was starting a tour of theme parks and county fairs in the Midwest. Carl had married this girl whose father owned a pretty good size farm near Wichita. When I came through town, he heard about it and called. He told me he was helping to run the farm, but he finally had to put a radio on the tractor while he was out there plowing. Knowing Carl, I knew that wasn't going to last. He may have come from Paris, Illinois, but he wasn't a farmer! We hadn't seen each other since we left the 'Gang.' So we had lunch. We talked about all the things you'd expect. And then I never saw him again. He looked pretty much the same. He was just Carl Switzer--kind of cocky, a little antsy--and I thought to myself he hadn't changed that much. He still talked big. He just grew up. In January 1958 Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm. The gunman was never caught. That December he was arrested in Sequoia National Forest for cutting down 15 pine trees; he was sentenced to a year's probation and ordered to pay a $225 fine. CANNOTANSWER | January 1958 | false | [
"Dione is a 1720 tragedy by the British writer John Gay.\n\nIt marked a departure from the comedies he had made his name with. It was also the first full-length play he had written alone since The Wife of Bath in 1713. It is likely Gay started writing it either before or during a recent trip he had made to Paris.\n\nWhile it was planned to be staged at the Drury Lane Theatre, in the event the play was never performed. Although a command was given by the Lord Chamberlain, the Duke of Newcastle that the play should \"be immediately acted\" after The Siege of Damascus by John Hughes in February 1720, this did not happen. It is possible that the Drury Lane management were not attracted by the style of Gay's work, a pastoral tragedy written in rhyming couplets, and therefore ignored the order to stage the play.\n\nGay wrote another tragedy The Captives, which was staged at Drury Lane, before turning back to comedy to produce his greatest success The Beggar's Opera.\n\nReferences\n\nBibliography\n Burling, William J. A Checklist of New Plays and Entertainments on the London Stage, 1700-1737. Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press, 1992.\n Nokes, David. John Gay, a Profession of Friendship. Oxford University Press, 1995.\n Winton, Calhoun. John Gay and the London Theatre. University Press of Kentucky, 2014.\n\n1720 plays\nTragedy plays\nPlays by John Gay",
"General Aslambek Abdulkhadzhiev (12 April 1962 – 26 August 2002) was a Chechen field commander during the First and Second Chechen Wars. He was a deputy of Shamil Basayev, and commissioner of Shalinsky and Vedensky Districts after being appointed by Dzhokhar Dudayev in 1994.\n\nAbdulkhadzhiev took part in the Basayev led Budyonnovsk hospital hostage crisis in June 1995. Shamil's fighters seized the Budyonnovsk hospital and the 1,600 people inside for a period of several days. At least 147 civilians died and 415 were wounded. They then successfully retreated to Chechnya under cover of hostages. The media coverage surrounding the events propelled Basayev into the international spotlight, and made him Chechnya's most famed national hero overnight.\n\nIn a Prism interview, Abdulkhadzhiev gave his opinion of the Budyonnovsk tragedy:\n\nAA: Here I must say we do not plan anything like Budennovsk. The Budennovsk tragedy will never be repeated. Moreover, we did not make these plans except as a last resort. Why was the world was silent when Shali was bombed, when some 400 people were killed or wounded? In fact, the evil we did in Budennovsk was not even 30 percent of what they did in Shali. And what was world community's reaction when they wiped out Samashki and Serzhen-Yurt?\n\nPRISM: You are saying Budennovsk will never be repeated. Then what will happen?\n\nAA: I want peace. Budennovsk is the way for all small people to save themselves. Today it is possible to have all the might of a big state turned against this state. Therefore, this war is senseless and it must be stopped no matter how much certain politicians would wish it to continue.\n\nDespite being wanted by Russian authorities, Abdulkhadzhiev continued to be a significant force of influence in southern Chechnya until he was assassinated on 26 August 2002 in Shali by Russian Spetsnaz.\n\nReferences\n\n1962 births\n2002 deaths\nChechen field commanders\nIslamic terrorism in Russia\nPeople of the Chechen wars\nChechen warlords\nRussian people of Chechen descent\nNorth Caucasian independence activists",
"The Landscape of Love (The Sisters Mortland in the US edition) is a novel published by British author Sally Beauman. It tells the tale of the Mortland girls – beautiful, but cold, Julia; remote and aloof Finn; and young ‘different’ Maisie – who come with their mother, Stella, to live in their grandfather's home, a huge and ancient ruin of an abbey.\n\nPlot summary \nIn the summer of 1967, the family friends Dan, Nick and Lucas arrive for a visit. Dan is Finn's boyfriend; Nick is a young doctor; and Lucas is a non-conformist fame-hungry artist and disregards others.\n\nLucas is painting the girls' portraits. When he works on Maisie, she entertains him with tales of the family's past. However, when Maisie tells of having her fortune told years ago, he scoffs and so she doesn't tell him what she saw in the fortune teller's crystal ball.\n\nAs the family begins to prepare to travel to Gramps's childhood home for their annual visit, their place is enveloped in a brooding sense of impending doom. Maisie (who wanders at night) spies Finn returning home very early in the morning, naked under her dress. Maisie worries that Dan's heart will be broken if Finn has been with Lucas, as she suspects.\n\nBefore the family leaves on their trip, Stella and her father work on their plan to ask Gramps's wealthy twin brother for a loan to repair the crumbling Abbey. Maisie slips away, spying Lucas furtively leaving for Cambridge on Julia's bike. She wonders if he has stolen it. Maisie then overhears a passionate argument between Dan and Finn, followed by an equally passionate embrace. The house is filled with fear, distrust and despair. Maisie doesn't know what is wrong with her family but decides she must take action to help them.\n\nAs usual Gramps's brother rebuffs the family's request for a loan, spurred on by his wife Violet ‘the Viper’. However, Maisie acquires money through surprising means. During this transaction she learns that her family fears she will turn out like her deceased father. She does not understand, what does it mean?\n\nThe story skips more than twenty years later to 1989, and, rather than being a continuation of Maisie’s tale, it is Dan who is narrating.\n\nThe sense of impending doom turns to suspenseful mystery as Dan reflects back on a tragedy that occurred during the summer of 1967 involving the Mortland family. Lucas is now a celebrated artist planning to show his 1967 portrait, The Sisters Mortland, at a retrospective. Dan is horrified at the thought of stirring up the family tragedy and sorrow. At this, it is learnt that Maisie was the cause of the tragedy, as she had jumped out of a window. It is also learnt by the reader, that Maisie was possibly autistic, though it is not explained clearly.\n\nDan's life is also something of a tragedy. His job as a producer of commercials ends, his father dies, and he exists in a drug-blurred depression. The current focus of his life is the tragic puzzle of the Mortland event that occurred during that long past summer.\n\nWhere did it all go wrong? Why did it happen? And how did he lose the love of his life?\n\nReferences\n\n2005 British novels\nFiction set in 1967\nFiction set in 1989"
] |
|
[
"Carl Switzer",
"Personal life",
"what songs did Switzer produce?",
"I don't know.",
"Whats so important about Switzer's personal life?",
"Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm.",
"how did he overcome this tragedy?",
"The gunman was never caught.",
"when did this tragedy happen?",
"January 1958"
] | C_78202db6c019496eaf52f5cddf28794e_0 | who is his family member | 5 | who is Carl Switzer's family member | Carl Switzer | In early 1954, Switzer went on a blind date with Diantha (Dian) Collingwood, heiress of grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain. Collingwood had moved with her mother and sister to California in 1953 because her sister wanted to become an actress. Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later. In 1956, with his money running out and Diantha pregnant, his mother-in-law offered them a farm near Pretty Prairie, Kansas, west of Wichita. Their son, Justin Lance Collingwood Switzer (now Eldridge), was born that year. They divorced in 1957. In 1987, former Our Gang co-star George "Spanky" McFarland recalled a meeting with Switzer when they spoke about the farm: The last time I saw Carl was 1957. It was a tough time for me--and him. I was starting a tour of theme parks and county fairs in the Midwest. Carl had married this girl whose father owned a pretty good size farm near Wichita. When I came through town, he heard about it and called. He told me he was helping to run the farm, but he finally had to put a radio on the tractor while he was out there plowing. Knowing Carl, I knew that wasn't going to last. He may have come from Paris, Illinois, but he wasn't a farmer! We hadn't seen each other since we left the 'Gang.' So we had lunch. We talked about all the things you'd expect. And then I never saw him again. He looked pretty much the same. He was just Carl Switzer--kind of cocky, a little antsy--and I thought to myself he hadn't changed that much. He still talked big. He just grew up. In January 1958 Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm. The gunman was never caught. That December he was arrested in Sequoia National Forest for cutting down 15 pine trees; he was sentenced to a year's probation and ordered to pay a $225 fine. CANNOTANSWER | Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later. | false | [
"Malik Adnan Hayat Noon is a Pakistani politician and businessman who is the shareholder of Noon Pakistan and is a member of the Noon family of Pakistan. His wife Tahia Noon is also a politician.\n\nHe is a former member of the National Assembly of Pakistan.\n\nReferences\n\nLiving people\nPakistani MNAs 1997–1999\nMalik\nYear of birth missing (living people)\nPakistani businesspeople",
"Pirates is a British children's television sitcom about a family of pirates whose ship runs aground in North London, and they decide to live in a council house on Wordsworth Terrace, located in the same area. The series ran from 1994 to 1997 on Children's BBC.\n\nCharacters\nLambkin Bones played by Hayley Elliott\n\nLambkin Bones is Roger's daughter. She is a fun-loving sassy tomboy who has a secret underneath her tough exterior – she doesn't like the sea.\n\nRoger Bones played by Paul Bown\n\nRoger Bones is a single father who is the patriarch of the family. He has a slightly sarcastic personality, and cannot co-ordinate things to achieve what he wants.\n\nGran played by Liz Smith\n\nGran is Roger's eccentric mother-in-law. Considering herself \"a pirate and a half\", she is a dab hand with a blunderbuss, and isn't afraid to fight hard. As the family's cook, her speciality is \"mince pies made of squirmy things\".\n\nLawrence Kitten played by Benjamin Rennis\n\nLawrence Kitten is a preteen streetwise boy who lives next door to the Bones family. Although he is often bemused by the family's antics, he and Lambkin are good friends.\n\nGrog Blossom Kate played by Rebecca Stevens\n\nGrog Blossom Kate is one of Gran's old pirate crew from many years ago, who joins the Bones family when Gran herself invites her for a get-together. She sometimes clashes with Roger, who does not get on very well with her.\n\nMinor characters\nPustule the Macaw\n\nGran's pet macaw.\n\nMan in the Sack played by Toby Sedgwick\n\nThe Man in the Sack is a member of the Bones family whose identity is unknown, as his whole body is obscured by a sack.\n\nMr. Jones played by Andrew Sachs\n\nMr. Jones is the Kittens' other next door neighbour, who leads a secret double life as the pirate Basmati Bill.\n\nBaby Bones\n\nThe youngest member of the Bones family, who is never seen, but his presence is often noted by a green glow coming out of his black pram.\n\nEpisodes\n\nSeries 1\n\nSeries 2\n\nSeries 3\n\nReferences\n\nExternal links\n\nBBC children's television shows\nBBC television sitcoms\n1990s British children's television series\n1994 British television series debuts\n1997 British television series endings",
"is a manga series by Yuriko Nishiyama. It was serialized by Kodansha in Weekly Shōnen Magazine and collected in 11 bound volumes. The manga was licensed in North America by Tokyopop, but the license was dropped after publishing 10 volumes. The story centers on a Japanese pop-singing group called Beatmen and focuses on the life of Rin Amami, the unlikely fifth member of the group who was foretold as the bearer of a legendary unique singing vocal called 'Dragon Voice'.\n\nStory\n\nThe main character is 15-year-old Rin Amami, a gifted street dancer. His dream was to become a singer like his mother, but he has a harsh and unpleasant-sounding voice. However, his chance encounter with the idol singing group Beatmen opens the path to the music industry to him.\n\nThe head of the small idol agency called Redshoes (who manages the Beatmen) is certain that Rin's voice is the legendary 'Dragon Voice.'\n\nThe Beatmen\n\nRin Amami\nRin is a good-looking and smart-mouthed street dancer. He can remember and copy any dance routine just by watching them once. He started out as a teenager who dislikes boybands. Ironically, Rin's hidden desire is to be a singer like his late mother, but decided to give up his dreams because of his bad voice, which was often referred by his schoolmates to 'resemble the voice of a bullfrog'.\n\nShino\nShino is the kind and responsible leader of the pop-singing group. Very professional, he often pushes himself hard at work even though he has an asthmatic condition. He is the most enthusiastic and optimistic member of the group. He acts as the \"glue that sticks the Beatmen together\".\n\nYuhgo Etoh\nYuhgo is the often quiet member of The Beatmen. He's been involved in the music industry since he was very young. He occasionally writes lyrics, and is the most technologically adept member of the group. His straight attitude sometimes make people think of him as being arrogant, though it is mostly because of his difficulty in expressing his own feelings.\n\nGoh Iwaki\nGoh is the \"wild\" member of the bunch. He was brought up in a family of kabuki actors and was supposed to succeed the family occupation, but rebelled in order to perform his own kind of music with the Beatmen. He has a younger brother who carries on his family's kabuki heritage in his place.\n\nToshio Tamura\nToshi is the delicate and flamboyant member of the group. He is a bit of a coward. Hailing from a wealthy family, he was trained as a classical pianist, but decided to throw his lot in with the Beatmen.\n\nManga\nChapters are called \"#\"s, written and illustrated by Yuriko Nishiyama, published in Japan by Kodansha, published in English in North America by Tokyopop\n\nExternal links\nTokyopop's Vol 1\nVol 2\nVol 3\nVol 4\nVol 5\nVol 6\nVol 7\nVol 8\nVol 9\nVol 10\n\nFictional singers\nKodansha manga\nShōnen manga\nTokyopop titles"
] |
|
[
"Carl Switzer",
"Personal life",
"what songs did Switzer produce?",
"I don't know.",
"Whats so important about Switzer's personal life?",
"Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm.",
"how did he overcome this tragedy?",
"The gunman was never caught.",
"when did this tragedy happen?",
"January 1958",
"who is his family member",
"Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later."
] | C_78202db6c019496eaf52f5cddf28794e_0 | who is collingwood? | 6 | who is collingwood to Carl Switzer? | Carl Switzer | In early 1954, Switzer went on a blind date with Diantha (Dian) Collingwood, heiress of grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain. Collingwood had moved with her mother and sister to California in 1953 because her sister wanted to become an actress. Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later. In 1956, with his money running out and Diantha pregnant, his mother-in-law offered them a farm near Pretty Prairie, Kansas, west of Wichita. Their son, Justin Lance Collingwood Switzer (now Eldridge), was born that year. They divorced in 1957. In 1987, former Our Gang co-star George "Spanky" McFarland recalled a meeting with Switzer when they spoke about the farm: The last time I saw Carl was 1957. It was a tough time for me--and him. I was starting a tour of theme parks and county fairs in the Midwest. Carl had married this girl whose father owned a pretty good size farm near Wichita. When I came through town, he heard about it and called. He told me he was helping to run the farm, but he finally had to put a radio on the tractor while he was out there plowing. Knowing Carl, I knew that wasn't going to last. He may have come from Paris, Illinois, but he wasn't a farmer! We hadn't seen each other since we left the 'Gang.' So we had lunch. We talked about all the things you'd expect. And then I never saw him again. He looked pretty much the same. He was just Carl Switzer--kind of cocky, a little antsy--and I thought to myself he hadn't changed that much. He still talked big. He just grew up. In January 1958 Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm. The gunman was never caught. That December he was arrested in Sequoia National Forest for cutting down 15 pine trees; he was sentenced to a year's probation and ordered to pay a $225 fine. CANNOTANSWER | Diantha (Dian) Collingwood, heiress of grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain. | false | [
"Norm Crewther (14 May 1919 – 20 October 2010) is a former Australian rules footballer who played with Collingwood in the Victorian Football League (VFL).\n\nHe also played for Coburg, South Richmond (VJFL) and East Brunswick Football Clubs.\n\nNorm is the nephew of Collingwood great Bill Proudfoot, and was the oldest living former Collingwood player until his death in 2010.\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\tNorm is the second great uncle of the former Federal Member for Dunkley, Chris Crewther MP.\n\nNotes\n\nExternal links \n\n\t\t\nProfile on Collingwood Forever\n\n1919 births\n2010 deaths\nAustralian rules footballers from Victoria (Australia)\nCollingwood Football Club players",
"Collingwood Dock is a dock on the River Mersey, in England, and part of the Port of Liverpool. It is situated in the northern dock system in Vauxhall, and is connected to Stanley Dock to the east and Salisbury Dock to the west.\n\nHistory\nThe dock was designed by Jesse Hartley, and opened in 1848 along with four other Liverpool docks. The dock was named after Cuthbert Collingwood, 1st Baron Collingwood and was intended to handle relatively small vessels only. The Liverpool Corporation had a berth for its refuse boats in Collingwood Dock for many years. A bascule road bridge spans the passage between Collingwood and Stanley Docks.\n\nPresent\nCollingwood Dock has been little altered since construction. The dock is part of the Stanley Dock Conservation Area \nand is on the route of the Leeds and Liverpool Canal extension to the Pier Head. \n\nCollingwood dock is home to the Glaciere Maritime Academy.\n\nReferences\n\nSources\n\nExternal links\n\n \n Collingwood Dock aerial photo\n Collingwood Dock\n\nLiverpool docks",
"Ron Carruthers is a former Australian rules footballer who played with Collingwood in the Victorian Football League (VFL).\n\nHe is the son of 1940s Collingwood player Ron H. Carruthers.\n\nNotes\n\nExternal links \n\n1943 births\nAustralian rules footballers from Victoria (Australia)\nCollingwood Football Club players\nLiving people"
] |
|
[
"Carl Switzer",
"Personal life",
"what songs did Switzer produce?",
"I don't know.",
"Whats so important about Switzer's personal life?",
"Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm.",
"how did he overcome this tragedy?",
"The gunman was never caught.",
"when did this tragedy happen?",
"January 1958",
"who is his family member",
"Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later.",
"who is collingwood?",
"Diantha (Dian) Collingwood, heiress of grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain."
] | C_78202db6c019496eaf52f5cddf28794e_0 | is there anything else important? | 7 | Besides Diantha Dian, is there anything else important about Carl Switzer? | Carl Switzer | In early 1954, Switzer went on a blind date with Diantha (Dian) Collingwood, heiress of grain elevator empire Collingwood Grain. Collingwood had moved with her mother and sister to California in 1953 because her sister wanted to become an actress. Switzer and Collingwood got along well and married in Las Vegas three months later. In 1956, with his money running out and Diantha pregnant, his mother-in-law offered them a farm near Pretty Prairie, Kansas, west of Wichita. Their son, Justin Lance Collingwood Switzer (now Eldridge), was born that year. They divorced in 1957. In 1987, former Our Gang co-star George "Spanky" McFarland recalled a meeting with Switzer when they spoke about the farm: The last time I saw Carl was 1957. It was a tough time for me--and him. I was starting a tour of theme parks and county fairs in the Midwest. Carl had married this girl whose father owned a pretty good size farm near Wichita. When I came through town, he heard about it and called. He told me he was helping to run the farm, but he finally had to put a radio on the tractor while he was out there plowing. Knowing Carl, I knew that wasn't going to last. He may have come from Paris, Illinois, but he wasn't a farmer! We hadn't seen each other since we left the 'Gang.' So we had lunch. We talked about all the things you'd expect. And then I never saw him again. He looked pretty much the same. He was just Carl Switzer--kind of cocky, a little antsy--and I thought to myself he hadn't changed that much. He still talked big. He just grew up. In January 1958 Switzer was getting into his car in front of a bar in Studio City, when a bullet smashed through the window and struck him in the upper right arm. The gunman was never caught. That December he was arrested in Sequoia National Forest for cutting down 15 pine trees; he was sentenced to a year's probation and ordered to pay a $225 fine. CANNOTANSWER | he was arrested in Sequoia National Forest for cutting down 15 pine trees; | false | [
"In baseball, a fair ball is a batted ball that entitles the batter to attempt to reach first base. By contrast, a foul ball is a batted ball that does not entitle the batter to attempt to reach first base. Whether a batted ball is fair or foul is determined by the location of the ball at the appropriate reference point, as follows:\n\n if the ball leaves the playing field without touching anything, the point where the ball leaves the field;\n else, if the ball first lands past first or third base without touching anything, the point where the ball lands;\n else, if the ball rolls or bounces past first or third base without touching anything other than the ground, the point where the ball passes the base;\n else, if the ball touches anything other than the ground (such as an umpire, a player, or any equipment left on the field) before any of the above happens, the point of such touching;\n else (the ball comes to a rest before reaching first or third base), the point where the ball comes to a rest.\n\nIf any part of the ball is on or above fair territory at the appropriate reference point, it is fair; else it is foul. Fair territory or fair ground is defined as the area of the playing field between the two foul lines, and includes the foul lines themselves and the foul poles. However, certain exceptions exist:\n\n A ball that touches first, second, or third base is always fair.\n Under Rule 5.09(a)(7)-(8), if a batted ball touches the batter or his bat while the batter is in the batter's box and not intentionally interfering with the course of the ball, the ball is foul.\n A ball that hits the foul pole without first having touched anything else off the bat is fair.\n Ground rules may provide whether a ball hitting specific objects (e.g. roof, overhead speaker) is fair or foul.\n\nOn a fair ball, the batter attempts to reach first base or any subsequent base, runners attempt to advance and fielders try to record outs. A fair ball is considered a live ball until the ball becomes dead by leaving the field or any other method.\n\nReferences\n\nBaseball rules",
"Transcendent truths are those unaffected by time or space. They define the world, but are not defined by the world. An example of a transcendent truth is \"God is good\", or \"there is no God\". Either way, how one looks at things contained by time and space is a result of the transcendent truth. One is true; both cannot be true at the same time.\n\nWorld views are made up of transcendent truths, things we believe are true before we question whether or not anything else is true.\n\nTheories of truth",
"A cost object is a term used primarily in cost accounting to describe something to which costs are assigned. Common examples of cost objects are: product lines, geographic territories, customers, departments or anything else for which management would like to quantify cost.\n\nCost object is anything for which a separate measurement of cost is required. Cost object may be a product, a service, a project, etc.\n\nThe use of cost objects is common within activity based costing and Grenzplankostenrechnung systems.\n\nSee also\nCost centre (business)\n\nReferences\n\nCosts\nManagement accounting"
] |
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